17th Jun 2003: add comments on R1; added "Through the Passing Seasons" screenshots
31st Jul 2003: use CSS.
30th Nov 2003: use CSS for most elements.
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First created on 21st Apr 2003. 17th Jun 2003: add comments on R1; added "Through the Passing Seasons" screenshots 31st Jul 2003: use CSS. 30th Nov 2003: use CSS for most elements. |
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I was impressed by the look of the bootleg Maison Ikkoku boxset and borrowed it from my friend to take a look. You can find the pictures of the boxset somewhere on my website. ;-) Here, I'll just look at the show itself.
This page may come in useful when Maison Ikkoku is finally released in the US in July. We can then see how the R1 measures up to the R2. However, someone else will have to do it -- I have no plans to buy the R1!
Update Jun 2003: MI is released in US! Screen captures done by other folks show that the R1 use the same video master. The images are the same, for all intent and purposes. Well done, Viz! The lower bitrate shows on dynamic scenes (like scene 5 here) -- more filtering, some blocking, and some mosquito noise. However, you will not notice them because the scene is changing so fast. Moreover, there aren't many fast changing scenes in MI.
| Category | R2 | R0 |
| Bitrate | ~8.9 Mbps | ~3.8 Mbps |
| Language tracks | Japanese (Dolby Digital 2.0, 384 kbps) | Japanese (Dolby Digital 2.0, 448 kbps) |
| Subtitles | None | Chinese and English |
| Others | Interlaced (analog telecine); splice marks; jittering | Interlaced (analog telecine); splice marks; jittering |
Click on the following to compare the two:
This OVA is for die-hard fans only. A friend of mine sold it to me after he realized it wasn't the music video style flashback/summary that he (and I) had expected. There was a US release in the 90s; that may have accompanying music.
The OVA is 1 hour 28 minutes, not counting the ep (there is no op). To tell the truth, I haven't watched it in its entirety! :-P
Oh, I should mention that this OVA is bundled with the Desert Island OVA. You don't miss much if you haven't watched it!
| Category | Through the Passing Seasons OVA |
| Bitrate | ~9.5 Mbps |
| Language tracks | Japanese (Dolby Digital 2.0, 192 kbps) |
| Subtitles | None |
| Others | Interlaced (analog telecine); jittering |
The video is not restored in any way and is on par with a n-th generation VHS.
| 0:10:36 |
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Higher contrast, meaning less shadow details. |
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ep 8, 0:11:05 |
| 0:12:13 |
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Slightly cropped and zoomed in. |
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ep 9, 0:04:55 |
| 0:15:14 |
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No EE, but very soft. |
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ep 9, 0:19:37 |
| 0:18:17 |
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Colors are slightly different. |
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ep 9, 0:22:58 |
These images are captured using PowerDVD 4.0. No hardware acceleration is used. Bob mode is used, as the video is encoded as interlaced. No resizing or sharpening is done. They are converted from BMP to JPEG (quality 9) using Photoshop 6.0.