Endless Paradigm

As wee've all noticed as every new season of anime appears Crunchyroll is adding more titles on simulcast but now they are offering their services in 1080p which is something that fansub groups haven't offered

Crunchyroll Wrote:Hey guys,

Wee are thrilled to announce that you will now be able to watch some of your favorite series in glorious 1080p resolution!

That's right! Starting today, all you lucky premium members can stream the latest anime titles immediately following Japan TV broadcast in Full High-Definition 1080p streams. Previously, you guys were able to stream videos at 720p quality.

Now, High-Definition 1080p streams are available immediately for Crunchyroll’s simulcast lineup.

Some of you favorite titles as NARUTO SHIPPUDEN, BLEACH, NISEMONOGATARI, HUNTER X HUNTER, THE PRINCE OF TENNIS II and over twenty other simulcasts, streaming in glorious 1080p immediately after Japan TV! In addition, our simulcast J-Drama titles such as SECRET AGENT ERIKA, MOONCAKE, and DEKA KUROKAWA SUZUKI look absolutely amazing in 1080p!

Things never looked so clear!

Obligatory screenshot comparison link: http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/102504

Keyword:  premium members


Also, anime in 1080p is pretty pointless.  Streaming in 1080p as a whole is pretty pointless too, because with streaming bitrates it'll still suck ass - you'd rather prefer high bitrate properly encoded 720p.

There's a reason why fansub groups don't release in 1080p. 1080p releases are only really justified from Bluray sources anyway.

Fansub groups aren't going anywhere.

LONG LIVE THE QUEEN!

what snesnei said

Lol @ 1080p
I've yet to even see a single anime Bluray which deserves 1080p.

Next up, 4k streaming.

EDIT: I thought that screenshot comparison looked off.  Looks like they're using some crappy bilinear scaler to upscale the 720p (though I guess if you're streaming, you probably don't have the option to change that).
More proper comparison, using their 1080p image with Lanczos scalers (+unsharp mask applied at the end):
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/102760

To me, it looks like the 720p upscale has more artefacts, but that's probably because of the higher quantiser used in the 1080p encode.  Which means that a 720p native encode at similar bitrates would look better.


But anyway, I think one of the ideals of downloading over streaming is that you have an archival copy (as well as the other conveniences/flexibilities of a local file, such as using on devices).  Of course, if you've got unlimited high speed internet, this probably doesn't matter to you.

How would this kill fansub groups?
1080p can't help me understand japanese better.

Silvertie Wrote: [ -> ]1080p can't help me understand japanese better.

Haha. That cracked me up.

you can argue because crunchyroll is adding more services and more titles that they may start to reduce the number of fansubbing groups, like dattebayo quit naruto after crunchyroll started doing it, and soon after that they disappeared

beaner2k6 Wrote: [ -> ]you can argue because crunchyroll is adding more services and more titles that they may start to reduce the number of fansubbing groups, like dattebayo quit naruto after crunchyroll started doing it, and soon after that they disappeared

That's because they had no purpose. That's understandable, though. My problem with CrunchyRoll right now - and why I haven't subscribed for it already (I want to watch as much as I can through legit sources as possible) is because of regional restriction. I'm limited to only a selection of what's available and I'd have to pay full subscription price.

I can understand that worldwide licenses must be hard to get - so maybe CrunchyRoll isn't the side to blame. How about some European licensing, Japan?

For this season I would only get to see:

Natsume Yujin-cho
The Prince of Tennis II
^ Both of these are sequels

Poyopoyo
Recorder and Randsell
^ These two have 3-minute runtimes.

Long-running shows:
Fairy Tail
Kaasan Mom's Life
Naruto Shippuden
SKET Dance

Seriously? That's no new titles for the season at all that have normal runtimes. I want to pay money to watch Nisemonogatari legally but I can't.