How many shows are produced in 720p? 1080p?
 

It's pretty obvious that 720p has become the standard for high-quality fansubs, but I can't find much information on whether it's actually the standard used to produce the original works. I know some shows appear in both 480 and 720 formats on different days, and sometimes on different network channels, but are the 720 shows upscales, or were the shows originally shot in 1280x720 and then center cut to 640x480 for SD broadcasts? Framing a show for both formats can be a difficult task for the director. If the show is framed for center-cuts, the director can't put anything important outside that area, which makes the wide-screen aspect rather superfluous.

Whether the originals are shot in 720p (or perhaps even 1080p) also matters for eventual Blu-ray distribution. So far most BD releases have been movies, where the high-definition transfer comes from film. Anime is mostly "shot" digitally these days, I believe, so whatever resolution the show is produced in will determine what formats can be used for releases. In amongst the films on the BD list are a few recent television shows like Shigurui. Looking at the product description for this item on a variety of sites, including Funimation's, gives me no clue what video format was used for this release.

The answer: Nobody knows. I've looked into this before and there are no official sources to determine what something is actually made in. The HV logo especially is a misnomer and isn't used anymore. You can find 3 or 4 Japanese blogs that will disagree on the same source video. You will get shows that air in SD-UP on some stations and HD on others. There is some agreement when there are obvious signs of SD-UP. The only semi-reliable way to find out is to find a station which lists the [HD] symbol on their schedule while the show is airing.

It is definitely the case that 720p is not standardized, but something that appears to be HD is used by the majority of production houses. As of last year, at least 1/4 of shows were still broadcast in non-HD formats (SD/SD-UP). Just as they upscale SD, they will just downscale for any stations that can't handle HD. (And yes, this means the majority of 720p subs are actually upscales.)

From my view, the more, the better. I would prefer 1080p over all. :cool:

But would get 1080p only for these series, they are worth for it. :heh:

And to make things even more complicated, because most anime has multiple different studios doing parts of the show, even one particular show could be inconsistent, with some sections being created at 1080p while others are only at 720p...

It's really, frankly, a sort of meaningless concept at some point for hand drawn anime. You should just sit back and look at it and say "How does it look?" Doesn't matter how much resolution you have if the art sucks, after all.

It's not entirely a meaningless concept since shows are starting to be released on Blu-ray. If the original material isn't HD to begin with, the only advantage I could see to BD releases is the ability to fit more episodes on one disc. If all BD means is that the episodes are upscaled to 720p or 1080p resolutions, then as a cost-conscious consumer I'll stick to buying DVDs and let my PS3 upscale them for me.

Fitting more episodes on BD will never happen because the standard 2 to 4 episodes disc is what's economically the most profitable combination.

Colouring, special effects, 3D models, and background imagery are three aspects of anime that profit the most from HD authoring. Rough 2D animation work is just too expensive to be full of detail worthy of HD authoring for most productions. This may be the case for years to come.

Techincally speaking all animation and film are produced in 1080, but they get down converted for tv, mainly because at the time the technology couldnt cope with the quality.

Think about when you first bought a tv, you just called it a tv it only became a standard definition tv when HD plasma tv's came out.

Its a little different if a company was recording with digital camera's that arent HD but most companies avoided doing it where possible, if they could afford it they still used film.

Hollywood and television has been slow on the take up of digital video technology because up until recently they couldnt provide the quality they needed. The only exceptions being news which needs footage edited within a couple of hours of being shot.