![][1] [1]: https://bit.ly/3IzUAq6 #### Thanks to: ghsushsu123 WPR Weebly9 nedragrevev #### [Discord](https://discord.gg/PMrccmpYTu) ___ ### A Silent Voice (Koe no Katachi) v2.1 Reuploaded due to a labeling error with two of the subtitle tracks that I just couldn't leave in. Thanks to bcvxy for pointing it out! Nedragrevev also updated his subtitles in the meantime, and I fixed a few other minor errors I'd made, so I'm now calling this a v2.1. Hopefully there aren't any left, but If you find any more errors, mistakes or anything of the sort, please let me know so I can try to fix them. ___ ### Why a v2? There were some errors that bothered me in the first one I did at the start of the year, and I wasn't generally satisfied with it after getting to know more about what doing these uploads a bit more properly necessitates. With this v2.1, I've fixed everything I wanted, updated things, and added some new stuff. I'll see about a v3 when/if the DDY release comes out that, as I understand it, they've had in the works for multiple years as of me writing this. ### Video The video is a raw remux of the 2018 Dynit IT BD. I think it's safe to say that mp3dom's encode found on the Dynit release is the consensus best version to date of *A Silent Voice* in terms of picture quality. It [solidly alleviates the problems](https://slow.pics/c/bRbh8SrV) the JP, US, UK, and basically every other home video release of this movie suffers from. The only further encode using the IT BD that I'm aware of is D-Z0N3's encode, and it doesn't seem to try to fix or improve anything in Dynit's video, essentially making it a more convenient, smaller size version that understandably loses some fine detail. The other encodes sampled below are Beatrice's and VCB's, both of which are sourced from the more problematic BDs that the IT BD bests. ### Audio Update: AU BD 5.1 audio is also heavily limited. One of the more noteworthy finds while inspecting everything was that the Japanese 5.1 audio tracks on the JP and UK BD had horrendous clipping throughout the whole movie, with the center channel [having gotten dealt the brunt of the hit](https://slow.pics/c/BkecoRZG) and all the dialogue in the movie sounding unnatural on them as a result. (If you're familiar with my [v2 uploads of Nausicaä](https://nyaa.si/view/1425023) and their English dub situation, this is nothing new.) What's more, in the included audio commentary, sound recordist Yasushi Nagura talks briefly about why dynamic range is important and how he and others put a lot of work into fine-tuning the sound of the movie, even going as far as adjusting the volume line by line, so it's a shame when the egregious clipping on these widely known and sold Blu-rays squanders Nagura's and the sound team's efforts. At least their work can shine on other official releases and any fan uploads that use the non-limited audio. Guess I was lucky too when I unknowingly used a better version of the track from the IT BD in the v1 earlier this year. This time around, the JP 5.1 tracks on the 2019 Right Stuf and Shout Factory US BDs were other contenders, but I went with the IT BD again as it seemed the overall best pick, though I could have likely gone with either one of the US BD versions just as well. The differences between the three are negligible, with perhaps the most significant divergence being only the slight top-end noise reduction on the US releases. All of the five mentioned BDs largely share the same mastering too, except, again, in the very top-end, where both of the US BDs roll off just a tad earlier. The JP/UK mastering does also deviate marginally from the others in the bass frequencies, where its roll-off curve isn't as steep, making the 60 Hz bass bump on it ever so slightly less pronounced in channels 1, 2, 5, and 6. The center channel (Ch. 3) on it is also heavier on the low bass in the 0-20 Hz region by approximately 3-5 dB. All in all, quite minor mastering differences, and most likely unnoticeable unless you were to specifically look for them and had the required sound system to do it with. The English dub 5.1 track from the UK BD shared by user Weebly9 is now included. A bit unfortunately, it too has slight clipping in some channels at the 1h30min-1h40min section and in other places where there are more considerable spikes in the audio. The clipping isn't nearly as bad as on the JP/UK BD JP 5.1 track and is inoffensive enough that it isn't really anything you should worry about, but it is there nonetheless. I additionally compared the UK BD dub to the dubs on the US BDs, and except for loudness differences, they were close enough to be called identical, i.e., all clip in the same fashion at the same spots. So as far as I know, there doesn't seem to exist a variant of the English dub that has zero clipping. All three dub tracks had no important differences in their masterings either. The other main audio choices you'll have are the Japanese 2.0 "DTS Headphone:X" and the Music 5.1 "Inner Silence" tracks, of which the latter only has droning, ambient music by Kensuke Ushio with no SFX or dialogue at all. My understanding is that it's supposed to emulate what it'd be like for a deaf person to watch the movie. It's an interesting one for sure, and if nothing more, a cool novelty track for hardcore fans of the movie and/or Ushio's music. DTS Headphone:X, on the other hand, sounds, at least on paper, like a much more involved listening experience as it's an object-based, "Spatial Sound" audio codec that's meant to create a multi-dimensional area around, above, and below the listener wherefrom it'll play the audio. DTS claims it to work with any headphone, so I guess try it out if it sounds like something you'd enjoy. For additional reading, [here's one article explaining more about the codec.](https://bit.ly/3IsBbqM) As the last track is the segmented audio commentary that starts with director Naoko Yamada (who's actually there for all three parts), character designer Futoshi Nishiya (RIP), color designer Naomi Ishida (RIP), and director of photography Kazuya Takao, then is continued from 45 minutes onward to the 1h30min mark by Shoko's VA Saori Hayami and Yuzuru's VA Aoi Yuuki, and lastly, gets picked up until to the end by composer Kensuke Ushio, sound recordist Yasushi Nagura, and sound director Yota Tsuruoka. ### Subtitles [Nedragrevev](https://github.com/nedragrevev/custom-subs) has revised his edited Kametsu subtitles for *A Silent Voice* during these past few months, further modifying/adding to the typesetting, improving line timings once more after having already fully retimed the script, fixing previously missed errors, and doing a few key edits to 35mm's translation. Additionally, the ending song was reworked completely. In nedragrevev's own words: *"ED song: As of this revision, it's fully redone. It should present well, and the translation should make a little bit more sense."* The improvements over the earlier versions are notable, so I've gone and used these newest subtitles of his for this v2.1. Also included as a legacy option are Kametsu's subtitles which use 35mm's initial translation and the older typesetting. Subtitles for the audio commentary were provided by WPR, which I have OCR'd and styled to improve the presentation a bit from their original PGS appearance. ### Comparisons The dynamic range (offline) meter results reiterate the story told by the waveforms: the JP and UK BD JP 5.1 tracks' center channels have a dynamic range of 18 dB, while the ones on the IT and US BDs have a 6 dB higher DR at 24 dB. Despite the other channels having less variation in their dynamic range across releases, I thought I'd include their data here too for good measure. I included the English track DR values as well, and although I'd say they aren't all directly comparable to the JP track values (somewhat of a different mix and all that), the dub UK and US BD values are of course still comparable between the three of them. Now, a dynamic range meter isn't some ultimate judge of quality, but it can give a good estimate of the loudness and dynamics in a track. People frequently utilize them, for example, when evaluating album remasterings to see if the music's dynamic range has been decreased by [brickwalling](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ), which is something that has happened and does still sadly happen with a lot of modern rereleases of older albums. #### Japanese 5.1 | |Ch. 1 [L]|Ch. 2 [R]|Ch. 3 [C]|Ch. 4 [LFE]|Ch. 5 [SL]|Ch. 6 [SR] |:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:| |IT BD DR|24|24|24|25|27|27| |(RS) US BD DR|24|24|24|25|27|27| |(SF) US BD DR|23|24|24|25|27|27| |JP BD DR|21|21|18|22|24|24| |UK BD DR|20|19|18|21|23|23| #### English 5.1 | |Ch. 1 [L]|Ch. 2 [R]|Ch. 3 [C]|Ch. 4 [LFE]|Ch. 5 [SL]|Ch. 6 [SR] |:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--:| |UK BD DR|21|21|21|22|24|24| |(RS) US BD DR|19|20|21|21|24|24| |(SF) US BD DR|19|20|21|21|24|24| |Japanese 5.1|English 5.1 | -| -| |[Spectrograms](https://slow.pics/c/21nljnFI)|[Spectrograms](https://slow.pics/c/v3AHvFcb)| |[Waveforms](https://slow.pics/c/ziP8CTAu)|[Waveforms](https://slow.pics/c/qN08GcR1)| |[Masterings](https://slow.pics/c/cLYXvfJo)|[Masterings](https://slow.pics/c/xagFwkuR)| |[Raw DR meter data](https://pastebin.com/raw/jJNSn8JH)|[Raw DR meter data](https://pastebin.com/raw/pnNwEEuh)| |Video| | -| |[BD comparisons](https://slow.pics/c/p0ULOX7H)| |[IT BD vs encodes](https://slow.pics/c/yF3cKG5S)| ### Specifics Video: 1. 2018 Dynit IT BD Remux (1920x1080, 23.976fps) Audio: 1. Japanese 5.1 FLAC (IT BD) (default) 2. Japanese 2.0 DTS Headphone:X (JP BD) 3. English 5.1 FLAC (UK BD) [Weebly9] 4. Music "Inner Silence" 5.1 FLAC (JP BD) 5. Commentary 2.0 FLAC (JP BD) Subtitles: (1-4 = [nedragrevev]) 1. Signs and Songs only 2. English (Honorifics) 3. English (No Honorifics) (default) 4. English (No Honorifics & Western Naming Order) 5. English (35mm's Initial Translation & Kametsu's Older Typesetting) [Kametsu] 6. Commentary (US BD) [MediaInfo](https://pastebin.com/raw/F7mH82Zm) ![][4] [4]: https://bit.ly/3lNcdc0