Monday, April 15, 2013

My VCD collection from ... some Chinese territory



Here's a whole pile of VCD's (video-cd's) that I bought second-hand at a video store in Copenhagen in the early 2000s. I have no idea where they originate from other that it's a Chinese speaking country. Mainland China or Taiwan I would guess but not Hong Kong as there's no English text on the covers. Some of them are actually called DVCD ("dvd + vcd = dvcd"!!). Is there a difference to the ordinary VCD format? No idea! Most of them have no English titles on the covers either but if I remember correctly they all carry English and Chinese subtitles (i.e. they're off HK prints).

PICTURE OF A NYMPH aka Portrait of a Nymph

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4 comments:

  1. AnonymousApril 16, 2013 at 2:08 AM

    Oooohh!! I can actually help you with this one Jack. DVCD's are "Double Video Compact Discs", a format that was launched as part of the attempt to compress more data onto the VCD format.

    I hear neither they nor competing disc types SVCD, nor "VCD 2.0" really caught on to any great degree once the DVD themselves came out. The format was used in Singapore for a brief while, but the lack of English language on yours makes me wonder. I see they are PAL format too.. those tend to be more common in Thailand and the other areas south of China itself so who knows?

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  2. A hero never diesApril 16, 2013 at 9:42 AM

    Nice! I've seen a few of these floating around on ebay, but I've never bought one. Are they the same quality as VCD?

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  3. Jack JApril 16, 2013 at 11:52 AM

    "mistressneko", is that you Miss Nekoneko? LOL. Thanks for the info. I think I've got a couple of SVCD's as well ("Super-VCD" if I remember correctly). Hmm, I didn't pay too much attention to their being in PAL but you're right. I wonder if they are bootleg releases.

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  4. Jack JApril 16, 2013 at 11:59 AM

    HeroNeverDies; Yes, the quality seems to be the same. One of them kept freezing towards the end. Unfortunately it was BLACK CAT and it happened when I showed it at a video night with friends sometime in the mid-2000s. Major bummer. I hadn't been able to test the film as I didn't have a player that could play them. I had seen the film at a Chinese cinema (in Melbourne) and later got a dupe off an English dubbed VHS from Holland - but this DVCD was subbed so that made it attractive. My friends never got to see the ending. LOL.

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