Don just received the first volume of Kamichu and mentions that the subtitling done by Geneon is poor compared to the fansubs. Also it seems that the fansubs come with a lot of “liner notes” about Shinto that help explain the series, which the official disc lacks.
My main interest is really the dub, since my daughter can’t read yet. Don hasn’t yet evaluated the dub quality, and I look forward to his comments. I’ve pretty much decided that this series will be worth buying, seeing how it meets my kid-friendly requirements. Still, I want to see what Don says before I take the final plunge.
We (IIChan Translation Group) put “FON’s Guide to Yurie’s World” at the end of each episode, illuminating a few cultural aspects occurring in the episode. We didn’t put very many notes on the screen during the episode (which some fansubbers do).
The fan video I mentioned earlier can now be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NauTDX3MegQ
The guides from the IIChan Translation Group’s fansubs for eps 1-3 are now on youtube:
Ep 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wq36gYptzYg
Ep 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0g3kXBd4wE
Ep 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amZbpCibghc
The text is readable, if not by much.
Also, someone has uploaded the Japanese version (unsubtitled, Japanese dub) of the entire series to youtube, if you want to get a flavor of the series. Search for Kamichu.