question about widescreen tvs and aspect ratios

[Sephiroth666]

Ok, widescreen tvs look nice and all, but how the hell do they handle all these different aspect ratios. Most of the better movies are 2.40:1 these days; whereas, other widescreen movies range from 1.78:1, 1.85:1,2.35:1, and even 2.39:1. Now how will they appear on these tvs? Will the 2.35/2.40 aspects still include those goddamn bars top & bottom? And how does the video being matted or anamorphic effect this? With matted the bars are encoded on the movie, right? Can the player/tv crop the bars in that case?

Why couldn't anyone agree on a standard for christ sakes!?

[j1d10t]

Widescreen TVs are 1.78:1 (16x9). Anamorphic 1.78:1 DVDs play full screen. 1.85:1 pretty much play full screen, too - you don't see any bars to compensate for the difference in the aspect ratios of the film and the TV. The other AR do have small black bars on the top and bottom of the video to make them fit into a 1.78:1 frame. If you've ever watched a 2.35:1 movie on your computer you've seen the black bars. They aren't bad. And for what you gain in picture, as compared with a video that has been cropped from 2.35:1 to 1.33:1 (4:3), it's well worth having the black bars. The only thing is that if you watch 4:3 video on a widescreen TV the video is either framed in the middle by bars on either side, or you can set it to fill the screen, but that affects the AR, so it looks a little stretched/wide. I know some people that LOVE cropped movies over widescreen on their 4:3 TV, and some people that will only get the widescreen movies for their 4:3 TV. It's personal preference After having a widescreen TV for a few years it's really weird to watch TV on a 4:3 TV. Go to an electronics store and ask to see clips from movies that have the different aspect ratios and see if you like it.

As for "cropping" the bars from a (lets say) 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen, that depends on your player - it might have a zoom feature that will let you zoom in on the picture, but that's going to crop off some from the sides, too.

[Sephiroth666]

As for "cropping" the bars from a (lets say) 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen, that depends on your player - it might have a zoom feature that will let you zoom in on the picture, but that's going to crop off some from the sides, too.

Problem with that is most of these players don't seem to have good enough zoom precision to move in to the exact aspect ratio (like say PowerDVD can on PC). You just get like 2x and 4x zoom. You'd probably lose some of the picture from top & bottom as well--more picture than you want to lose.

[BSpielbauer]

Most of the better movies are 2.40:1 these days; whereas, other widescreen movies range from 1.78:1, 1.85:1,2.35:1, and even 2.39:1.

Interesting. It may be that you have a preference for films that happen to have a wider aspect ratio. I just thought about my own favorite films, and only one of them was wider than 1.85:1.

Now how will they appear on these tvs? Will the 2.35/2.40 aspects still include those goddamn bars top & bottom?

Yes, I am afraid that you are likely to see those "goddamn bars" [SIC] on a 16 X 9 widescreen TV. This is because a film which is 2.35:1 or 2.40:1 is still wider than a 16 X 9 television display. Some sets will allow you to crop the image, to eliminate the bars, if they bother you. However, there are many of us who would much prefer to see the entire picture. Some sets will also allow you to stretch the picture, to try to force it to eliminate those "godamn bars" [SIC]. However, there are many of us who prefer not to see images that are somewhat out of proportion, and an image that is degraded due to this conversion. I guess some of us are just a bit weird that way.

And how does the video being matted or anamorphic effect this?

If the DVD is truly an anamorphic video (which is most often listed as being "anamorphic" or as being "enhanced for 16 X 9 TVs") then you can expect to see smaller black bars on a 2.35:1 or 2.40:1 movie. You can also expect that a 1.85:1 movie will often exhibit none of those "damn black bars" [SIC]. This is due to a phenomenon where the TV display cheats and manages to use some of that area where the black bars would have been in order to cram more lines of resolution into the viewable image. It is also due to the outrageous amount of overscan which is programmed into most of our TVs, as an insurance policy against thgose who think any sort of border might be nothing more than "goddamn black bars" [SIC].

As to a matted movie, this is an entirely different issue. As most people use this term, this is a case where the director purposely shot the film using an oversized image, and did his best to keep those edges free from anything which might have focus. Then, he could try to supervise releases which were best suited for a wide transfer (without losing anything of much importance at the extreme tops and bottoms of the viewable image), and he could also supervise a transfer which was best suited for a narrower transfer (without losing anything of much importance at the extreme left and right hand edges of the viewable image).

With matted the bars are encoded on the movie, right? Can the player/tv crop the bars in that case?

This depends on the display. Some can. Some have several options for this. Some cannot. There are also DVD players which have some options for this sort of butchering -- ahem -- oops, I meant editing.

Why couldn't anyone agree on a standard for christ sakes!?

Film is (fortunately) still an art form. It is also a business, to be sure. However, it still has artistic elements, and I hope we never see the day again when the business side overwhelms the artistic aspect too much (we have seen periods where this occurred already).

So, a director may make an artistic decision that his new film called "Lawrence of Arabia" needs to be a very horizontal film, so that he is able to emphasize the endless wide vistas of the desert, the sense of nothingness, the beauty and yet the loneliness. He might just be audacious enough to insist on a very, very wide aspect ratio in order to convey this to his audience.

A director might also make an artistic decision that his new film called "Who's Afraind of Virginia Woolf?" needs be a very vertical film, with camera pans moving up and down from one story of a house to the next. He decides the film needs to put the audience into a state of claustophobia, so the audience feels just as trapped as the characters feel. He wants the audience to feel contained, as if they were in narrow, tight quarters, with no way out. It is a tightly contained script, it takes place all in one night, and the four characters are "trapped" for the evening, and 98 per cent of the psychological horror takes place in one suburban house. So, he might just have the audactity to insist on an aspect ratio of 1.85:1.

Imagine the hubris of these guys.

There will always be outrage felt by some when they visit the musems, and view the tiny, intimate, vertical format chosen by Da Vinci for his Mona Lisa, and then walk into another venue and see the overly large, incredibly horizontal format chosen by Seurrat for his "Sunday in the Park at Le Grande Jette."

Or, by Da Vinci himself for his "Last Supper."

Now, those guys had some gall. To be sure.

It is too bad they did not cater to those of us who enjoy a certain sameness, a certain standard, a certain uniformity.

And, of course, those of us who might notice the white space surrounding those works of art, and their own lack of uniformity.

Or, those of us who insist on the need for "no goddamn black bars." [SIC].

I hope this helps, and I would only add that you might write the film directors themselves, and ask them nicely if they can somehow see to it that you do not have any more of those "goddamn black bars." [SIC].

Take care,

-Bruce

P.S. Next week's column: "Why all songs should be precisely 3 minutes and 45 seconds in length."

[BSpielbauer]

Just as a further informational primer:

Listed below are some apsect ratios of a few fairly well known films which I compiled awhile back for something I wrote on the subject:

Ben-Hur 2.76:1
The Robe 2.55:1
The Road Warrior 2.45:1
Blackhawk Down 2.40:1
Star Wars II – Attack of the Clones 2.35:1
The Sound of Music 2.20:1
Tucker: A Man and His Dream 2.0:1* (*the DVD was actually
deliberately cropped to this shape)
The Grifters 1.90:1
Signs 1.85:1
The Exorcist 1.78:1
A Clockwork Orange 1.66:1
Singin' In the Rain 1.33:1


-Bruce

(Next week's column: "Why all stage plays should feature a chandeleir.")

[manono]

goddamn fine couple of posts there, BSpielbauer.

[guns1inger]

Go to the now aging (but apparently still relevent) http://widescreen.org