why 2.35:1?

[mridang_agarwal]

Why was 2.35:1 made? I mean, what was the purpose? Even widescreen TV's show 2.35:1 with black bars, so wheres the fun in that?

[wonderuss]

TV was invented, everyone stopped going to the cinema so they came up with "Cinemascope" as a new thing to pull in the audiences 2:35:1 (you couldn't view it like this at home).......................then they go and make widscreen tv years later!.... a visious circle me thinks.
Russ

[cd090580]

I hate movies in 2.35:1 which have more black bars than video. This is why I backup all 2.35:1 dvd to enable the pancan flag so I can which a 2.35:1 with small bars (about 1.85:5).
I prefer lost a part of video instead of viewing more bars than picture

[Baldrick]

2:35:1 was not made for TVs but for cinema. Some 2:35:1 movies are pan&scan/cropped to 1:85:1 but most are not....thanks for that...I don't want cropped movies.

[mridang_agarwal]

cd090580 , what do you mean whne you say that you enable the PnS flag? How do you do it? I generaly watch movies using MPC. If enable the PnS flag and then watch the movie on a widescreen TV, would I still get the black bars? If no, then what could i do to ensure that the video fills the widescreen TV?

[minchjp]

I love watching 2.35:1 in the cinema, it is fantastic, and you get so much more picture. I usually watch 2.35:1 movies cropped to fill my whole screen (16:9)

[guns1inger]

If you enable the P&S flag o a movie without the proper P&S coding you are simply reframing to the centre. Pointless exercise. With a film like Leone's The Good, The Bad and The ugly you miss almost all the action in the final shootout because it takes place at the edges of the frame, not the centre. Same with zooming in to fill a 16:9 frame.

If you guys are watching the bars and not the movie, I pity you. 2.35:1 is actually my favourite aspect ratio.

[cpotoso]

If you enable the P&S flag o a movie without the proper P&S coding you are simply reframing to the centre. Pointless exercise. With a film like Leone's The Good, The Bad and The ugly you miss almost all the action in the final shootout because it takes place at the edges of the frame, not the centre. Same with zooming in to fill a 16:9 frame.

If you guys are watching the bars and not the movie, I pity you. 2.35:1 is actually my favourite aspect ratio.

Absolutely agreed! I love wide screen (the wider the better). Just get a projector (like I did), then your screen is ca. 3-4 meters wide and who cares if a bit if it is black, it is huge anyway!

repeat with me: I will see movies in the original format that the director intended... 8)

[kimco52]

Who cares why it was made. It was. It was great in the theatre. So was Cinerama. Cinerama is the only way How the West Was Won should be viewed.

I want to watch all movies in the format that they were originally made. I don't care if it is 1.85:1, 2.35:1 or 9:1. I want to see the whole picture. I don't care if there are black bars on the screen or not. They don't bother me. Watching Pan and scan or having the sides of the picture cropped or stretching either direction to fill the screen bothers me. When a movie or tv program says "reformatted to fit your screen", I go away and don't watch it. Same for audio.

If you don't like the black bars, hang a curtain across your tv and imagine you are at an original movie theater.

[DRP]

To answer the question the ratio was decided upon as being a function of 4:3 just like 16:9 was.

16:9 = (4:3)²
2.35:1 (actually ~2.37:1) = (4:3)³

I too hate that ratio and it's pointless anyway. In 99.9% of scenes there is nothing going on at the very edges of the screen anyway. Just a marketing thing to try and keep people going to the cinemas in a changing market where that is a rapidly dying thing. First thing I do when I get a DVD I want to copy is find out if it's WS and/or on DL disc. DL means simply shrinking, WS means a full re-encode cropped down to 16:9

[guns1inger]

DRP - directors who know how to use widescreen effectively make use of the whole frame - Leone, Lean, Kubrick (when he used it) all compose their shots to make full use of the available area (sometimes wider than 2.35:1). Cropping for 16:9 destroys this framing and composition. Even worse, I am betting you simply take the centre section of the frame, regardless of the composition or focus of the action. Your cropping is way more 'pointless' than the decision to use the 2.35:1 aspect ratio - a decision made way before widescreen television was even though of.

[DRP]

It all depends on what you use movies for. Me? I use movies as throwaway entertainment. I don't keep them. I don't watch them multiple times. I don't get dressed up like an emo-kid and then pretentiously deconstruct the latest piece of depressing crap put on at some indie film festival over half double decaffinated half-caf lattes with a twist of lemon proclaiming them to be high-brow "art".

Movies simply aren't that to me. To me a good movie is one that I get lost in and forget that I'm actually watching a movie. I'm not sitting there analyzing the borders and wondering what drugs the cinematographer was on when he was shooting it. If I was some navel gazing arts student wearing a black trenchcoat in the middle of summer then I'd probably agree with you but I'm just a normal guy who watches movies for enjoyment and a bit of escapism and for me it's much easier to get that from a movie when it isn't a licorice thin strip of colour in between two gigantic black blocks top and bottom.

End of sermon.

[guns1inger]

To me a good movie is one that I get lost in and forget that I'm actually watching a movie

Then you wouldn't notice the bars. I do agree with you on one thing - I'm not into film analysis either. But I do appreciate the skill that goes into making a movie as much as the entertainment it provides. I watch on a 4:3 TV with widescreen switching because a lot of the movies and TV shows I watch are 4:3., and I haven't seen a widescreen TV big enough to watch these on comfortably that isn't plasma or LCD. So the bars on mine are way bigger than yours. But I don't see them when I'm watching the movie, because I'm watching the movie, not the bars.

[InXess]

I hate movies in 2.35:1 which have more black bars than video. This is why I backup all 2.35:1 dvd to enable the pancan flag so I can which a 2.35:1 with small bars (about 1.85:5).
I prefer lost a part of video instead of viewing more bars than picture

Regardless of some comments what is "proper" or "improper" how do you enable PnS flags? Please just address the question and guys keep your advice like "get a projector" to yourself I'd say. I don't like 2.35:1 at home either.

I'd appreciate a pointer to what other (all) flags are possible, how to locate and edit them on a DVD (in .ifo file...). Any simple click it "on and of" (flag) software...?

PS. http://<a class="contentlink" href="http://www.dvdr-digest.com/articles/article_ifoedi...page1.html</a>
is this how it's done? any comments...

[guns1inger]

That won't really solve your problem. The idea of the P&S flag wasn't to simply fill the screen, but to actually tell the player which part of the screen to display, so that action remained in frame. It is an electronic version of the old manual process of creating P&S prints. Doing what that tutorial says *might* fill the screen the for you, however all it will do if it does work is frame and zoom the centre of the screen. If the action occurs to right or left hand edges of the frames, you won't see it. You will also have to change your players configuration from 16:9 or Letterbox to Pan and Scan.

I haven't seen a commercial disc that has successfully implemented this feature, so I suspect it doesn't really work as advertised.

As far as answering only the question, the original poster didn't really ask for advice, just simply questioned the need for 2.35:1 as a valid shooting aspect ratio. This opens the gate to discussion of love it or loathe and all is fair game.

[DRP]

P&S would indeed be a great thing if there was any equipment or media that could actually use it but I too have never knowingly seen any that does. I know the theory of how it's supposed to work. It's supposed to be a floating frame within the picture frame that moves left and right depending upon (presumably) the director's wishes to maintain focus on the most important part of each individual scene.

In reality it's all bunkum anyway. This is exactly what the camera operator's eye + brain combo is doing automatically as he shoots the film in the first place. The human brain automatically employs 'rule of thirds', 'golden mean-grid' etc. kind of analysis to centralize the important parts of any scene or image in realtime just like a director can in an editing studio afterwards.

The reality is that 99% of the time taking the central portion of a too-wide WS movie and cropping evenly either side will not lose you anything significant. The remaining 1% will be in movies like Phone Booth where there are a lot of split screen scenes of people talking to each other on either end of a phone conversation, but even in that extreme case it's still best to crop evenly either side if you have to crop at all, but in the case of Phone Booth in particular it's probably best not to crop at all.

[guns1inger]

I'm curious. You said earlier that for you movies are throw away entertainment. You don't keep them, you don't watch them more than once. So why buy them, back tem up, and go to the trouble of butchering them in the process if you don't even want them ? You are also pretty niave reagrding the film making process if you believe that the framing isn't carefully composed. I guess in kick-boxing films and The Fast and The Furious it doesn't matter much, but most decent films are carefully constructed, and not just point and shoot.

[manono]

It's supposed to be a floating frame within the picture frame that moves left and right depending upon (presumably) the director's wishes to maintain focus on the most important part of each individual scene.

Baloney. It's some lab tech's idea of how it should be done. If the director had wanted to create a 1.33:1 movie, he would have done it in the first place. While it's true that some directors make better use of the widescreen format than do others, there's no way that a good director's widescreen film can be successfully panned and scanned.

The reality is that 99% of the time taking the central portion of a too-wide WS movie and cropping evenly either side will not lose you anything significant.

More nonsensical gibberish. That's even worse than pan and scam. You really have no idea at all what you're talking about. You can wreck your movies all you want. I don't have to watch them. And when in the next few years you get your own widescreen TV set, those butchered DVDs of yours will look real nice. Oh wait, you can stretch them to fill the entire widescreen, making everyone look fat and still miss a third to a half of the video.

http://www.widescreen.org/examples/lord_rings_rotk/index.shtml
http://www.widescreen.org/examples/last_crusade/index.shtml

[DRP]

I'm curious. You said earlier that for you movies are throw away entertainment. You don't keep them, you don't watch them more than once. So why buy them

I don't buy them. There are no movies made these days that are worth the cost of even renting let alone actually going to a cinema to watch.

I guess in kick-boxing films and The Fast and The Furious it doesn't matter much, but most decent films are carefully constructed, and not just point and shoot.

On the contrary. Those sort of movies are the ones that suffer the most when cropped. It's the big action CGI filled movies that make the most use of the full frame width, but, they are also the least intelligent and least satisfying movies to watch because they generally have minimal plot and nil character development.

It's the movies that are less dependent on CGI like for example The Upsdie of Anger that can easily be cropped back to 16:9 with no ill effects due to every scene basically being two people in a room talking to each other. Those scenes are never filmed with the two actors at the extreme edges of a 2.35:1 ratio frame, so all your cropping out is the back of a chair on one side and a blank wall on the other. If that's the sort of detail required for you to enjoy a film or to follow the story then you are clearly the emo-kid arts student I suspected.

[DRP]

And when in the next few years you get your own widescreen TV set, those butchered DVDs of yours will look real nice.

I have a 106cm plasma 16:9 screen and a 51cm 4:3 CRT right now thanks and yes, they do look real nice cropped back to 16:9.

Oh wait, you can stretch them to fill the entire widescreen, making everyone look fat and still miss a third to a half of the video.

There's no need for me to employ that useless function on the plasma. You see it's 16:9 which just happens to be the very same ratio I crop back to, so they end up full screen on the plasma and with mild black bars on the CRT.

[RottenFoxBreath]

2:35:1 is closer to human vision ratio than any other format.
4:3 was technologys limits.--for home viewing at least,in past history.
16:9 or widescreen,is a sort of convergence of both,giving the opportunity to be dual purpose.
2:35:1 at the cinema is closer to our vision,as you dont have to strain the head to match vertical eye placement,just horizontal eye movement,without moving the head.

[manono]

WS means a full re-encode cropped down to 16:9

Sorry, I missed that you were cropping back to 1.78:1 and not 1.33:1.

...so they end up full screen on the plasma and with mild black bars on the CRT.

So the amount of black bars that a 2.35:1 movie displays on the 16:9 TV is so objectionable that you feel the need to do a full reencode to get rid of them, but about the same amount of black bars visible on the 4:3 set after cropping back to 1.78:1 doesn't seem to bother you? Curiouser and curiouser.

I'm almost afraid to ask, but how do you watch "fullscreen" movies and TV shows on the plasma? I take it that you can't enjoy them with the pillar bars?

[DRP]

So the amount of black bars that a 2.35:1 movie displays on the 16:9 TV is so objectionable that you feel the need to do a full reencode to get rid of them, but about the same amount of black bars visible on the 4:3 set after cropping back to 1.78:1 doesn't seem to bother you? Curiouser and curiouser.

No, a 2.35 movie is not so bad on the plasma that I can't watch it but it is on the CRT and all the encodes I do need to be watchable on both screens and I'm not willing to encode everything twice, once cropped for the CRT and then again uncropped for the plasma, so they are done to suit the worst case which is the 4:3 CRT. It makes no difference though because as already stated I lose nothing of any significance in the crop from 2.35 to 16:9 anyway.

I'm almost afraid to ask, but how do you watch "fullscreen" movies and TV shows on the plasma?

Quite easily. I set the plasma to 4:3 mode and watch it and it's just like watching it on a very big 4:3 CRT television. Yes there are black bars left and right that disappear into the black background frame of the screen but so what? The picture is still way bigger than anything else. You're trying to argue that the X-sectional area of visible picture is all that counts and that's not true. The aspect ratio counts too. Take it to extremes. Would you be willing to watch a picture that was 6 metres wide and 1cm high? Well that probably has a very similar X-section picture area as a 4:3 image on a 42" plasma but it's not the same thing is it?

[FulciLives]

This is silly.

Anyone who feels that the original aspect ratio of a movie must be "changed" to suit them is one egotistical bastard/bitch.

Watch it the way it was made and get over it.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

[whitejremiah]

and for the people who scream about black bars.......you are the types of people who make fullscreen still exist....your eyes will adjust to the black bars first off, secondly, the movie was made that way, so just deal with it, and thirdly, if the black bars REALLY offend you that much, just kill the lights in the room your watching the movie in....it will make them barely noticeable.....i dont have a very big tv at all, but i will still watch 2.35:1 movies if that's how they were filmed.....i'll bet the people who are screaming about black bars on a widescreen tv, didn't have a widescreen tv when they first bought a dvd player, so they screamed how everything was widescreen and didn't fill up their whole picture on their tv's at that point...... and to DRP....take a look at www.widescreen.org ....that will show you how much of the picture you are actually chopping out by making stuff 4:3 basically they show comparisons of a 4:3 picture, to a 16:9 picture stretched vertically to be the same hight as the 4:3 picture......you can see a LOT of stuff missing on the examples they show..... i know that's not exactly the same, but it's the same general idea....you're still throwing out a good chunk of the picture and it can still have a bit of an effect on the "feel" of the movie, if you will.......

[Cornucopia]

I think most peoples' annoyance with widescreen (of any flavor) isn't the presence of the black bars, but rather the SMALLER screen real estate. It either "looks tiny" or their not "maximizing their investment". Thing is, if you're watching an occasional widescreen show, live with it. If you're watching alot of widescreen shows, it's probably time to get a bigger TV.

Like the man said, you never notice it if it's projected!

"I pity the fool who can't stand widescreen!" -Mr.T

Scott

[DRP]

This is silly.

Anyone who feels that the original aspect ratio of a movie must be "changed" to suit them is one egotistical bastard/bitch.

Watch it the way it was made and get over it.

- John "FulciLives" Coleman

No. The overly pretentious egotistical director who thinks he's making "art" that anyone is gonna give two squirts about in 3 years time is the bastard. If they'd get over themselves and realise they're making disposable entertainment for the masses and frame it accordingly then there'd be no reason to have to adjust it.

They are making a product for a market. That market used to be cinema but that is changing and more and more that market is becoming home cinema in the form of 16:9 plasma & LCD screens. Already I've noticed a lot of latest release DVDs coming out with the video at exactly 16:9 (either full screen 16:9 or anamorphic 4:3 encoded on the MPEG) and I think it's a good thing too. It shows the studios are starting to realise where most of their market is watching them.

[guns1inger]

You and your kind are the reason I don't go to the cinema any more. You pay to watch what someone else creates. You don't own what they create, you pay for the privilage of watching their art. You don't like it, don't pay, don't watch. The technology available to you allows you to arbitrarily butcher their work - fine - no one is stopping you. But if you really knew anything about making movies, you would be out there doing it, not sitting at re-encoding to get that extra half inch of screen covered in image because the director is obviously an idiot. You are a luddite.

[DRP]

Guilty as charged. But I'm enjoying myself and to me that's all that matters. It's true I don't think movies are art. I don't think they're important cultural signs of our times and I don't think they suffer one iota from being modified to make them more watchable on the current generation of consumer devices available to display them.

IMO the choice is between watching in the original AR in a cinema with other people talking, the smell of stale popcorn, the inability to pause when you need a toilet break, the uncomfortable seats, that crackling speaker in the ceiling right above your head, the crying babies and any number of other annoyances or watching slightly cropped so that no-one but a film arts student with pasty skin and no life would notice in the comfort of my own home.

I'll choose the later everytime and I guarantee that I'll comprehend far more of the story despite the cropping than I ever would in the cinema with all the inherent distractions.

[guns1inger]

I agree completely about the theatre experience, or lack thereof, nowadays. That's about all I agree with, but that is enough. Just keep looking for that small print on the back of the disc that gives me the shudders - "This movie has been modified from it's original format. It has been altered to suit your TV" and you will be happy.