widescreen or regular..what do you perfer?

[tinycorkscrew]

Widescreen for me, too.

My wife accidentally rented Mummy Returns (crap movie) in fullscreen and it was hard for me to sit through it. Stupid Blockbuster should put a warning label on fullscreen versions when a widescreen is available.

On Amazon.com:
Mummy Returns widescreen - Sales Rank: 36
Mummy Returns fullscreen - Sales Rank: 354

Jurassic Park III widescreen - Sales Rank: 6
Jurassic Park III fullscreen - Sales Rank: 82

lol

[salvius]

I'm interested about this projector idea. But where are you guys finding them for less price than TVs??? Are they CRT or LCD projectors, what brand etc. etc. The least expensive used projector I fond was $1000 which isn't cheaper than buying a nice TV.

[Sefy]

Joel0607, why tear down the posters ? build this thing at the top of your wall where you can pull down something to playback on (my english isn't good for what i'm trying to say now)

salvius, TV's usually have great prices upto maybe 33", however when you go to 40"+ the prices start to jump WAY up, now, when you buy a Projector, you don't need the BEST one, you just need one that is capable of 800x600 resolution (DVD is 720x576 max).
i've seen some nice Projector for about 600$ more or less, which may be alot of money, but think of the SIZE you get (WALL size!) and the space you save (where the hell are you gonna put a 50" TV!!?).

[adam]

A projector is a nice idea but its really not practical for most casual viewers. Even if you do find one for cheap (cheapest I've seen is still a few thousand dollars) the bulbs are ridiculously expensive and they burn out relatively quickly. I think the bulbs alone cost several hundred dollars.

[Sefy]

I don't know Adam, i've seen very cheap ones, and we've got two of them at work which are only 800x600 resolution, and they have been working for 6 years now, i'd say that's pretty good working time, and they aren't exactly brand names either.

Like everything, if you don't give it the proper treatment it needs, it will go bad, just like taking off the Fan and Heatsink from your CPU and asking, why did my CPU just fry ?

[Joel0607]

Yeah, projectors arent for the casual viewer... unless you want to watch a 6-foot-tall close-up of Tom Brokaw's face. This I guess would be for when you REALLY want to watch a movie.

Also, we have 3 projectors at work which are on pretty much from 9:00 to 5:00. The bulbs seem to last about 6 months before they begin to fade and we switch them a few months later. These projectors at least are supposed to have a bulb life of about 1000 hours, and they recommend changing a little early.

So, unless you plan on using your house as a movie theater and charging your friends a few bucks... no worries about reaching that limit for a while.

[iluvJLO]

sometimes i prefer widescreen and sometimes i prefer fullscreen. i just wish DVD's included both versions. Yeah, on a pc dvd, u can change the aspect ratio to fullscreen, but its different from TV fullscreen. On PC, it looks stretched rather then properly chopped up and formatted for 4:3 viewing

[wingstar1]

Adam is correct about the price of the cheapest projector; The cheap type is usually 800x600 pixels output, and it's about 1500.00 - 2000.00. Sony used to make one for about 750.00 but that is only capable of producing 640x480 pixels. However, you can't find that anymore. I've used one and I think it would be better to spend the 750.00 on a good 36In TV instead. Furthermore, the further away the projector is from the wall the bigger the pixels become and the blurrier it gets ( This is why you need more pixels power ); A projector with 640x480 pixels output will not pixelize as much when you are about 6-8ft away ( That's about the size of a typical 48" full screen TV ), but beyond that you'll really notice the pixels not to mention the drop in the luminance and the details! The bulbs range between 250.00 to 500.00 depends on the manufacturer and life hours. The bulb life spand is approximately 1000-2000hrs (42-80 days rated as being on all the time or x 3 = 30% usage ), but the quality of the picture reduces exponentially when it reaches 2/3 of its life span.

Now I have a HDTV 65In widescreen Mitsubishi and I watch Widescreen DVD without the black bars, but the picture will be cut off a little at the top and the bottom if I want to see the movie at the correct aspect ratio (expanded mode). Otherwise, the picture will be a little bent out of shape. Widescreen is definitely much better over full screen; It has more details to the scene. Just imagine this: A space battle between the Fed and the borg on a widescreen vs. a full screen

[Battra92]

I prefer widescreen myself. As for a projector, i would LOVE to get a projector but no where to put it.

One other thing I like about widescreen is when I fansub some movies I can put the text in the black area without covering part of the picture. Makes it much easier to see.

[sracer]

I can't believe that I'm the first one to reply:
ORIGINAL ASPECT RATIO

Many widescreen zealots are just as bad as the Pan-n-Scan crowd. I can't count the number of times some self-inflated "expert" extolled the virtues of Widescreen presentation and proclaimed that he is such a die-hard Widescreen fan that he refused to buy "Wizard of Oz" until they released a widescreen version... that the current Pan&Scan version was a travesty.

FYI, Wizard of Oz was originally filmed 4:3 fullframe.

[Greg12]

I was interested in ur sales statistics.

Perhaps Sales are low because people don't know they exist.

I didn't know u could get Jurrasic Park 3 in full screen.

[DrDoak]

WIDESCREEN

only because I hate seeing those "this film has been modified from its original version" messages at the beginning of full screen movies.

[vhelp]

warning.. 2 year old topic.. please don't be mad at me

I brought this topic into play here, because I wanted to correct what I had
stated back then, and to demontrate my change of preference.

I NOW prefer WideScreen
I'm growing more and more away from fullscreen w/ the exception of those
that are made for TV's and old tv programs/shows that were for fullscreen
viewing.

My preference are:
* 1.85 and 2.35, though there are many other 16x9 variations.

Hmm... I hope I find more of these oldies :P

-vhelp

[thayne]

widescreen

[hoyboy]

Widescreen ALL the way

[ChrisX]

I prefer widescreen DVD viewing if available and where available.

Unfortunately, not every DVD is widescreen and some films aren't made to be released as widescreen such as most of Stanley Kubrik's titles. The examples are Clockwork Orange, Eyes Wide Shut and The Shining.

Not all retailers have widescreen available either and I have to read the DVD cover first before purchase. Thank goodness, widescreen is mostly available everywhere.

On my local TV Channel 9 in Sydney shown "Woodstock" overnight recently and mostly shown as full screen: 4:3. However some parts especially with "double Images" shown side by side and this was viewed as widescreen.

A DVD of Woodstock is 4 hours long with widescreen always on with surround sound 5.1.

[Solarjetman]

warning.. 2 year old topic.. please don't be mad at me

Wow, talk about digging up an old topic.

I prefer widescreen most of the time. However, if I am watching the move on a small screen (like a computer monitor) I would rather have Fullscreen.

[adam]

You know the sad thing is, is that we were never supposed to have to choose between a FS and a WS DVD at all. The DVD standard supports pan and scan information, so that the movie could be stored on the disk once, and viewed in either format, making the DVD player do the P&S in real time if FS output was selected. No need for two separate movie releases, no need for DVD-10's with FS on one side and WS on the other, we could have had the best of both worlds. But for whatever reason few dvd players support this function and even fewer DVDs implement it.

[Hardcoreruss]

Widescreen all the way baby

[tenders]

widescreen

[vhelp]

@ Solarjetman..

warning.. 2 year old topic.. please don't be mad at me

Wow, talk about digging up an old topic.

Actually, I was doing some searching, and found some oldies, and I came
accross this one, and well.. it brought back some memories of how I felt
about my response on this topic. Then, I decided I wanted people to know
how I felt, and that peoples decisions DO change over time, like mine :P
and that it's ok.

I'm glad that Baldrick keeps these old threads because they do come
in handy, ..not to mention, they show you just how stupid you were then (me)
and/or how far you've come in your video endeavors, and so on and so forth.
It was a pleasure to bring back this topic, and admit my newly found change.

I prefer widescreen most of the time. However, if I am watching the move on a small screen (like a computer monitor) I would rather have Fullscreen.

At first, I felt the same way, but now I feel different, and prefer the WS all
the way, TV or even PC monitor. And, since I now own an 15" LCD screen, I
find it even better to view w/ WS. These LCD screens are much better than
they were a few years ago. Video used to be quite pixelated then. Now,
when I look at my LCD and I'm watching an actual Movie (ie, DVD) the
quality is outstanding, real-to-life like. Not as deep and rich as a TUBE, but
deffinately worth the ~$278 I paid for it.. and no bad pixels either, on this
unit..
..plus, no more headaches after watching the TUBES flicker for many
hours..
and when you're on a computer all day long, well, you get the point.
My model is: NEC 15" MultiSync 1555V

When I view DVD titles on my LCD, and they are 16x9, (ie, 1.85 or 2.35)
I take great pleasure in the 16x9 view when not in Fullscreen view. Did you
know that you can set PowerDVD up to display Widescreen in a window ??
sort of gives you another perspective on 16x9 viewing Even my so
called homemade 16x9 encodes come out great when watched this way.
Jump to my VHELP's Samples.. thread for the proper PowerDVD setup for
16x9 mode.

Thanks guys, for continuing this old thread :P
-vhelp

[ChrisX]

I prefer widescreen most of the time. However, if I am watching the move on a small screen (like a computer monitor) I would rather have Fullscreen.

-vhelp

This is what I have in mind; a small 14" TV and I agree that full-screen is best as too small to appreciate widescreen.

My DVD player can be viewed on three TV's at home, the small 14" TV, medium 20" TV and the large 26" TV in different areas.

I usually view the DVD on the large TV and this one also got the receiver for surround sound. This is where is best to watch near cinema viewing of a widescreen DVD movie. For example: “The Fast and Furious” or “Chicago”.

Great sound is just as important and DTS is the best with superb widescreen using the “Superbit” DVD having much higher bit rate superior picture than a standard DVD.

Information on Superbit: http://www.ezydvd.com.au/superbit.zml

[Marco33]

I can remeber watching VHS's back in the 80's and thinking... is it me or is the camera way to close to the action.

I thought it was just me. It was just P&S.

I only buy Widescreen DVD's unless the DVD only comes in P&S.