So, there are three DVD screen formats.

[SingSing]

Based on what I gathered from the web, there are three DVD formats :

4:3 TV full screen

16:9 TV wide screen

Movie wide screen.

Since, most of us watch 4:3 TV in U.S., there are complains that
16:9 wide screen movie scaled by DVD players for 4:3 on the fly, has distortion/artifact. Do you agreed ?

[Anonymoususer]

Well you say that

16:9 wide screen movie scaled by DVD players for 4:3 on the fly, has distortion/artifact.

Considering that movies encoded in DVD are usually flawless (well the new ones), digitally remastered and all, so how could they be flawed. Is that what your asking...?

If not Im confused as to what your saying.

[johneboy]

what i dont get is why so many (almost all) DVDs are in the 16:9 format?
I cant imagine more then 5% of the US population even own widescreen TV's (doesnt apply here, cuz most people here are video buffs)
ANYWAY, since i do not personally own a widescreen TV, i find it very annoying that i have to watch a movie that takes up only half the screen.. and watching these on my little 13" is almost unbearable.

[vandakeg]

The reason dvds are in 16:9 is b/c there is no resizing necessary for the producers to go from the theater film to dvd. If you notice, 16:9 dvds don't have the 'this film has been modified to fit your screen' disclaimer, whereas the 4:3 versions do.

[johneboy]

The reason dvds are in 16:9 is b/c there is no resizing necessary for the producers to go from the theater film to dvd. If you notice, 16:9 dvds don't have the 'this film has been modified to fit your screen' disclaimer, whereas the 4:3 versions do.

so.. in other words, they are lazy...

insomnia is the only "new" movie out , that i saw was 4:3

[johneboy]

just out of curiosity..
when they do convert the film from 16:9 to 4:3
do they just crop off the sides of the movie, like we could do in VirtualDub?

[snowmoon]

It depends...

Some widescreen to fullscreen conversion use the film as shown in the theater and crop it down to meet the dimesions of the screen, or as you say chop it down like we can do in vdub.

Good transfers are done by going back to the original film and using more if it ( most film is shot much larger than is needed ), Then then re-compsite the film for video. Cameron is know for this ( Terminator, The abyss, ... ).

CGI movies can often crop some scenes and re-position the elements in others for the narrower screen.

So 4:3 movies can be lazy or advanced.

I perfer widescreen enhanced videos even before I got a widescreen set. Without the widescreen you are oftern seeing just a fraction of what the director intended. 4:3 transfers are also masterd based on the least common denominator of the video buying world and it shows ( ringing, EE, vertical low pass filtering ). 16:9 video rarley shows half the problems of your typical 4:3 video.

Just my .02USD

[tonyp12]

There are a lot of aspects ratio out there:
http://www.widescreen.org/aspect_ratios.shtml


Click here for the widescreen info webpage.
http://www.widescreen.org

[sterno]

Personally, I like the widescreen versions even though I have a cheap 4:3 TV. Watching people talk from halfway off the edge of the screen gets old. For that matter, when they're not halfway off the screen the person they're talking to or the object they're looking at is usually all way off the edge.

insomnia is the only "new" movie out , that i saw was 4:3

I have noticed that some of the newer DVDs I've bought don't have a 4:3 version on the disc, while the older ones usually do. I've seen quite a few recent movies in 4:3 format in the store, but now they're selling two different versions each at the same price as before instead of putting both in the same case.

Guess it wasn't enough for them to sell a DVD, then release an expensive "special edition", then cut the price on that one when they release an even more expensive "collector's edition", and then release a version with a metal case, a book, a couple dozen scenes they deleted from the final cut because they sucked, a bloopers disc, a hundred hours of people involved in making the movie talking about how great everybody else was, and a mail-in certificate for one of the stars to come to your house and spank you like a bad dog.

[vandakeg]

Spiderman has s fullscreen (4:3) version... but like the rest of you have said, I like the 16:9 aspect ration better, even on my 4:3 screen.

[crahak]

If you have a reasonably big TV, the widescreen won't be that small, and it'll show you the movie the way it was meant to be shown. I love it, even tho I don't have a WS TV yet.

[hp_lovecraft]

There are a lot of aspects ratio out there

I "think" he was referring to the 3 aspect ratio -modes- on all the DVD players.
Those are:
16x9 anamorphic
4x3 standard
4x3 pan/scan

They are called different things on different players.

If you have a 4x3 TV, you'll notice that 16x9 makes the actors look skinny, but 4x3 standard, and 4x3 pan/scan look the same.
4x3 Standard is designed to play the movie exactly like it is on the DVD.
4x3 pan/scan is designed to take a widescreen movie, and convert it to fullscreen (pan/scan) on the fly-

In order for 4x3Pan/Scan to work, the DVD has to be properly flagged, and practically NONE ARE.
The only ones I can think of are: "Men with Brooms", "Ginger Snaps", and "Jules et Jim".

The problem is that there is a loss of resolution with the pan/scan conversion, and pans are artificial looking, so NO studio is using it. (Plus, people seem to be happy with the 'zoom' function anyway).

Nick

[tonyp12]

I "think" he was referring to the 3 aspect ratio -modes- on all the DVD players.
Those are:
16x9 anamorphic
4x3 standard
4x3 pan/scan

I think he was refering to the different Widescreen formats.

16:9 and 1.85:1 (16/9 =1.7777) (1.85/1 =1.85)

As you see the later has a higher width ratio, so even on 16:9
widescreen TV there will be some black bars.

I'm not sure if they are real black bars or unused space on your TV.


And some DVDs are even 2.35:1 so there will be black bars.
(on a 4:3 TV it probably will be 45% unused TV space.)