Widescreen (Finally) Winning

Yort writes "There's a little blurb over at the IMDB about customers at Blockbuster now generally preferring the widescreen, or letterbox, format over full-screen. This after Blockbuster tried to only stock full screen versions of movies a few years ago. I guess now the wife will have to let me buy that new widescreen TV, right?"

Comments

It is a superior format

[revmoo]

Widescreen is undeniably a lot better way to watch a movie, and I'm sure that TV makers like it, because no one wants to watch a widescreen movie on a small TV

I think it will be really nice in a few years when widescreen TV's are the norm.

Re:It is a superior format

[gilesjuk]

Only because film makers shoot in widescreen, they haven't always. It was a gimmic to stop the decline of the cinema when TVs became popular.

Perhaps they will revert to a squarer image when all TVs are widescreen?

Widescreen is popular in the UK, go into an electrical store and you'll see rows of big widescreen TVs and only a handful of 4:3 tube sets.

Problem is the UK sets aren't HD yet and are unlikely to be for many years.

Re:It is a superior format

[mwolff]

I saw a short clip on letterbox vs. full on Turner Classic movies. I was shocked at how much was lost when it was converted from the original format to the full screen format. Entire characters would disappear sometimes. Since then I have only watched letterbox. It is the way the director intended you to view it.

Re:It is a superior format

[stevelup]

Hi

This is simply wrong. When you watch an anamorphic widescreen DVD, your player is still outputting 480 (or 576 for PAL) lines of resolution, and your TV squashes the picture vertically. You get an even sharper and more detailed image. You most certainly *do not* lose resolution.

The exception to this is if your TV cannot do 16:9 compress, and/or you have your DVD player set to letterbox mode rather than 16:9 mode.

Widescreen

[obotics]

The problem with widescreen at the moment is that TV is not broadcasted in widescreen. This means that quite a lot of your $10,000 TV is not being used when watching regular broadcast tv. Granted, I love widescreen for movies, but I also would like to see televion broadcasts switch over.

Still, I have to admit that those plasma TVs look darn nice!

Re:Widescreen

[Osty]

This means that quite a lot of your $10,000 TV is not being used when watching regular broadcast tv.

That may suck if you paid $10,000 for your TV, but when you can get good widescreen RPTVs for under $2000, it's not so bad. Modern TVs have ways of combatting the burn-in you'll see from the 4:3 sidebars (mine has grey sidebars, to at least get even burn of the phosphors since the problem with black bars is underburn rather than overburn of the phosphors, and it shifts the position of the 4:3 box to try to minimize burn-in from the bar edges). As well, you can change your format to fullscreen and learn to live with slightly fatter/shorter people and objects, or some TVs even come with a second stretch mode that stretches the edges more than the center. It can make for a fisheye view on some shows, but it's not too bad on most shows. Since most shows have all of the action in the center of the screen, that's the least-distorted part of the picture.

So, other than burn-in, what issues do you have with not using the full width of your TV? Plasma screens are very prone to burn-in, though, so aside from movie or strictly 16x9 HDTV viewing, they're pretty worthless (which would also help explain why the price is still so high -- their utility is limited, so demand is low and price stays high).

Re:Widescreen

[YetAnotherName]

US TV is broadcasted in widescreen:

* Alias (widescreen high def)
* Smart Travels (widescreen high def)
* My Wife and Kids (widescreen high def)
* George Lopez (widescreen high def)
* Star Trek Enterprise (letterboxed standard def)
* Law and Order (widescreen high def)
* Jay Leno (widescreen high def)
* Crime Scene Investigation (widescreen high def)
* Manor House (widescreen standard def)
* Animals Behaving Badly (widescreen standard def)
* E.T. (ABC commercial presentation, widescreen high def)
* Dragnet (widescreen high def)

You want more examples? There's a lot more!

Re:Widescreen

[drudd]

There's no inherent reason why a wider aspect ratio is any better in the first place.

I disagree... I think we're used to seeing the world in a pretty wide aspect ratio... compare how your peripheral vision compares left to right as up and down. I can see ~40-60 degrees more left to right (just a quick approximation).

I think the wider view is more immersive... not necessarily as good as having an IMAX type screen where you can't see the whole screen unless you turn your head, but we can't all afford that :)

Doug

Re:Widescreen

[Eccles]

I disagree... I think we're used to seeing the world in a pretty wide aspect ratio..

I looked it up once, and came up with the conclusion that 5:3 was our "natural" aspect ratio. Clearly wider than 4:3, but a little narrower than 16:9 (since 5:3 would be 15:9.)

I think the wider view is more immersive... not necessarily as good as having an IMAX type screen where you can't see the whole screen unless you turn your head, but we can't all afford that :)

How about using a projector like a Dell 2100MP? $1300 list, 800x600 res, make your movie room dark and you can make as big an image as you have a wall for (pref. with a screen on it, of course.) You can even adjust the zoom for best fit of widescreen vs. 4:3, perhaps with black drapes and the like to properly frame the image.

Good comparison site

[teko_teko]

This site has some samples of movies in widescreen format and the result that one will get in the full screen format. widescreen.org.
The full screen version of LoTR is really bad because of its original screen ratio.

Yeah!

[sg3000]

The masses choose wide screen over full screen! Next, we have to wean them off of pro wrestling, Brittany Spears, and lite beer and the 2000s won't end up being an embarrassment to history! Or at least we'll be cooler than the 1920s, with their flagpole sitting and zootsuits.

Upgrading

[darkov]

While I think releasing DVDs in widescreen is the way to go, I've noticed that more and more programs on my TV are being letterboxed, probably becuase programs are increasingly being distributed and broadcast in HD.

Meanwhile the effective size of my TV screen is being erroded beacuse of this letterboxing. Damned progress.

Re:Upgrading

[darkov]

No, that's to cater to the sucker mentality that letterbox=elite (as is evidenced throughout this thread): When a show or commercial wants to seem classy or refined, here comes the letterbox!

To a degree, but It can be valid, if I were shooting in a HD aspect ratio I'd probably be pretty frustrated to find that my shots ended up looking crappy in the narrow aspect. Good composition would be very difficult (if not impossible) to achive for both aspects at the same time.

But then again, we are talking about TV, not high art.

No need to buy a widescreen

[joeflies]

Considering that the cost of front projection DLP is falling fast, I'd skip the widescreen tv route entirely. You get whatever aspect ratio you need.
Even if you do go rear rear projection or tubes, I think I'd still go with a bigger 4:3 (as long as it supported 16x9 compression, like the Sony's or JVCs)

Re:No need to buy a widescreen

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Just about every new TV set larger than 27" sold in the US has a 16x9 squeeze mode. A scarce few of them autodetect the anamorphic flag and autoswitch, but not all DVD players send that flag either.

Most projectors can adjust aspect ratios to fit the available panel.

Even so, I think my next projector will be a 1366 x 768 widescreen so it will take 720p HDTV without down scaling. I haven't decided if it will be DLP or LCD, LCDs are cheaper, still get a decent contrast ratio (some at 900:1) and don't have DLP rainbows.

DLPs do have better contrast ratio, sometimes up to 2000:1 but I think I might be bothered by rainbowing.

Widescreen = Bedda!

[CyberBill]

My parents always watch DVDs in pan-n-scan, because my dad says "We bought a big tv and that widescreen doesnt use it, what a waste!", but I personally ONLY watch DVD's in widescreen unless not available. You can see a lot more of whatever is going on, I feel. :)

-Bill

Do Not Underestimate Customers

[thatguywhoiam]

I remember buying American Beauty last year on VHS, as a gift for my sister. The clerk asked me 3 times whether I was sure I wanted widescreen. When I assured her that I most definitely did and asked what the hell the problem was, she replied "We get at least 10 people a day in here returning widescreen movies because they think something is wrong with them. They say they 'don't fill up the TV screen.'"

I find, generally, that when you say 'aspect ratio' to your average layperson they say 'gesundheit'.

Re:Do Not Underestimate Customers

[_|()|\|]

I remember buying American Beauty last year on VHS, as a gift for my sister. The clerk asked me 3 times whether I was sure I wanted widescreen.

You have to admit that wide-screen VHS is a small market. Wide-screen anamorphic DVD is popular because it displays at a high resolution on a decent TV. Wide-screen VHS looks bad on any TV.

HD tv

[mjdth]

isn't HD tv's native format widescreen? wouldn't this help to get every type of TV media on the same page?

That depends...

[raehl]

SOME TV is not broadcast in wide screen. Some is. I'm pretty sure all of the late-night shows are filmed in wide screen now for example.

Now, whether the broadcaster in your area is broadcasting that wide-screen signal, or your cable provider is carrying it, is another matter entirely.

How?!

[limekiller4]

Call me a snob, a bigot, whatever. But I cannot fathom how people stomach non-widescreen. I mean, it's cutting off sizeable chunks of what the director intended you to see. With competent editing it is a disaster. With incompetent editing it's unwatchable.

How the hell are you supposed to watch Kubrick or Kurosawa, for that matter, on a format other than they shot it in and not walk away with (almost literally) half the picture?

Re:How?!

[Anonymous Coward]

You are a snob, a bigot, whatever!

Happy?

Re:How?!

[farnsworth]

How the hell are you supposed to watch Kubrick

Kubrick typically prints the entire film negative, giving you a 4:3 aspect ratio, i.e., "not widescreen". Almost everyone else cuts off the top and bottom of the film to give you 16:9.

You make a good point, but keep in mind that "what the director intended you to see" does not always mean "widescreen."

Re:How?!

[Belgand]

IIRC he saw one of his early films on tv at one point and was appalled at how it had been mangled. In order to be certain that this would not continue to happen from then on he set up his shots such that 4:3 would contain the full shot, but that nothing significant would be lost when it was matted for 16:9 to be projected in theaters. Thus the majority of Kubrick films are correctly in 4:3 on DVD and video, but actually slightly off in the theater. While not a "Kubrick film" Spartacus is a notable exception having a rather wide ratio, 2.2:1 (70mm) going by the back of the box for the Criterion DVD release. 1.85:1 (academy flat) and 2.35:1 (anamorphic scope aka Panavision/Cinemascope) tend to be the standard two widescreen ratios.

Likewise films before the 1950s were largely filmed in 4:3 (academy standard). This is the main reason why televisions are also 4:3. When the NTSC chose an aspect ratio standard they went with academy standard. Films later went widescreen to offer something above and beyond television.

Ok, so we're half way there

[decarelbitter]

Because most modern movies are recorded in Cinemascope, which is not 16:9, but 2.35:1. So cool movies like LOTR still have a nice black bar on the top and bottom when viewed on a Shiny! 16:9 plasma screen.

Wide vs Full

[Masem]

I realize that to provide both a widescreen and a fullscreen version, with 5.1 sound and little encoding artifacts, would generally require a second disk for most feature films, I don't understand the trend currently for many newer movies to have separate boxes for Wide and Full, particularly when the version info is not easy to pick out (Now whenever I get a DVD, I doublecheck the back of the box to get all the formatting information to make sure it's what I expect). The old Warner DVD titles were flippies in that one side was full, the other wide, but this means you didn't have a picture on the DVD media itself (oh, boo hoo!). It would seem to me that providing both versions of the movie on a flippy disk in one box would be cheaper than making up two distribution runs, particularly when the number of full vs. wide is still rapidly changing.

of course

[Darth Maul]

The widescreen version is better because it is the full frame as the cinematographer and director intended. Anything 'pan and scan' cuts out about a third of the frame. But we all know that.

I bought a widescreen HDTV a few months ago and I must say there is no going back to standard 4:3. Even if you do not watch/get HD feeds, I highly recommend the new widescreen HDTVs for DVD watching. Even without my HD receiver, I'd still have purchased the TV just for the DVD experience. Now, of course, I'm an anamorphic snob ;-).

It depends where you are

[EnglishTim]

Here in the UK quite a lot of the digital channels are broadcast in widescreen, and all the free-to-air digital channels are.

Seems like almost all the TVs in the shops are widescreen now, as well.

Re:It depends where you are

[El Cabri]

In Europe TV broadcasted movies and VHS were universally letter-boxed even before 16:9 TVs appeared. Maybe it's because the higher vertical resolution in the PAL and SECAM standards compared to NTSC makes the waste of scanlines less painful for picture quality (which is not an issue now with anamorphic DVDs anyway).

Re:I personally find it infuriating....

[alphaseven]

Flame all you want, but after the first month, approximately 100% of people who watch any movie will be watching it on a T.V., so why the hell wouldn't you design the movie to be seen on that medium?

A few directors do that, Stanley Kubrick shot most of his films in something closer to a TV ratio (the top and bottom would be cropped off in theatres) and I read an interview with Cronenberg where he stated that he tried to frame his films with the expectation they will be shown in a television ratio.

We need more models of widescreen TV in stores

[grahamwest]

If only widescreen TVs would become more commonly available in the USA - last time I was back in Britain visiting family I found you were hard pressed even to find a 4:3 TV in stores. The little 10" TV/VCR combo units were about the only ones left, everything else was 16:9. This is because the upcoming DTV standard for Europe is 16:9.

That said, Panasonic sell a nice 30" and 34" 16:9 HDTV tube TV in this country. Movies and videogames look phenomenal those sets and they're a lot cheaper than plasma displays.

Explanation is Simple

[tabdelgawad]

With decent (not great!) 27" TVs dipping below $200, the median size of TVs in US households must be significantly higher than it was a few years ago. This tends to resolve the tradeoff between letterbox and fullscreen in favor of letterbox.

I tell fullscreen supporters...

[shepd]

Your DVD player has a zoom feature (most do, anyways). USE IT! That way we both win.

Re:I tell fullscreen supporters...

[John Miles]

This method won't work until DVDs store info about the area of focus, and can pan&scan on-the-fly, to any ratio your player wants to put it in.

Which they've actually always been able to do. That's why your DVD player's setup menu has a preference field for the selection of 'full screen' or 'widescreen'. Widescreen DVDs that offer P&S-on-the-fly support will play back in fullscreen mode if you set up your player that way.

However, very few discs have taken advantage of the P&S-on-the-fly feature. I'm not sure why; it may be because the telecine P&S process has more options available than the automatic feature provides, like zooming.

The original pressing of the Last Temptation of Christ DVD actually enabled this feature by mistake. Viewers with the fullscreen option turned on were rewarded with a corrupted P&S picture (well, more corrupted than usual). I imagine they've fixed this by now.

Because the format sucks?

[Kjella]

No, seriously... 4:3 is nice for a newsreporter, or a solo artist etc. But compared to the human field of vision, it's hopeless. And if you're looking to convey a "realistic" scene, you can either squeeze all the actors together, or you can have basicly a lot of ground and sky that would be "outside" the letterbox. Either way it sucks, and I'm glad we're moving to a format that is at least closer to the experience you get at a cinema. Note that cinema producers would actually like it even more rectangular, like 1,85:1 or 2,35:1. Personally I have a 32" widescreen (not HD) TV, and it's great for watching DVDs.

Kjella

Viewing 16:9 movies on 4:3 TVs

[Dwindlehop]

Sony 4:3 televisions have a feature that will compress the scan lines into a 16:9 format. You lose surface area, but you don't lose any of the pixels. Great way to get quality 16:9 movie playback on the cheap (less than a thousand bucks).

here is an example.

[geekoid]

The second example from the bottom is enough to sell me on widescreen.

Re:Mismatched solutions...

[specialized_sworks]

Easy solution...

The DVD player was set to 4:3 instead of 16:9. They all (most) have a setting to tell them what kind of TV you have. There is no way for them to tell automatically.

In fact, a while ago a large number of DVD players defaulted to 16:9. That resulted in many returns by customers because they thought the DVD player was broken. So, now they default to 4:3. I guess they figure if you can afford a new 16:9 TV, you might be bright enough to read the manual.

-Dubya

Re:Mismatched solutions...

[Krokus]

The reason DVD imagery tends to look awful on widescreen TVs in shops is typically because they have the same signal running to multiple TVs, at least some of which are 4:3. For some odd reason, they tend to configure this shared display for the lowest-common (or perhaps better selling) denominator.

The fact that each TV is showing an image that has been been split multiple times also tends to result in image quality quite inferior to what the TV is capable of producing with a single connection.

This is why I don't judge a TV based on whatever it's displaying in a shop. I use the internet to find in-depth reviews carried out under more controlled conditions. I mean, if it's on the internet, it must be reliable, right? :)

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:As usual...

[geekd]

Too bad widescreen films didn't appear until 1953, after 4:3 TV format was established.

Films went widescreen in response to TV:

"Oh, crap. People can watch moving pictures in thier home now. What are we gonna do?"

"We'll make the show really wide so to differentiate ourselves, and continue to make money"

Halo isn't widescreen

[Osty]

I'm glad Microsoft was smart enough to put in HD and widescreen formats built into the X-Box. Once you go widescreen Halo, there's no going back.

Except that Halo is a 4:3 game, not 16:9. Sure, you can display it in fullscreen mode on a wide TV, but that's just stretching things horizontally. The XBox supports 480p (4:3 and 16:9), 720p, and 1080i (only 16:9 for both of those, IIRC), but only if the developers choose to support them in their game. 480p 4:3 generally comes for free. 480p 16:9 may have some effect on your textures or HUD. 720p and 1080i generally need you to rethink your engine design.

That said, Halo2 is supposed to support 480p 16:9 and 720p, so you will eventually be able to experience a Halo game in widescreen glory. Just not now.

There are a few widescreen games out there, though. Hitman2 (480i 16:9, not 480p), Sega GT 2002, Tony Hawk 4 (and possibly 3? 720p, 480p 16:9), Amped, and more. Check out this thread for an ongoing list.

Reminds me of what a Suncoast employee said once..

[D'Arque Bishop]

"Pan-and-scan is formatted for the small-minded."

Re:Advantages of Widescreen?

[santos_douglas]

The idea behind widescreen is that it approximates the human field of view better than the standard mostly square picture on a 4:3 TV. I think it translates well to TV programming in ways that may take some time for TV producers to understand and take advantage of. For instance on 4:3, in a close up shot, notice it's often difficult to squeeze more then two faces into a single shot because of the aspect ratio, but on widescreen this is now problem. Some of the better TV commercials will even throw in letterboxing just to get the proper effect.

Re:As usual...

[Sycraft-fu]

Well there is also the issue that we see more horizontally than verticly, about twice as much. Also films have no one standard for widescreen. 1.85:1, 2:1 and 2.35:1 are some common anamorphic lense formats, but they aren't the only ones. Also some films are shot with spherical glass and then hard matted to the desired ratio (Fight Club for example).

I'm also not sure when the concept of anamorphic lenses came about, which is how widescreen is generally done. In case you don't know, anamorphic lense are squashed, so the image on the film is also squashed. You then hook the same kind of lense to the projector which unsquashes the image. Gets better resolution than doing the same shot with aspherical lens and cropping it since you use more of the film, but has trouble with some aspects of focus. Look at lights in teh distance in Fight Club and contrast them to other movies and you'll see the difference.

It may be that the move to widescreen was partially motivated by TV aspect ratio but I think it was more due to the natural percetion of humans and also perhaps the invention or refinement of anamorphic lenses.

Re:As usual...

[Waffle Iron]

Gets better resolution than doing the same shot with aspherical lens and cropping it since you use more of the film, but has trouble with some aspects of focus. Look at lights in teh distance in Fight Club and contrast them to other movies and you'll see the difference.

The first rule of filming Fight Club is: You do not use a low f-stop.

The second rule of filming Fight Club is: You do not use a low f-stop.

This is the same Blockbuster that edits content

[gad_zuki!]

Great, now I can watched widescreen NC-17 and other films edited by the studio for "family-friendly" stores like Blockbuster and Walmart because these stores will refuse to carry content they find religiously/morally questionable. The studios don't want to lose money so there goes the penis scene from Bad Lieutenant. I can't remember any others from the top of my head, but the editing is quite real.

They need to widen their tolerance not their aspect ratios.

UK leads the way with widescreen TV

[rklrkl]

Unusually for once in the realm of TV, the UK has a clear lead in the widescreen arena:

• 16:9 sets have been outselling 4:3 sets significantly in the past 3-4 years, so much so that it's virtually impossible to find any set over 20" that's in the old-fashioned 4:3 format.

• Almost all UK-made dramas aired on UK TV are now widescreen - in fact, if a new UK drama airs that isn't widescreen, I find it quite shocking :-)

• The majority of UK TV adverts are now widescreen.

• More and more "cheap and cheerful" UK TV shows are being aired widescreen (home makeovers, quiz shows, gardening etc. etc.). BBC and Channel 4 have been the leaders in this, with ITV begin somewhat behind and the laggards at Sky One bringing up a distant last place.

• Sky (the largest UK digital TV platform) has just made all its "Sky Box Office" pay-per-view movies widescreen (what about the normal movie channels too, Sky ?).

I was amused that I had to beg the BBC a couple of years ago to air "Film [insert year here] with Jonathan Ross" in widescreen, because they amazingly shot Ross's studio reviews in 4:3 and then had letterboxed movie clips. The series that followed finally switched to widescreen - amazing that the most obvious BBC show to get widescreen (a movie review show) was one of the last to get it !

One weak point in the UK widescreen TV market, though, is the virtual non-existence of widescreen TV's below the 24" mark. Now, I don't know about you, but I have a small bedroom with limited space to put my VCR, satellite decoder and TV (in fact, the three are stacked on top of each other).

There's no way I can fit a 24" widescreen set in the space available, so how come it's impossible to buy a portable widescreen set in the UK now ? Luckily, I got myself a Sony 16" widescreen set before they got discontinued and I love it to death, but when that needs replacing, I'll have to knock the wall through to the next room to fit a widescreen set in :-)