All 4 "Airport" Films From Universal -- Coming February 10th (1 Viewer)

[Harry-N]

Interestingly, though, Harry, these screenshots ARE indeed WIDER than my copy's image. I noticed this wider AR on the last pic you posted (of the 747 on the ground). In your shot, we can see the entire yellow service vehicle on the right side. On my copy, only about two-thirds of this truck is visible. Odd. Your copy is showing more info (left & right).

...and that actually hits the nail on the head. Think about it. Start with your image. Now try to "squeeze" the extra left-right inforamtion into the same space. The result is that everyone has to be skinniner in order to make room for the extra stuff (keeping the height the same.)

If you want to check your PC monitor's ability to display correct images, there are a number of websites with test patterns and such. One I use is:

http://freepctech.com/rode/004.shtml

Using that software, I can see that my monitor is calibrated to display a perfect circle. And when I measure those tires and engines, they're not round.

 

[David Von Pein]

...and that actually hits the nail on the head. Think about it. Start with your image. Now try to "squeeze" the extra left-right inforamtion into the same space. The result is that everyone has to be skinniner in order to make room for the extra stuff (keeping the height the same.)

OK. Thanks Harry.

So, I guess this means we've come "full circle" (sorry about the pun :frowning: ) on this discussion pretty much.....

Meaning: that evidently there ARE definitely TWO differing "versions" (so to speak) of Airport 1975 on "The Terminal Pack". This being "confirmed" by the simple FACT that YOURs (Harry's) copy does show MORE left-right visual information than my copy/version.

Hence (as Henry Lee from the O.J. Simpson Trial would put it): "Something wrong."

And the "something wrong" must be with your copy.

However, to continue for a moment -- WHY, do you suppose, Universal has cropped a few inches off the sides of this movie? For, obviously, YOUR copy shows the "full" (or at least fuller) image. Is it usually SOP for studios to "crop" off small portions of the left & right sides in order to achieve the ideal (undistorted) ratio?

 

[David Von Pein]

Addendum -- Guess we're not completely "full circle" here. Because, I just now remembered what Tony said (above).

He says he's got the "odd-looking" (distorted somewhat) version. And yet he too, like me, only sees part of the yellow truck in that one screen-pic.

If Tony has the "defective" version, then he, too, should see the whole truck.



Weird. Very weird.

Or is this simply a matter of the differing "overscan" between one TV and another?

 

[Harry-N]

If I'm reading it correctly, Tony's issue is an overscan on his TV - not uncommon at all. Most TV's overscan a little, so most people miss a little info on either side and top and bottom of their TV.

The pictures I posted are from a computer DVD image which shows the entire picture as encoded on the disc. Since windows can be resized, we can, in effect, "underscan", the effect of which is seeing the whole image.

It sure sounds like there are two different version out there. I'm East Coast based near Philly, and picked up the Terminal Pack in our local Best Buy.

For what it's worth, the Disc ID of this disc, as identified in DVD Profiler is AIRPORT_75(1F593138).

 

[David Von Pein]

If I'm reading it correctly, Tony's issue is an overscan on his TV - not uncommon at all. Most TV's overscan a little, so most people miss a little info on either side and top and bottom of their TV.

Well, that's the same issue I face as well then.

Because the entire truck is NOT on my screen either. BUT--I don't experience any "stretching" or distortion whatsoever; but Tony says he does.

Weird. Just...plain...weird.

 

[TonyD]

there is no side cropping on this.
i put it in the dvd player in my computer and saw the entire yellow truck.
there is no overscan on computer dvd players.

 

[David Von Pein]

there is no overscan on computer dvd players.

Right.

Harry -- I understand why you see the whole truck on the computer DVD-ROM image; but is the truck cropped when you watch via your regular Player? I'm guessing it will be.

If so, your previous analysis regarding the extra image squeezed into the picture won't wash as a reason why things are "squished". Because this "cropping"/overscan happens on ALL DVD Players.

 

[Scott Strang]

I bought the first Airport movie 2 different times. Once when Goodtimes issued it in P&S and again as a widescreen release.

Sadly the P&S version has the best sound quality. The widescreen version has this annoying phasing sound during the opening credits that was NOT on the P&S version.

No one ever seems to hear things like this.

Same happened with The Right Stuff which still had screwed up sound quality.


Infuriating.

 

[Harry-N]

If so, your previous analysis regarding the extra image squeezed into the picture won't wash as a reason why things are "squished". Because this "cropping"/overscan happens on ALL DVD Players.

Well, I can't see your picture, so I can't say for sure. All I know is that on mine, the image is horizontally squished so that people look tall and thin, and that round objects are slightly oval.

For what it's worth, I put the DVD in the computer again and took off the "Keep Aspect Ratio" setting, and began sizing the window until round things were round and everything looked normal to me. Once I had an image that looked normal, and I measured the round objects to make sure that they were round, I then measured the height and width of the full image. It came out to an exact ratio of 2.5:1. Yet IMDb lists the film as being 2.35:1, which is what the DVD is anamorphically coded at.

Strange, indeed.

 

[Harry-N]

In doing a little more thinking on this subject (way TOO much time for a near 30-year-old movie), I decided to do a direct comparison between Jonathan Little's pictures posted above from his GoodTimes DVD and my Terminal Pack version. I sized my picture to match his - here are the results:


^The GoodTimes DVD.


^The Terminal Pack DVD.

I think it's clear here on a direct comparison of identical frames what's going on. The Termimal pack DVD is stretched. People are taller and thinner. Now look at the chrome-striped partition that the woman behind Heston is walking past. In the GoodTimes DVD you can see a floor reflection showing. In the Terminal Pack DVD, that part of the image is missing - which tells me that the Terminal pack version of the film was mis-framed at the bottom, and stretched to compensate for the picture height.

Now, as to whether there are two versions of the Terminal Pack? Still open for debate.

 

[David Von Pein]

One final post (hopefully ) re. this long-winded debate .........

Checked my copy yet again (comparing above screengrabs) --- And Harry is indeed correct. My copy is identical (framing wise) to Harry's "Terminal Pack" pic above. The new print shows slightly less at the bottom of the frame.

So, I guess my copy is "stretched" to meet the 2.35 requirement of this AR, too. But it sure look OK to my eyes. I never would have even posted about any "distortion" had it not been for the (mini-)uproar on forums like this.

And even in the two examples we see above -- to ME, Chuck & Karen look just fine in the bottom photo (even though they must be stretched slightly to meet the AR).

The stretching is so slight, I'm surprised anyone picked up on it.

Maybe it looks worse on different-sized TV screens. Beats me. ?????

Anyway, thanks for the hard work on this matter, Harry. Nice job, my man!

 

[Harry-N]

Anyway, thanks for the hard work on this matter, Harry. Nice job, my man!

At least I think we now all agree that there's something wrong with the AIRPORT 1975 aspect ratio on the Terminal Pack.

Harry

 

[jonathan_little]

At least I think we now all agree that there's something wrong with the AIRPORT 1975 aspect ratio on the Terminal Pack.

I guess the aspect ratio is correct, though the framing is wrong. To hide the error it looks like somebody or something decided to stretch the image to the correct aspect ratio.

I doubt Universal will fix this problem on a set priced like this. :frowning:

 

[Tim RP]

The Airport Terminal Pack came out on R2 a couple of weeks ago and the misframing/stretching issue on Airport 1975 has been corrected. Compared to the grabs above it looks like slightly different framing again with a little less picture information at the top of the image (the top border is just touching Chuck's head) but pretty much identical at the bottom of the image. R2 has lost the insert (of course) and rather annoyingly due to the pan-European nature of the disc with 6 language and 14 subtitle options for 1975, '77 and '79 the trailers have been dropped. Airport has just the English 5.1 and DTS tracks so retains the trailer.

 

[Andrew Bunk]

I just picked this up at Circuit City a few weeks ago. I go there often and never say it on the shelves until recently. I wonder if Universal corrected it for a new pressing. I'll have to check mine out.

 

[Harry-N]

I see this old thread has revived itself. Hard to believe it was two years ago (and I've still not watched anything other than the first AIRPORT movie from this set!)

My only update to this is that we now have a Sony 16:9 HDTV, and in just now checking it on that TV, this movie (AIRPORT 1975) still looks vertically stretched to me.

Harry

 

[R-T-C Tim]

Just to bring this thread back from its watery grave (a la Airport 77)...

I decided to Marathon watch the entire boxset (the British version) and reviewed all the films at my site. The British boxset does not seem to have any of the print issues (and comes in any easy to use 4 disc digi-pack), but does lack trailers.

Personally I found the first film impressive, the second generic and poor, the third surprisingly entertaining and the Concorde simply daft - but at least watchable.

 

[Radioman970]

Great set of films even with the slightly messed up AR. I paid $15 for mine. Very happy.

Hard to argue with you R-T-C. Although I find them all extremely fun to watch in their own way.

Airport is genuinely excellent and worth the purchase price alone.

'75 and '79 are laugh riots! I love those. I mean, George Kennedy just had me rotfl in '79. Funny! And the stretched picture in '75 just makes it funnier.

'77 was the first airplane disaster movie I ever saw and what happens to the plane just left a huge impression on me as a kid. Some really good moments there. I'd always been a fan of Emergency! on TV and '77 was sort of a big budget version of that same idea.

Sorry you R2 folks didn't get the trailers.

 

[John Stockton]

I am really interested in seeing the original Airport in its original Todd-AO ratio of 2.21:1 and I was very disappointed that Universal did not give us that version in the terminal pack. I have also been told that TCM has aired the Todd-AO version in the past. Does anyone have any info on whether any other regions have the Todd-AO version or any word if it may arrive in the near future??
Edited by John Stockton - 8/9/2009 at 10:57 am GMT

 

[Eric Huffstutler]

Strange to see this come back up. I had to send my discs to Deluxe for replacement just last week as the packaging held on too tight to the discs and I cracked one from the "outer edge" getting it loose. never happened before in all of the 2,000+ discs I own. had many "tight hubs" but never cracked one getting it off of it.