Direct from Hollywood: Widescreen DVD releases under the gun! Here's the Answer! (1 Viewer)

[Zach]

My DVD dollar will not be spent on P&S or open matte DVD productions. I also find it hard to believe that non-OAR DVDs are briskly outselling those of the widescreen variety. Are there any sales figures on this situation?
OAR...all the way.
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"Life is short and hard...
like a bodybuilding elf."

 

[Neil Joseph]

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My Favourite Movie

 

[Brian Harnish]

I despise the fact that the studios would even CONSIDER releasing P&S crap on the DVD FORMAT! I really hope this turns around. Shortly before getting into DVDs, I started collecting OAR-only VHS. Being one of the technical guys in the family, I had learned of the dangers of Pan & Scan before I even knew that there was a term for it.
Now, I will not even consider buying a DVD that's P&S unless it's a concert DVD not filmed in widescreen or a movie actually FILMED in 1.33:1. Those are the only exceptions to the rule. I'm really starting to wish that DVD was a niche format like laserdisc used to be (unfortunately, I never did get into laserdisc). That way we could get what we want and Joe Sixpack can be left with his pretty little screen filled.
I am very scared when the time comes for Universal to release major catalog titles that they will be released in P&S only. If the Back To the Future trilogy is not available in its OAR, then I will not buy it.
No OAR = No sale!!! Period.

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- Brian
My DVD Collection
Want Sliders on DVD? Then please SIGN the petition!

 

[Stu Rosen]

[Edited last by Stu Rosen on October 14, 2001 at 06:52 AM]

 

[KennyWayne]

True we don't need to go Pan and Scan with dvds. How ever just to be on the side of the none home theater part of America it must be told that before I seriously got into the hobby of HT. I hated wide screen versions of DVD. I know it may be hard to believe but mainstream USA does not have a 16/9 aspect ratio televisions yet. The other problems has to do with advertisement of the benefits of the 16/9 aspect ratio has over Pan and Scan. Instead of wasting money on converting movies to P&S, why not bring down the prices of HDTV. Now since I took the time to do many months of research on future benefits of HD technology I cannot ever go back to 4:3 aspect ratio television sets. The other reason they want to produce more P&S dvd software is because they are just now understanding the mistakes made long before DVD was introduced to this country. Not enough people make enough money to purchase a HDTV. Television currently are broadcasting more of their shows in 16/9 aspect ratio to show us the benefits of the new sets. They are just not giving out enough information to encourage consumers that it is a time for change. The same can be said about actual dvd players. How long before we have dvd players that output a 720 progressive image? At what price? Todays main stream consumer wants something that will last more then a couple of years. We are now in a time of epic technological break through. That means we need to find a better way of presenting these new advances to our now hard to reach consumers. Lets face it! A lot of us are to broke to spend $2500.00 on a 16/9 aspect ratio television to enjoy a $20.00 dvd on the $400.00 to 1000.00 progressive scan dvd player. To the average consumer it just is not economical. I hope Hollywood learns from its' mistakes and invests in getting information out to the main stream.

 

[Jeff]

I'll probably have to start a new thread for this but can someone give me some links to sites with pictures of P&S vs Widescreen movies?
I used to have a great site bookmarked but it's completely changed. It had some great shots of Indiana Jones, Braveheart, etc.
Thanks,
Jeff
[Edited last by Jeff on October 14, 2001 at 07:27 AM]

 

[Glenn Overholt]

Ok, one question, and one statement...
Question - the added cost for a widescreen version doesn't make any sense to me at all. A new movie comes out to the screen, and they transfer the entire movie into their machine and pan & scan it. They already have the OAR version in it, so where is the added cost - the DVD pressing?
Statement They should make DVD players with a coax output. JSP would love it, I'm sure. Of course, even better would be to have the players automatically pan and scan the 'F' output for them.
Glenn

 

[Reginald Trent]

I don't see why Pan and Scan should cost more than the OAR. Remember the Pan and Scan is automatically done for TV broadcast, VHS and inflight movies. Bottom line both versions should be available.

 

[TomRS4]

I don't see why Pan and Scan should cost more than the OAR. Remember the Pan and Scan is automatically done for TV broadcast, VHS and inflight movies.

'Automaticaly done'? - So whenever an OAR copy is made a pan & scam copy is also made with no extra effort, and this costs nothing? Somebody would have to do some explaining since I don't understand how this could be.
Wouldn't it be easier to not pan and scam? It's been quite a while since I've seen an in-flight movie, but I have seen OAR TV broadcasts and OAR VHS, and they beat the pants of any pan & scam that I've seen. I suppose if a movie were simply cropped the cost would be the same as producing an OAR version, since no effort would be needed to chose which portion of the original film to use.
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Tempus Fugit

 

[JohnE]

Wow, this sucks!!! I've only been into home theatre for the last year or so, and have become a complete advocate of widescreen. To be honest I never even gave it any thought until I started buying dvd's, but now that I'm used to it, there is no going back. And I don't even have a tv that takes advantage of it. Major suckage.

 

[Reginald Trent]

Tom, how many channels premium or broadcast show all of their presentations in OAR? Studios have to provide the networks movies in Pan and Scan. Same for VHS so the Pan and Scan version is a given along with the original OAR that's your answer my friend.

 

[TomRS4]

Quote:

Let's assume for the moment that all movies have in fact been panned and scammed for network presentation and for MAR VHS. Some of these same movies have been broadcast and released on VHS in OAR, they do not have to do pan and scam, even though somebody somewhere prefers it.
Is there some legal agreement between the studios and networks that stipulates that pan and scam copies must be provided? That is the only reason I can think of that they would 'have to' provide pan and scam versions, and I'm sure there would be some way out of this. If a network decides they simply have to fill up a 4:3 screen when they broadcast a movie, let them do the panning & scamming. It's not like networks don't chop the snot out of every movie they show anyway.
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Tempus Fugit

 

[Lars Vermundsberget]

Brian wrote:
"Now, I will not even consider buying a DVD that's P&S unless it's a concert DVD not filmed in widescreen or a movie actually FILMED in 1.33:1. Those are the only exceptions to the rule."
A 4:3 version of a movie actually filmed in 1.33:1 (or rather 1.37:1) is (practically) OAR, not P&S. There's no need to talk about exceptions to the rule.

 

[David Ki]

"I was going to respond to this, but Mike Knapp said it well. Ignorant means uneducated, not stupid.
Calling someone who doesn't understand p&s ignorant is no more an insult than calling Mike an elitist bastard."
"Ignorant", like many other words, has a slang meaning and stupid is one of them. The word as it has been used in this thread seems to imply the slang meaning as if the people informed of this situation are smarter than the people who are not. Under your assumtion, it would be Ok to call a black person (also uninformed of this situation) a "nigger" because by definition it means "an ignorant man".
I was mearly ponting out that by using a slightly different vocabulary, it would make the people making these posts seem a little more intelligent and less like they are insulting other people.
[Edited last by David Ki on October 15, 2001 at 10:04 AM]

 

[Steve Owen]

Sorry to not let this thread die...
In an effort to do something about the problem, I took it upon myself to send a message to the owners and editors of the top Home Theater and DVD websites. The suggestion I had was that, although they are somewhat "competitors", they get together somehow on this issue.
The response I got was... well... nothing. Well, not entirely nothing... I got back one response that pretty much said the whole thing is bullshit and that we have nothing to worry about.
Sigh...
I guess I'll put my energy where it can do more good... such as fighting http://www.eff.org/alerts/20010921_eff_sssca_alert.html Home Theater Gear

 

[Mike Knapp]

Steve, Im willing to help out. I just havent gotten to returning the email yet. I have been thinking about a course of action but have no firm plans that I can reveal.
I, like the others, are probably very busy running our respective sites. Dont count us all out yet.
Mike

 

[Steve Owen]

Thanks Mike. I'm probably a little to eager to jump in with both feet sometimes. I sent the message on Friday I think... I probably should give it a few more days for a response, huh? I know that I get behind in email... I can't imagine the volume of stuff that the heads of these sites get.
-Steve

 

[Joshua Clinard]

Oh, Good, I do hope that we can start some sort of cross site promotion for the continuation of OAR!

 

[Joshua Moran]

This actually upsets me. I bought a HD 16x9 television to view widescreen product as it is meant to be seen. I love widescreen and I thought that everything in HD was going to be 16x9 and the studio's were trying to force the 16x9 format to the joe six pack crowd. DVD got popular in the widescreen format. So why change that? If the studios start releaseing things in P&S only I will no longer buy them. I don't mind releasing both P&S and widescreen because then we have a choice. But if you release in P&S then those with 16x9 TVs have bars on the side instead of top and bottom plus lets not forget the loss of picture. Ether way the bars are here to stay whether they are on top & bottom or on the left & right side.

 

[paul o'donnell]

This all boils down to OAR vs cropping, panning and scanning etc.
Some people have said that the average viewer just wants the picture to fill the screen. I feel this is a pretty spot on statement.
I was at someone's house who had recently bought a widescreen TV because they are becoming the hip thing to buy, and the Wizard of Oz was on and he stretched the picture to fill the screen (its full frame for those not familiar with it).
So it works in reverse too. But at least that way it's a choice at home, which can be made by the individual rather than having the choice made for us by removing some of the picture for the release.
Really, offering BOTH options is the only way to please everyone.