HD DVD Anamorphic? (1 Viewer)

Hey guys. I have not seen this question answered before. I just bought a HD-DVD player and the picture is amazing, but it is just like DVD Player before Anamorphic was introduced. I have this 61" TV and the picture takes up less than half of it or close. When Anamorphic DVDs were introduced, we got almost all of our screen filled, with very little black or loss of picture. Is this possible in HD DVD?

it will depend on the aspect ratio of both the encoded material (HD-DVD) and the AR of your HDTV.

most HDTV's are 16:9 (1.78), but a lot of films are 2.35/2.4 and old classics are 4:3. this means that if you watch a lot of TV shows on DVD or classic films... then you WILL see black bars on the left and right.

if you watch LOTR or star wars, you will still see black bars on the top and bottom of a HDTV... but it is a lot thinner than a 4:3 TV. if you watch a recent HDTV show... then the picture will 'fill the whole screen'.

All of the brand new HD DVD Movies I have have a huge black space above and below movie. 2:35:1 is almost 50% black, 1:78:1 is better, but my comment was on Anamorphic. Is that possible or something similar in HD?

If your 16x9 display and player are set up right, 2.35x1 movies will show black bands across the top and bottom, 1.85x1 will have the smallest of small black bands across the top and bottom, 1x78x1 will fill the screen. In theory, 4x3 content mastered in HD will be pillarboxed--black bands on the sides. I am speaking of 1080i, 1080p, or 720p content.

Now, some of the 480p DVD content contained on HD DVD is not enhanced for 16x9 playback, thus you get letterboxing across the top and bottom, and black bands on the sides.

Thus, the term anamorphic is not used...

- Steve

Sounds like something is not set up correctly. By default HD content should act identically to an anamorphic DVD.

There is no anamorphic. The native AR for an HD frame is already 16:9. Anamorphic on DVD was used because HDTVs were 16:9 while the DVD frame AR is only 4:3.

It sounds like Robert's HDTV is a 4:3 aspect ratio model, which would allow him to not squeeze the 16x9-enhanced DVDs, which would allow him to fill up the entire 4:3 screen for films with a 1.85 aspect ratio, and have less black bars for the 2.35 aspect ratio films, but the people on screen would look taller and skinnier without the squeeze turned on.

Or I could be totally off-base without any more details of the HDTV set in question.

Maybe Robert wants to show us some photos about what it looked like?

But have anyone think of this? 2.35:1 and 2.40:1 materials being anamorphic on HD-DVD? I think it would be very sweet with the extra resolutions. We may not be seeing the advantage now but after few years when the LCD displays on market are capable to display beyond true HD, we will start to ask for this feature.

BTW, does anybody know whether the 2.35:1 orignal HD masters are anamorphic in 1080 x 1920?

I have a 61" Samsung 6168 DLP 1080P set. If I play "Phantom of the Opera" DVD, widescreen, it fills most of the screen, when I put in HD DVD of POTO, it takes up about half of the screen it did on DVD.

Can anyone else test this or is it identical on everyone elses? If it is there is something severly wrong with my player or settings.

Thanks

Sounds like you set up DVD playback to 4x3 letterbox instead of 16x9 widescreen. In the DVD, do all the people look tall and thin? Do you have it zoomed in?

HD DVD playback of HD content is native 16x9, and in this instance, correct. You should have black bands on the picture, in roughly these proportions on a 16x9 widescreen display:



If you ignore the black bands, the picture from POTO looks roughly like this:



- Steve

"It sounds like Robert's HDTV is a 4:3 aspect ratio model, which would allow him to not squeeze the 16x9-enhanced DVDs, which would allow him to fill up the entire 4:3 screen for films with a 1.85 aspect ratio, and have less black bars for the 2.35 aspect ratio films, but the people on screen would look taller and skinnier without the squeeze turned on."


Patrcik can you provide more details, my Sony HDTV is 4:3.

Robert, the aspect ratio for Phantom fo the Opera is 2.40:1, which is supposed to have black bar on top and bottom even on a widescreen HDTV like yours. See the first picture in Steve's reply for example.

How did Phantom of the Opera DVD fill up your screen is beyond me. Are you using different player to watch SD-DVD rather than on the same HD-DVD player? You sure you didn't buy the fullscreen version? Hehe.

You can also check your Samsung HDTV for different zooming method, to make sure you are not using letterbox zoom.

Anyway, you should use other movie as example. There are certain scenes in Phantom of the Opera that were squeezed out of proportion a little bit. I don't really understand why they did that.

Oh Steve, I am rather curious about your first picture. Charlie is not a 2.35:1 movie, is it?

i believe it is. there's a lot more 2:35 movies now than before.

Like all of Tim Burton's films, Charlie and The Chocolate Factory is 1.85:1.

MARS ATTACKS and PLANET OF THE APES are both 2.4:1.

Vincent

Right you are. Thanks for the correction. Let me rephrase. Like MOST of Tim Burton's films, Charlie and The Chocolate Factory is 1.85:1.