Best Buy ad has OAR explanation! (1 Viewer)

[DaveF]

http://64.14.232.164/BestBuyInserts/...8AP2_19AP1.PDF
This week's Best Buy circular (in my area anyway) has a two-page spread advertising home theater hardware and setups. And on the bottom of the right-side page is a blurb about "16:9 aspect ration" that reads

.

(emphasis in original) Next to it is a scene from the pod race (in TPM) labeled "Widescreen", with a smaller inset frame showing "Standard" region.
So how about that? Best Buy steps up to the OAR line. Are we happy?

 

[David Lambert]

Yes, this is awesome..combined with the fact that their price for A.I. is the same for both AR editions, unlike their competition's...
Best Buy has just earned my business all over again!

 

[AndyDL]

My goodness...
I never thought in a million years Best Buy would be the first to do this.
This is excellent news.
Kudos, Best Buy!
Andy

 

[Greg_Y]

It's not correct though.

you get your movies the way the director intended

You can still get your movies "the way the director intended" on a 4:3 screen. You just have less screen used for the picture. It's misleading.

Also, the picture on top (the 57" Toshiba) shows Phantom Menace filling the screen, which it wouldn't do.

The picture at the bottom shows the widescreen vs. standard picture with the standard picture being a box inside the widescreen. Why would they crop the top and bottom of the film? For pan & scan, the sides are cropped and the image is panned back and forth to center on the action. What's the point of cropping the top and bottom? None. That's why it's not done and why the ad is wrong.

 

[Todd_Brown]

Best Buy corp. recently purchased On Cue, Sam Goody, and I assume Suncoast. At my local On Cue, they have a similar posting above their DVD section showing the difference between OAR and Pan & Scam. Even though Wal-Mart is in the same shopping complex, I only buy from On Cue (which means sometimes paying a few dollars more), I'd rather support the store that supports OAR!!

Todd

 

[LukeB]

It's inaccurate, misleading, and confusing....but hey, it's attempting to teach the masses about OAR.... I LIKE IT!

 

[Dave H]

The ad is not 100% correct - but it clearly makes its point and is a big step in the right direction.

 

[Clint B]

This is a great start for Best Buy, but it still doesn't explain why "them thar black bars" are there. By looking at this, one could be led to believe that the black bars are not there on a widescreen DVD--unfortunately, this is not true for most consumers.

 

[DarrenA]

Yes, I agree that for all it's merits this example is very misleading and rather confusing. I saw this in my newspaper this morning and thought to myself the following...

Why did they use a 2.35:1 movie and crop it to 1.78:1?

Why do they show the 4:3 window not filling the height of the 16:9 image?

Why not just show accurate 4:3 and 16:9 images?

Seriously, I'm glad to see some form of education of widescreen televisions, I just had hoped it would have been much more accurate than it was.

 

[Duane Robinson]

It's a good start although it is kinda wrong on certain aspects (forgive the pun). It's better than a lot of major retailers are doing so I give them credit but it also seems like they are just trying to sell some widescreen TVs. Especially with the line about theater-like screens. We all know that you can get the same theatrical aspect ratio on a standard TV but to the uninitiated it might seem like the only way to duplicate this is with a 16:9 TV.

 

[Aaron Garman]

Hello all. I'll have to dig up that ad to see it for myself. One thing I noticed as a former employee of Best Buy is that a few people on the staff knew just about as much as that ad portrays. With the clients we dealt with, it made it easy for them and also got them excited about widesceen movies. I believe this ad will work very well because it is going to reach a large audience. In addition, the sales of widescreen TV's are just going to go up (that was the goal of the ad), which could mean that even Joe Sixpackers (many people who shop at best buy) will now want widescreen movies for their widescreen TV's. Very cool on the part of Best Buy.

AJ Garman

 

[David Lambert]

Hello all. I'll have to dig up that ad to see it for myself

Gee, and I went to all the trouble of posting a capture of the pertinent part of the ad up above! :frowning:

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Why do they show the 4:3 window not filling the height of the 16:9 image?

I assumed due to overscan on 4x3 TVs.

 

[Nick Graham]

Now that they are educating their customers, it's time to educate their employees. I recently went in to exchange my defective copy of the Boogie Nights 2 disc SE at the Joplin, MO store, and of course they had to see the defect in order to believe me. So, I told them what chapter had the defect, but quickly found myself coaching the guy at the service desk on what buttons to press to get there. He had legitimately never worked with a DVD player before! After 30 minutes of a transaction that should have lasted five, and with a rude manager treating me like an idiot for not having a receipt (it was a Christmas present), I was FINALLY out of the store with a working DVD.

 

[DaveF]

Dave L: thanks for posting the picture (why didn't I think of that?)
Why the box-in-a-box illustration? Probably for clarity. This image makes it very clear that the standard picture is a subsection of the widescreen image. It communicates the primary point effectively.
Considering people usually flip through ads. This blurb needed to be understandable after just a few seconds glance, by John Q. Public. I think BB did a bang-up job.
Perhaps HTF sould have a little design contest, to help BB out -- create an accurate explanation of OAR, with the following constraints:
- 300 characters of text
- one graphic illustration
- three colors (excluding colors within graphic illustration)
- fits within approx. 2" x 2" space
- must convey facts, even if only given a cursory glance.
- must encourage reader to purchase new, Widescreen TV (that's the whole point)

 

[Seth Paxton]

Nice that there is some effort and we can move from totally clueless to dangerously mis-informed.
But IMO Best Buy is doing this to SELL 16x9 sets. After all OAR has NOTHING TO DO WITH 16x9 DVDs. In fact Evil Dead is one example where a 4:3 frame is now cropped (with director's approval) to a 1.85 AR and placed on a 16x9 frame (anamorphic).
Best Buy wants to see 16x9 as a format to sell TVs that use this format.

 

[MathewM]

I think part of the reason the standard frame is de-magnified is to try to rid people of the misconception that 16:9 sets are shorter (hence less picture area) than 4:3 sets. I've heard numerous people complain about this issue. I still think that sports is the real way to get the average joe interested in 16:9 sets. Start letterboxing Monday Night Football, NASCAR, WWF etc. and I bet you'll start seeing a huge rise in sales. Of course they'll be pissed for awhile, but once prices drop to 4:3 level, it will be a mute issue. As much as I love the elitism of owning a 16:9 set, I am also desparate for WS material besides DVDs. One can only watch so many movies a week.

I just wanted to add that the same misconception is in the computer market as well. I own a Powerbook G4 that has a wide screen display (like 16:10). I was in Compusa a few weeks ago (the horror) and over heard a store employee disuading a potential buyer from the Powerbook because the screen was shorter than the others. He then went on to (falsely) say that the Powerbook would be soon updated with a taller screen. What a way to confuse the customer.

 

[James_Kiang]

This may belong in a different area but I thought I'd start out putting it here. It seems like many members of HTF are quick to speak out against a lot of the chains - Best Buy, Circuit City, Blockbuster, etc. - when they do something...illogical and they may deserve it. I just wanted to say something in supposrt of Best Buy now that they have done something I feel warrants it. I was looking through their Sunday ad when I noticed something along the bottom 1/3 of the page with the TVs. They are actually informing the consumer about how to go about setting up a Home Theater. As part of this, they mention how DVD allows people to see the director's intended vision and not have any of the picture cropped out. Now, I'm not saying this excuses Best Buy for any mistakes they have made or will make again. It was just nice to see a large retailer taking a step that many of us here at HTF wish more companies would take.

 

[Carlo_M]

Guys,
I can guarantee you that not everyone wants to know the differences between 2.35, 2.0, 1.85, 1.78, 1.66, 1.33, Super35, and the dozen or so other processes to shoot a film.
I think BB is doing enough, so that "The Masses" will start thinking that you see more with widescreen rather than them black bars are covering up picture.
If we can get the Average Guy to NOT complain about the black bars, we can let the studios (who have been doing a great job so far) worry about the specific aspect ratio.
Kudos to Best Buy.

 

[Kevin P]

There is already a thread on this topic.

KJP