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OAR is again in danger for HiDef (1 Viewer)

george kaplan

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No, like the hose going into Violet Beauregarde. Watch that scene and tell me that you're supposed to the hose at the bottom of the screen.
 

PeterTHX

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But 99.9% of the time the director and the cinematographer composed it a different way than what you "like". If it played theatrically, especially back in 1971 when home video didn't exist, then it was meant to be seen 1.85 widescreen.
 

MarkHastings

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One of my favorite "open Matte: Whoops" moments was when Shelly Long opened the dumb waiter (The Money Pit) and the open matte revealed a hand, throwing the fake raccoon at her. :D
 

ChristopherDAC

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Just a tidbit gathered out of my reading: So saith Takashi Fujio, who was made responsible for developing a system which everybody — not just cinéasts with the most expensive equipment available — could use. It's worth noting that High Definition was intended as a replacement for NTSC, and so had to made suitable for broad adoption; all of NHK's development work was done with this in mind, and they came up with quite a few ideas which stayed in the lab because they had no broad applicability. Obviously a packaged media format is different from a broadcast format in this respect, but for economic reasons it still has to be usable by the greatest number [hey, anybody with a TV could watch LaserDiscs]. It's also worth noting that the aspect ratio finally adopted is a little wider after all.
 

DaViD Boulet

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5:3 = 15:9

so you're right, our 16x9 is even a tad wider.

BTW, something else to consider that often gets forgotten: When the aspect ratio was being chosen for HD (regardless of who's system), not only were considerations of "a good fit" for academy aspect ratio programs, 1.85:1 & 2.35:1 movies on the radar, but the technical difficulty of designing direct-view CRT monitors in aspect ratios that were very wide was also an issue that affected our ultimate design.

It's a bit sad that today with flat-panel monitors that are entirely free from technical hurdles like keeping a scanning-beam focused across its arc in a sealed presurized tube that had to carefully be constructed to keep from imploding...that today when HD is finally starting to take off, that a technology that will probably nearly vanish from the marketplace over the next 5 years was actually a primary reason why many of the HD-developers opted to stay as narrow as they did.
 

ChristopherDAC

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I wouldn't count the CRT out yet. Sure, the flat-panel and "digital" projector systems are going to handle the large screen sizes; they were developed, after all, in concurrent research with the other elements of HiVision technology, and everybody knew that the 40-inch direct-view CRT, which required the development of new fabrication techniques [which have given us today's flat-face tubes] was a one-of-a-kind monster. On the other hand, I think a majority of the TVs out there are going to stay in the smaller screen sizes — many of these are 2d or 3d units for home which will already have a big screen — and it's here that tube units have a big advantage. Plasma panels seem to have cell-size problems with fabrication, which are keeping them at 720/768 resolutions even in large sizes, and the problems with achieving an acceptable yield rate in producing what is, essentially, a ridiculously large computer chip are keeping LCD prices high. We're talking about the market range from about $600 down to $60 which encompasses a huge proportion of the units actually moved, mostly in screen sizes of 27" and smaller. I really think the shadowmask tricolour kinescope is going to have the upper hand for a long time yet — and I'm not about to rule that people should be restricted to watching High Definition only on the largest possible display, even if the little ones aren't very good at actually resolving all that detail!
 

ChristopherDAC

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Ah, but a very common ratio in Japan and Europe! From what I understand, many of the films we see at 1.85, they get at 1.66. Certainly the matted-widescreen anime in my collection has a definite 1.66 bias. If your TV is overscanning badly, you may not even be able to see the bars…
 

PeterTHX

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From my understanding the 16:9 ratio was chosen because it was smack dab in the middle of 1.33 and 2.35, with approximately the same size letterbox/pillarbox bars. I know people like Victor Storaro lobbied for a 2:1 ratio (and he crops his 2.35 films on video accordingly, UGH!) but it seems to me at least 1.78 is a good fit.

As a side story, I always thought it was funny when I had to convince my parents widescreen was the way to go. Showing them their favorite films on LaserDisc, and later DVD in their OAR was a revelation to them. Later, when it came time for them to buy a new HDTV (which ended up being a 16:9 Sony KV-34XBR910) my mother asked "aren't there any WIDER TVs?". She thought "scope" TVs were on the horizon! :D I had to convince her that 16:9 was the widescreen TV size for the forseeable future.
 

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