Pulp Fiction SE Problem (1 Viewer)

[Angelo_Alex]

Hello all!
I am new to this forum and wanted to say hello and pose a question to you all. I picked up my S.E. of Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown. My J.B. dvd is perfect. I seem to have no problem, but I am having a problem with my Pulp Fiction.
I am getting 2 sets of letterbox borders. One is 1.85:1 and the other is 2.35:1. Has anyone else experienced this problem? It is very weird. I am not sure if this is a defective dvd or what. I have checked all the settings on my dvd player and put in a few other discs to do a double check but everything seems to check out? If anyone has any ideas, please let me know! Thanks all!


Angelo_Alex

 

[NickFoley]

I've never experienced that before. Two different sets of black bars? Interesting.

One thing that I will add, is that the PF layer change is in a horrible place.

 

[Ian_H]

I have yet to watch my copy of Pulp Fiction but I did notice the same problem with Lord of the Rings. You can see the "extra" black bars when the film fades to black.


--Ian

 

[Brett Hancock]

I also noticed this on Lord of the Rings. However Lord of the Rings was filmed with a 2:35 aspect ratio so the lighter black bars are not really extra but still it is a weird thing to see.

 

[Angelo_Alex]

I am glad to know that I am not the only one noticing some weird stuff going on from a dvd. The one thing is that I am watching my dvd's right now on a 19inch tv while my Proton is getting fixed. Fortunately I get the set back on wednesday and I was gonna wait to see how it looks on that set, but I think I am gonna return it and take my chance on another copy and see what happens.


Angelo_Alex

 

[cafink]

Have you had your television calibrated or anything, or is it still set to the default, out-of-the-box settings?

"Pulp Fiction" is 2.35:1, and the DVD is anamorphic, which means that there actually ARE two sets of black bars — one to frame the 2.35:1 film within the 16:9 anamorphic image, and another to frame that 16:9 area within your 4:3 television. The former is encoded on the "Pulp Fiction" disc itself, while the latter is being generated by your DVD player.

Both are black. With a properly calibrated monitor, you shouldn't really be able to notice the difference, but they're not always the exact same shade.

 

[Joel Mack]

One thing that I will add, is that the PF layer change is in a horrible place.

Where is it? I watched it the other day, and didn't even notice it...

 

[Lyle_JP]

The reason for the "two letterbox bars" is that the whole disc has been mastered too brightly, so that even the letter-box bars (inside the 16:9 frame) are a shade of grey instead of true black. The reason you see two sets of bars, one black, one grey, is because your player is generating the set of black ones to frame the 16:9 image in your 4:3 television.
And no, this is not a case of his set "not being calibrated". In fact, a well calibrated set will show this defect in the Pulp Fiction set, whereas a poorly calibrated set (with brightness set too low) will not. Simply put, the black letter box bars should have been black. If they contrast at all with the player generated bars then they are obviously not black, but rather a dark shade of grey.
Secondly, yes, this is one of the worst and most infuriating layer changes in recent memory! Worst, because it interupts the flow of arguably the greatest (and certainly the most bizzare) monologue in the history of film. Most infuriating, because there is actually a fade-to-black scarcely two minutes before where they stuck the layer change!! I refuse to believe that space was at such a premium that they couldn't have changed the location of the layer change by only 2 minutes. And if space was at that kind of premium, then they should have dropped the DTS track (and that means a lot coming from me, since I'm one of the biggest DTS boosters on the HTF).
-Lyle J.P.

 

[Patrick Mirza]

Carl's explanation is correct. A 16x9 transfer measures at 1.78:1 - appropriately sized bands are needed within the actual film transfer to translate that ratio to 1.85, 2.0, 2.1, 2.35, etc.

 

[Bruce Hedtke]

The layer change was poorly chosen. It could've been planned much better. But, the "Gold Watch" switchover screen probably wouldn't be a good choice either, as the audio that played in the background was pretty important to the story.

Bruce

 

[Matt Pelham]

I posted this EXACT same problem in the LOTR DVD thread a few weeks back, and people simply dismissed the idea entirely saying my TV contrast levels were wrong. I'm soooooo glad to know I'm not the only one. So far Pulp Fiction and Lord of the Rings are the only two 2.35:1 movies I've had this problem with.

 

[Angelo_Alex]

I knew I was not seeing things. And to double check I put on a few other discs like "The Phantom Menace" and "Unbreakable" and they are both 2.35:1 and anamorphic and I can only see the one set of bars which are the 2.35:1 bars. Like I said before I am getting back my regualr t.v. set which I have had for 11 years and still ROCKS, Proton VT-296 if there are a few other Proton owners out there, and see if that helps any.


Angelo_ALex

 

[Lyle_JP]

The layer change was poorly chosen. It could've been planned much better. But, the "Gold Watch" switchover screen probably wouldn't be a good choice either, as the audio that played in the background was pretty important to the story.

I was actually referring to the fade-to-black which occurs before Walken's monologue begins (right after Vincent bids Mia goodnight). It is a fade-to-black with silence and a perfect candidate for layer change placement.

-Lyle J.P.