side bars (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Willis]

Greg,

Welcome to HTF! This place is an amazing source of information, to say the least. The gang here knows the subjects and I've learned a lot since becoming a member. I'm mainly a TV/DVD collector but I jump over to the film Bd occastionally to get some info Plus it's a well-admin'ed forum site. When a thread starts to get "out of control", it doesn't last too long here.

Billy, thanks for the clarificaiton post. I'm somewhat new myself to the HD world having recently entered it with my 1st WS TV & upgraded DTV HD svc. Fortunately, I'm one of the "4:3 sidebars don't get to me" crowd. It's good that I am since I watch a lot of 4:3 OAR material.

One thing I can say for certain for anyone out there considering entering the WS TV market. You'll never want to go back to a 4:3 CRT TV

I've found that my 50" Plasma set doesn't take away anything from watching even some 50's/60's TV/DVD's on it. And anamorphic films...WOW

The only "peeve" that I have is waiting for (hopefully) the anamorphic releases of a few of the older LB movies in my collection.

 

[Sumnernor]

I have a "wide screen" TV and not the "normal" 4:3 TV. I will define "stretch" which will distort a picture such that a circle is no longer a circle but an oval.My german TV "Loewe" has various picture options: 16:9, 4:3, "Pan", "Cine", and "Zoom". I'd forget the names and use : 16:9 and 4:3, Zoom1, Zoom2, and Zoom3.

16:9 is for most DVDs that are not 4:3 (or "Letterboxed"). All TV programs will use 4:3 or one of the Zooms.The german stations ARD and ZDF have a widescreen "PALPLUS" which fills the screen. This is a widescreen LB. No picture information is missing and a circle is a circle. Other german stations use zoom2 or zoom3. Depending on the particular TV, if one has a picture with black bars left & right AND top & bottom, one must then use the zoom function to adjust the picture. This a widescreen Letter Box. As described above, TV programs that are 4:3 will have only black bars left & right. For a 4:3 picture, if you choose 16:9. you will distort or "stretch" the picture. The whole screen will be used but the picture will be distorted. There are some DVDs that are not 16:9 but are letter-boxed. Examples are the original Star Wars 4,5 and 6. Also "Barry Lydon" and surprisingly DGG's Verdi Macbeth. Most DGG, Philips, and DECCA DVDs are 16:9 wide screen.

I usually watch 4:3 programs with the left & right black bars. A friend told me that after 6 months, you will fill the screen but not me!. For my TV the first setting "zoom1" almost fills the screen with 2 very thin bars left and right and a small bit of info is missing. I also have a friend who zooms further so that there are no bars, but then alot of picture information is lost.

There are some 16:9 DVDs, that have black bars top and bottom due to the Aspect Ratio of the film such as Ben Hur but no picture information is lost. For many widescreen films this is normal.

 

[David_B_K]

gcan, Summnernor sums up all the black bar options nicely. I never stretch anything on my TV, and the only time I zoom is if I am watching a non-anamorphic widescreen movie. As long as you have a big screen, I do not think you will regret watching anything in its proper aspect ration. I have a 62" screen, but your 50" screen is still pretty big, and movies should look fine on your display without any zooming.

 

[TonyD]

greg you'll find a lot of friends here.

billy great job quoting that ridiculous post by ernest, he must have been kidding.

 

[BillyFeldman]

Ah, I just noticed that Ernest completely nuked his post. I don't get it - can someone explain that to me - is he a troll?

 

[Robert Crawford]

A bad attempt at humor or thought better of that post??? Either way, let's move on.





Crawdaddy

 

[GerardoHP]

Greg, first of all, congratulations on your new TV.

Movies and TV programming come in all sorts of different aspect ratios. That's just the reality of it. It's been like this since the beginning, but this may have been hidden by the fact that, frequently, movies are cropped to fit the entire frame of TV set.

I think if you try to get used to each show or movie's correct aspect ratio, eventually you won't mind the bars at the top and bottom or on the sides. In my opinion, those are preferable to having your picture distorted or cropped by zooming or stretching, where in some cases you'll be missing some important information.