When "Foolscreen" dvds are necessary... (1 Viewer)

[MarkHastings]

Hey Rob, remember the time when your posts were HUGE?:
April 27, 2003

Well, it's happening again:
Oct. 28, 2003



I believe this only happens in the Safari app (Macintosh)

 

[Rob Tomlin]

Well, Mark, it just means that you have to pay extra attention to all my posts!

 

[MarkHastings]

They scare me though

 

[Brian PB]

Just to reiterate: Fullscreen (please let the only-funny-the-first-time-I-heard-it and misleading term "foolscreen" die a quick death) is not the enemy.

Pan & Scan is the enemy.

 

[Brian McHale]

Don't forget Open Matte, which is the slightly-less-hated-than-P&S enemy.

 

[Rob Tomlin]

Don't forget Open Matte, which is the slightly-less-hated-than-P&S enemy.

Not sure why this is so.

I mean, in an "open matte" transfer, we are actually seeing more picture information, correct?

 

[Aaron_Brez]

In some scenes. In anything with effects, we get zoomed P&S. This is not to mention the times when we see things in the unmatted area that we don't want to see (see A Fish Called Wanda, Muppet Movie, Pee Wee's Big Adventure).

The original aspect ratio, as specified by the director and/or cinematographer, is the only way to see the show. All others are Evil(tm).

 

[MarkHastings]

(see A Fish Called Wanda, Muppet Movie, Pee Wee's Big Adventure).

The Money Pit

 

[Jason*C]

Thanks everyone. Your posts helped out alot.

 

[Joshua_W]

If you're looking for a good sci-fi show that's 16 X 9, check out the Babylon 5 boxed sets. They weren't cropped, they were originally filmed with the future format in mind. (Or so says the show's creator.) Very good show.

Not exactly -- it's a bit more complicated than that.

The show was filmed Super-35 in a widescreen aspect ratio, and then cropped at the sides for broadcast in 4:3. Sort of like "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." (It should be noted that Joss Whedon is on the record stating that 4:3 is his intended ratio for that series. He went to so far as to include a note in the Season Four boxed set.) In Babylon 5's case, it was always intended that the show would be shown in 16:9 widescreen at some point in the future -- at the time, they thinking HDTV.

When Babylon 5 was produced, the CGI effects were created in the 4:3 aspect ratio as well, with the understanding that they could be re-rendered from the original computer files when the time came to do widescreen transfers.

It was stipulated in the contracts that the special effects companies could not keep copies of the necessary computer files to re-render the CGI, as they were properties of Warner Bros.

So what did Warner Bros. do? They trashed the only copies of the files available.

In order to release Babylon 5 in widescreen, pretty much any shot with CGI in it had to be cropped at the top and/or bottom. Along with this, there's also a loss of resolution that tends to stand out in the effects shots. While more image is gained in live-action shots, it's also lost in effects shots.

As such, I still haven't been able to shell out the cash to buy the Babylon 5 DVDs. Even though it was released this way with the creator's blessing, it feels like a compromised work.