Wide vs. Full PQ (1 Viewer)

[Doug Z]

I have read all about which aspect ratio shows as far as "too much" or "unwanted" info of the scene but for my set in question...RP CRT widescreen, is there any PQ quality issues with full-screen over wide? I have the Departed in FS and my BIL has wide and I think the FS copy looks worse, is this the norm with FS?

 

[Jack Johnson]

Apart from all the inherent aspect ratio issues--what's "intended" and what's not--sometimes Full Screen transfers will offer a more detailed image of whatever imagery lands in the frame. If you do a line of resolution count on a 2.35:1 anamorphic dvd with all its resolution "unpacked" on a 4 by 3 screen (with the dvd player set to "16:9") the resulting, vertically stretched image will still not be as tall as the "full screen" transfer. So it would seem the full screen transfer would offer more finely rendered images, depending on the framing...but at heinous cost of cropping the original theatrical ratio.

I don't know if this holds true for 1.85:1 films; resolution may be nearly comparable there, with the key difference being the framing (no cropping with widescreen, a tad with full).

 

[David_Blackwell]

Full Screen to me just contains lots more video noise than a Widescreen copy of the same film. That is the way it looks to me from what films I have had the misofrtune of viewing in FS instead of WS.

 

[Sean Richardson]

I would assume that 'The Departed' was shot open matte, so I don't think there should be a difference (I may be wrong on that). If the fullscreen movie is pan and scan, though, then the picture quality should be worse because they're blowing up the image more. There's no new details, and the ones which are there are spread a little more thin.

That is naturally assuming that you have a big enough screen to make out the details in the widescreen transfer; up to a point, the extra lines of resolution for fullscreen vs. widescreen would probably help the fullscreen transfer, but I only have a 20" TV, and I can usually tell pretty quickly whether a movie is open matte or pan-and-scan because of the blow-up.

 

[cafink]

I don't think this is quite correct.

Because the pan-and-scan version uses the full 720x480 pixel image area for its display, while the widescreen version uses only part of that resolution for the same picture area, there is more detail to be gained. The film negatives from which a DVD transfer is made contain much more detail than can be resolved by DVD's meager 480 lines. Some of this detail ought to show up in the additional resolution afforded a pan-and-scan transfer, correct?

 

[Stephen_J_H]

It all boils down to what the originating negative was. If the ONeg was Super35 or open matte, it would be a non issue. IMDb has The Departed listed as 4 perf Super35 and this is not the type of film that has oodles of digital effects, so the resolution should be fine in any scene other than an effects scene, provided that the transfer was done from the open matte negative or an interpositive derived therefrom. If someone goofed up and transferred from a matted and scope converted element, there would be the attendant loss in resolution.