stupid question regarding my new HDTV

[Dominic]

first of all, I've ALWAYS bought widescreen/letterboxed DVDs, as I'm an advocate of seeing a film the way the filmmakers wanted me to see it.

Anyway...my new TV is a widescreen, with an option that lets you change the aspect ratio between:

16:9 standard
16:9 zoom
4:3 standard
4:3 expanded
4:3 zoom1
4:3 zoom2

Now...when I put in a widescreen DVD....say, Kill Bill...the 16:9 standard is both letterboxed and looking a little squeezed. The best of my choices seem to the 4:3 expanded, as I see most of the picture (only a little bit of the right and left edges are cut off) and it fills more of the screen than the 16:9 standard. All the other choices cut off too much of the available frame for my liking.

I guess because most films I'm looking at on DVD seem to have been shot in 2.35:1,, I'm going to see the letterboxing even on my wide screen. The only time I won't is if the film haappened to have been shot in 16:9 - which very few films are.

Am I right? Or am I missing something easy that will fill up my big, beautiful screen???

/images/graemlins/confused.gif

[Joe Tall]

I'm a little confused to what you mean by, [ QUOTE ]
the 16:9 standard is both letterboxed and looking a little squeezed

[/ QUOTE ]

but the 16:9 standard should be the correct one.

[Dominic]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm a little confused to what you mean by, [ QUOTE ]
the 16:9 standard is both letterboxed and looking a little squeezed

[/ QUOTE ]

but the 16:9 standard should be the correct one.

[/ QUOTE ]

When I put in a letterboxed DVD and my TV is set to 16:9 standard, I can see the whole frame, but the picture is still letterboxed - probably because most films are not shot in 16:9, but 2.35:1 or more....

[joshman1204]

I have the same exact question I just never thought to ask OOT.

[kenberman]

you are right: very few DVD's are exactly 16:9, even if they are "widescreen".

you will still get letterboxing on most DVD's, and the determinant is the DVD native aspect ratio. you can fiddle with your TV settings, but it really depends on the DVD you watch...

this was a dissapointment for me when I first watched DVD's on my widescreen monitor. I automatically assumed the picture would fill up the whole screen. alas, I was dissapointed.

[wonderwes]

a dvd is progressive but still not true HD. You are only getting it at 480p. When BluRay dvd's come out (also on the ps3) you will have true HD quality on your tv. Do you have a progressive scan DVD player? The quality of your DVD player (the decoder on it) will really start to show on a nice HDTV.

[Brainwalter]

Make sure the DVD player is set to know that the TV is 16:9. Then the image will not be stretched, but of course if the image is wider than 16:9 there will still be letterbox.

Does this make sense?

[kenberman]

[ QUOTE ]
a dvd is progressive but still not true HD. You are only getting it at 480p. When BluRay dvd's come out (also on the ps3) you will have true HD quality on your tv. Do you have a progressive scan DVD player? The quality of your DVD player (the decoder on it) will really start to show on a nice HDTV.

[/ QUOTE ]

progressive/Blu Ray/etc are all different issues than aspect ratio.

you prob know this, but HD deals with the amount of lines on the screen at the same time. Progressive/interlaced deals with how those lines are displayed.

aspect ratio deals with the horizontal/vertical ratio of display

[Dominic]

the picture looks phenomenal...I know it'ss not true HD...but it still looks better than my old TV.

[Dominic]

yes! Didn't think that the DVD player might have an option for this...thanks.

[whiskeytown]

right..

official movie size is 2.35-1 many films are shot this way but a lot are shot and brought down to 1.85-1 -

but if it's a big movie, expect to have to expand the picture a bit - I see a lot of movies (on Sundance) that are broadcast in 4:3 but have the letterboxs there too - and then you use the zoom function to get it to fill the whole screen...

pretty damned cool - my DVD does the conversions automatically but it also stretches my stuff to 16:9 which pisses me off when it's a 4:3 movie - so I have to use the vertical stretch option to even it out-

RB

[ QUOTE ]
official movie size is 2.35-1 many films are shot this way but a lot are shot and brought down to 1.85-1 -

[/ QUOTE ]

Thanks! I've always wondered why some but not all DVDs are still letterboxed on my HDTV as well (though not stretched incorrectly the way Dom described).