Blue Ray Aspect Ratios

Gentle reminder to use the search engine before posting. This topic comes up once per week and we have quite a few existing threads on the topic. When I put aspect ratio in the search engine, here are just a few of the many threads:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...t=aspect+ratio

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...t=aspect+ratio

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...t=aspect+ratio

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...t=aspect+ratio

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...t=aspect+ratio

The director shot the film in the aspect ratio of 2:40:1, so to see ALL of the films image you need bars at the top and bottom. You won't find many ppl at an HT hobbyist website that believe chopping portions of the image off to fill the screen worth it in the long run.

Someone really needs to make an OAR sticky.

For the same reason movies weren't all 1.33:1 when people only had 4x3 sets. It's because movies are typically made to be seen in theatres, where the aspect ratio can be essentially whatever the director wants to fit his or her artistic preference. The only way to do a film justice on home video is to show it the way it was meant to be seen.

Directors are the ones deciding on the aspect ratios and they don't care whether their movies will fit your little screen. They only care how their movies will look in the theaters.

The DVD companies don't make the movies (*) - they just release the movies that were made for cinemas (theaters). Given that a lot of films are made in a Cinemascope style widescreen, and projected in this manner in the cinema, and given that most home TVs aren't Cinemascope aspect ratio, then when mastered for DVD, HD-DVD, BluRay or TV broadcast they have to transfer them either to fill the screen, cropping bits of the original picture, or transfer them to show the whole film frame, with black bars top and bottom. The latter is preferred for DVD releases and by some movie channels, whilst the former is used less often for DVD releases, but is more common for general broadcast outlets.

(*) Yes - I know that the DVDs are often released by the same studio that makes the movie - but they don't make the movie specifically for DVD release, and the department that releases the DVDs is not the same dept. that makes the movie.

2.35:1 and the other "wide" aspect ratios were designed to bring people back to the cinemas after the invention of the television. It gives peripheral information like normal sight. It looks a heck of a lot better. If you saw a movie projected at 4:3 you'd be like "What the heck is this? I want my money back!".

Most theaters use curtains to cover the sides of the screen not used in 1.78:1 showings.

Who knows, maybe someday TVs will be in 2.35:1 ratio and you'll be complaining about the black bars on the sides.

Greetings

How come all pieces of sting don't come in the same length?

Regards

I wish movies would switch to 1:85:1. I thought the reason why movies were shot in wider aspect ratio was because they wanted to fit as many people into a theater as possible and by stretching the screen into a super wide aspect ratio, it allows for more people to fit into a theater room.

I believe it was narsil that was in shards of varying size and shape.

Dude,

With a comment like that without doing some research, you're just asking for trouble!!!

Pidge,
Theaters using masking and moving screens to accomplish the wider aspect ratios.


Spielberg still uses 2.35. He didn't start using 1.85 to compromise like Kubrick rather it made specific films look better for the composition he wanted.

Ya.....

I don't even know what to say.

that's not evil.

stick to HBO HD.

Zoom away.

Please explain how "stretching the screen into a super wide aspect ratio" allows more people to fit into a theater?

With this talk about "moving to 1.85:1 because of HDTV," remember it could go the other way. Directors may be more likely to shoot in 2.35:1 because now less of the home screen will be taken up with black bars. I believe that one reason why there's been an increase in 2.35:1 recently is due to widespread OAR presentations on DVD. Knowing the films won't be cropped in homes (if they choose the widescreen version) may be making them more comfortable with the wider ratio.

Learn to love those black bars and wider than widescreen presentations, it is the only way to see the movie as it is suposed to be.

I love it, the wider the better I say.

Partial credit. Films adopted many technological innovations in response to market pressures. For example, sound was adopted in response to radio, color in response to black and white TV and wide screen in response to color television. Their goal was to get as many people in the theaters as possible, but they were not worried about screen size as much as competition.

/carmi

The answer is similar to "showing your work" in a math problem. The answer is correct that as you and others have pointed out the innovation was to "attracted" a wider audience (pun intended) and lure ppl back to the movies. But just as in a math problem, the member's work to get to the answer was way off base....the innovation had nothing to do with a reason to change the shape of the theater to add more seats.

Ron

So, a "wider audience" wasn't just to attract more overweight people?

Sorry. My previous statement was more of a comment rather than fact. Anyways, I think the HDTV aspect ratio is the perfect ratio for a home. And that is my personal opinion, not something based on research or polls