Plasma's screen has black lines w/ DVD?

There are several different movie aspect ratios. The ones that most closely fit a 16:9 widescreen TV are 1.77:1 and 1.85:1.


Some filmmakers (George Lucas, among them) prefer to use a wider format (like 2.35:1 or 2.40:1), since that more closely matches the human eye's field of vision. You probably rented some 2.35:1 "super-widescreen" movies, and hence saw some letterboxing.


Hope this helps,

-MrB

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If you see black bars on the top and bottom of some movies - this is normal. The film was made with the 2.35:1 ratio. If you don't like the black bars - use the zoom function. Star Wars movies are good examples.


Toy story, spiderman are examples of movies that will fill the screen.


JCPZero

Look for anamorphic movies, they will best fill the screen. It's a common misconception that 16:9 tv = no black bars.

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Careful, this could be misleading to newbies.


Anamorphic does not mean "fills a 16:9 screen." Anamorphic is a process in which the DVD is transferred to display correctly on a 16:9 display. (Non-anamorphic titles, which are rare now, were formatted for display on a 4:3 TV set).


However, most wide-screen Anamorphic transfers preserve the original aspect ratio of the film. Since film aspect ratios vary, you'll still see that variation show up on your 16:9 display (e.g. 2:35:1 aspect ratio movies will be wider than the 16:9 display so it will have black bars top and bottom).

This archived thread might help out. It has a great explanation provided by a forum member.


I'm also a big fan of the images that let you get a good visual of the aspect ratios as listed on Digital bits .


Enjoy!


-JR

If you look very closely in the fine print on the back side of the DVD retail box it should show the movie's aspect ratio, if it says 1.85:1 it will fill the 16:9 display, if its bigger like 2.35:1 it will have black bars - thats normal.