WideScreen vs. FullScreen

[Fsiphskilm]

So which do YOU preffer?

[Bobtheduck]

Wide Screen... I prefer to see the whole picture...

I grew up not knowing that Bobba Fett was even in Empire Strikes Back because he was always off in the corner... I didn't see him there until I saw it in cinemascope in the theaters during the re-release.

[The Silence]

this is on topic really:

You know those recent-est TVs you can get that are more widescreen sized, so when you watch movies the fit the screen properly without being cropped? When one is watching nomal TV on those things, one has the option of either having the image with black on either side or having it s-t-retch-e-d out weirdly, and it drives me insane to see it stretched out .... bleeah.

Ok well, maybe that was rather random, but it is relevant to wide/full screeness...

[Straylight]

You know what I like? playing PS2 games on a widescreen tv. Silent Hill 2 is so much more fun that way

[The Silence]

do you have a larger view that way?

[Orange Kitten]

So which do YOU preffer?

So post what you like, and why you like it .

Simple answer, full screen sucks.

I mean, if the original was shot on full screen then alrighty cool. But all major movies are widescreen. Cropping the image takes out like 20% - 30% of the image. Get used to the black bars, if you don't like em, get a bigger TV to compensate. Take a look at the ratios Full screen is easy, you got the 4:3 ratio. Widescreen, well it's a little more complex. You got 16:9, 2:1, 2.35:1, 1.85:1 and any others I missed? The point is, take a widescreen ratio, and then convert it to fullscreen, that's a lot of your image that goes *woop* out the window.

Know what's worse than fullscreen? Pan & Scan. That's like a cross between the two that fails miserably. It's fullscreen, but then it digitally pans the entire screen over to the left or right to show something important on the screen that is cropped by the 4:3 format. But it looks like crap.

I say keep the movie in whatever format you originally shot it in.

[shooraijin]

I'm not really sure which to choose, but since I have "only" a 20 inch television, full-frame looks better even though I despise the loss of large portions of the view (zoom on a wide-screen, unless the bit rate is high, just looks pixellated). Nevertheless, if I'm forced to make a choice, I usually buy widescreen DVDs because I imagine one of these days I'll own a widescreen TV. My parents do already, in fact.

[madphilb]

I feel yourpain Shooraijin, I've got a crummy 19" screen (or my 17" monitor on the computer), but I think I still preferr to see the whole scene.

Few years back they ran Superman (the orignal movie) on one of the cable stations, I had seen that movie a bunch of times, we had it taped off cable on our Beta VCR for crying out loud! But I've always seen it full frame (cropped images and all). But when they put it on whatever channel it was, they ran it letterbox. Some of the scenes where so much better widescreen. A young Clark Kent standing on the edge of a wheat field with the wind rippling, etc.... very cool and touching scene, way better than the full frame of Clark standing in some grass

BTW, the Finding Nemo movie did something different (if you can believe them, I haven't watched it) with their full-frame version. Aparently they kept the width on the shots and opened them up vertically.

PHIL

[Link Antilles]

I'm not a major fan of wide screen TVs, cause they're to darn expensive. I have a 15" monitor, a 19" TV, and I'm perfectly happy. Anyways, I have a lot better things to buy than a new TV. Though, in the far future I might get one.

[Shao Feng-Li]

i got a 65 inch WS tv... Xbox looks awsome on it! i hate when i rent a dvd and they only got the full screen version!!! GRR

[Lufkin777]

Wide Screen all the way.

[Ashley]

Well how do widescreen TV sets affect normal viewing, like with tv shows and stuff? Don't you still get a funny box?

[shooraijin]

Depends on how it's done. On my parents' Samsung plasma, normal 4:3 TV signals can either be: 1) stretched to the full width (looks weird), 2) same aspect ratio with black bars on the left and right (ugly but watchable), or 3) stretched on the edges with the center normal sort of in an parabolic warp fashion -- this minimizes the stretch of #1, has no black bars like #2, but when the camera pans left and right the distorted edges warp badly and actually the effect is kind of ... disorienting.

There's no good way IMHO, but when I watch their TV, I usually use #2.

[shooraijin]

BTW, the Finding Nemo movie did something different (if you can believe them, I haven't watched it) with their full-frame version. Aparently they kept the width on the shots and opened them up vertically.

I'm not even sure how they could accomplish that without distortion, though. There's just not enough real estate on the screen. *puzzled*

[madphilb]

I'm not even sure how they could accomplish that without distortion, though. There's just not enough real estate on the screen. *puzzled*

2 disk set... .disk 1 has the widescreen, disk 2 the full screen re-framed (re-rendered?) to keep the wide shots and fill in the bottom. Least, that's what they say on the intro to the DVD, haven't watched it yet

PHIL

[shooraijin]

Well, let me know. I'm curious about the aspect ratio difference.

[Shinja]

im waiting on the imax view personal tv.

[Fsiphskilm]

Yea, widescreen is the future.

[Orange Kitten]

check your settings

[Fsiphskilm]

When you first buy your

[Orange Kitten]

Like I said, there are many different types of Widecreen. There is no 'one' standard. A movie can be made widescreen in either the 16:9, 2.35:1, 2:1, or 1.85:1 ratio. Your TV can only be one. And if your dvd has a different ratio than the dvd, you'll see black bars; the size of the bars varies on the ratio.

Like i said Most of today's TV aren't TRUE WIDESCREEN, they are Wider(er) Screen.

What (to you) IS a TRUE widescreen?

[madphilb]

I personally consider Widescreen (or Letterbox as it's noted on VHS tapes, not that I buy these anymore) to be the full width of the original production.

Since these productions very by width, some movies will still show up as "letterbox" on a widescreen TV. Take a movie like Ben Hur for instance. If I remember correctly there are parts of that movie where they pulled back the curtains aside the screen to make the image even wider (If I remember correctly, the image is almost 3x as wide as it is tall compared to a typical TV screen).

There is a standard for Widescreen TVs though (I think)... something to do with the HDTV standard if I'm not mistaken.

PHIL

[Tet-chan]

I prefer widescreen......
maybe because all the movies i watch are in widescreen

[Fsiphskilm]

Wide(er) tv's are just WIDER

[ShiroiHikari]

The widescreen TV thing sounds like it sucks. ; _ ;

But as far as movies go...widescreeeeeen. But there are still these jerks that make the widescreen version of the DVD kinda hard to find.

[Gypsy]

I prefer widescreen.

[Fsiphskilm]

Grrrrrrr..

[otaku]

depends on the tv size but if its a big screen with widescreen support certaily, its more the movie you'd see on the theatre

[kaze]

widescreen, of course. i made the mistake of accidentally buying the full screen version of The Two Towers...

[Bobtheduck]

You know what sucks? The fansubs of the 3 sailormoon movies are in widescreen... I deleted those (like 4 years ago, or whenever they came out) in favor if the legitamate movies, and they are FULL SCREEN! Man... I was so mad...

Some new anime are being made in a widescreen format even on TV (like .hack//sign) I hope that as they gain a US release, they aren't sliced up to make them fit the full screen (or even worse, "squished")