Shoutbox

"16:9" or "1.78"
Standard aspect ratio for widescreen and/or high definition television


"4:3" or "1.34"
Standard aspect ratio for standard definition television (NTSC/PAL).

If you view a 4:3 movie on a widescreen television you see this:

Subtitles appear in the viewscreen.

You can also stretch it out on a widescreen television, then you'll see:

Subtitles appear in the viewscreen (but stretched).


"Anamorphic" and/or "Widescreen" (not nessecairly the same)
Typical standard for encoding widescreen content on a DVD such that it utilizes all available scanlines when encoding (unlike letterbox). The black bars which appear when viewed on a 4:3 screen are not part of the actual picture.


"Letterbox"
A way of producing a widescreen format on a standard 4:3 television. There are black bars above and below the viewscreen. It's a poor means (but often used) method of producing a "widescreen" picture, because not all the scanlines (only 2/3rd) are used for showing the picture; aka: the black bars are also part of the played picture; they are recorded with it:


Note that this can also occur on widescreen movies themselfs if they originally were recorded in a cinemascope (2.35:1) aspect ratio.


"Pan and Scan" or "Full Screen"
Movies encoded into 4:3 ratio by panning and scanning horizontally across the widescreen film to keep the action in the middle of the screen. Though better than merely cropping the image in the center (which is most used in 4:3 formats), this still results in 1/3rd loss of the original picture:


- Note that Pan & Scan can also be used in widescreen movies for the same reason as with the letterboxed ones: Movies are often recorded in an even greater aspect ration than 16:9 (eg: the aspect ratio of screens in the movie theater, aka "cinemascope" or "2.35").

- Note that the vertical equivalent of "pan & scan" is called "tilt and scan" and is also often used together with pan & scan when the movie was recorded in a big full frame aspect ratio. Movies recorded in Full frame and filmed with "open-matte" (no black bars on the negative) will actually show more information on the upper and/or lower parts of the screen on a 4:3 television than the widescreen equivalents. Although this "extra" info often reveals things you shouldn't see like micro booms and other stuff which should normally be concealed from the viewer.


-----------------

- Note that even some HDTV's can not show you a full true widescreen image. Even with those TV's you will see a black bar above and below the image (but the bars will be smaller compared to viewing the same image on a 4:3 TV). The same happens when you view a 2.35 widescreen image on a 16:9 widescreen TV.

- Note that there are many more (widescreen) aspect ratio's though, eg: cinerama, panavision, super-panavision, ultra-panavision, vistavision, technirama, 70mm anamorphic, IMAX, ...


-----------------

more details:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_and_scan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widescreen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anamorphic
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letterbox
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/14:9
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinemascope
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panavision


-----------------

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ghost_Stalker
Just curious, what do you find wrong with the 16:9 format? Its a more natual way of seeing things.

---

Actually it isn't...

The reason why widescreen is more in favor is because it contains more visible info, not because it is more "natural".

With the words of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widescreen:

quote:

---

Since the human eye has a field of view that extends farther to the sides than it does above or below, a widescreen image makes more effective use of the field of view, thereby producing a more immersive viewing experience.

However,

The human field of vision, based upon the angular ratio of our fields of view (180 degrees horizontal, 135 degrees vertical), is in fact closer to the older ratio of 4:3, and not widescreen ratios such as 16:9 or 2.35:1.

Also the area of the retina used for detailed vision is circular, not rectangular. Consequently, large-format technologies like IMAX favor a 4:3 format!!!

---