Wide HDTV - It simply isn't all that wide.

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aristide1
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Wide HDTV - It simply isn't all that wide.

Post by aristide1 » Thu Feb 28, 2013 11:26 am

When I view a movie on a 16:9 set it fills the screen. Is this good? It depends.

16:9 in cinema terms works out to 1.777778:1. Now this is very close to 1.85:1 which some movies are filmed in, you won't be missing much.

However, many of my movies are 2.35:1. In computer terms that works out to over 21:9. Which means about 25% of the width of the picture is lost if it is scaled to filled the screen height-wise. To test this theory I decided to watch The Chronicles of Riddick, filmed in a massive 2.4:1 ratio on my PC, then compare some scenes to DVD playback through my DVD player. No doubt about it, the DVD player simply eliminates 25% of the picture, which in some of the spaceship scenes is very significant. It may not be the greatest classic you've ever seen and at 1.778:1 it's a large movie, but at 2.4:1 it's an epic size movie.

I don't know if BD or DVD players are willing to scale to width and place bars on wide screen TVs, but there should be such an option. I will need to check out my remote more closely. I'm hoping the Oppo BD-103 allows viewing this way.

I've never understood why bars bother so many people, I feel like I am a movie theater when I see them, and they make an excellent backdrop for subtitles. Early Oppo players even allowed for gray bars instead of black to minimize plasma burn-in.

Now I'm going to watch Ben-Hur with the classic chariot race scene in all its wide wide screen glory.

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