Hot Topic #2: Widescreen vs. Fullscreen

[Brian Cruz]

Would anybody here refuse to buy a full screen DVD of a widescreen movie? Does anybody here hate those black bars and can't understand why so many people prefer widescreen? Did anyone used to hate widescreen but now love it? Has anybody ever tried to educate someone on the beneifts of widescreen? Post your widescreen vs. full screen experiences here!

[Bird Boy]

oh man..I used to hate widescreen..that's all I can watch now.

I will NOT buy a DVD if it's fullscreen...it has to be widescreen...

-BB

[James Harvey]

Widescreen. On Wednesday I went to go buy SILENCE OF THE LAMBS and had trouble finding the widescreen edition. It took me three stores to finally find the widescreen edition. I just dislike full screen completely now becuase they cut out sooo much! Widescreen all the way!

[Joker85]

Before I got a DVD player, I hated widescreen, but now I would not buy a DVD unless it had a widescreen option on it. I only own 2 DVDs with ONLY full screen on it.:)

[Calhoun07]

I just want the movie the way it was originally filmed and intended to be seen by the director. While there aren't many films shot in the 1.33:1 ratio, there are a few (TRUE STORIES comes to mind) and I would be just as upset at a widescreen DVD if it was a movie that was intended to be seen in full screen. But like I said, there aren't many.

Black bars are also a non issue for me. I don't even think of them as black bars, and really hate it when people use that terminology. It's just space that's not being used, they didn't put black bars over the picture, which is what some people think when they see that.

I do refuse to buy pan and scan movies on DVD if I know it was shot in widescreen ratio. But it goes deeper than that, because you can have a wide screen movie but if the ratio on the DVD is 1.85:1 and the ratio is supposed to be 2.35:1, for example, then I also think that is wrong. Which is why I stress I want to see the movies the way they were originally shot. If you take a 2.35:1 movie and crop it down to 1.85:1 movie on DVD, it's just as bad as taking a 1.85:1 movie and cropping it down to 1.33:1 ratio for full screen. The bottom line is the director's original intent of the movie should be and must be preserved on the DVD. Anything less is unacceptable.

I have tried to educate people on it in the past, and the main objection I hear every time from somebody who hates widescreen and wants full screen is that they feel the "black bars" are preventing them from seeing the entire picture. What is ironic, that's what widescreen embracers are saying, they want to see the entire picture and they want nothing cut out. Most of the people I try to educate feel they are getting everything on a full screen movie, and while I've seen some come to the realization of what widescreen is about, most just go on in their ignorance and bliss, not hearing what you say when you tell them a movie screen is a rectangle and their TV screen is a square. They just don't get it, or don't want to.

Now, I want to raise this question....

We are living in a digital age, where it's possible for movie studios to reformat the picture to get EVERYTHING in on the TV screen when they make it full frame. Take Bug's Life, for example. On the two disc set, they have a comparison between full frame and widescreen, and they were able to digitally move all the characters into the full frame screen and where the empty spaces were on the top and bottom in other shots, they were able to fill them in digitally. So, in reality, you are not missing anything when you watch Bug's Life or Toy Story in full frame, just maybe slightly altered here and there to format it into the full frame but you are missing nothing. And as movies become more digital as time goes on, I could see other movies able to do this.

Now, for my answer, I go back to my original statement....I want to see the movie the way it was shot for theatrical release. While I may not be missing anything on full frame Bug's Life, that is not the way the movie was filmed for theatrical release.

In closing, full frame people are of a dying breed. I see more older adults who hate widescreen. Kids have grown up on widescreen movies and widescreen videos and such, and I hardly ever hear a kid complain about a full frame movie.

[James Harvey]

The only FULL FRAME DVDs that I have that I can think of offhand are RETURN OF THE JOKER, BATMAN BEYOND: THE MOVIE, the three X-MEN: TAS discs, and ROUGHNECKS. The rest are all widescreen (save the DVDs with both FULL/WIDESCREEN versions).

[Calhoun07]

I bought Vison Quest on DVD, and was disappointed to find it was full frame. Same with Driving Miss Daisy.

I don't count TV shows on DVD as full frame. I know they are, but it goes without saying...they were already formatted that way! Unless you're talking about V, which was filmed in widescreen for over seas theatrical release. Most TV mini series are filmed in widescreen so they can release them in theaters over seas.

[joker]

i love wide screen, my friends hate it though, they dont want to watch any of my movie because most of them are in wide screen, but i just love to see the movie how it was supposed to be seen.

[Vigo Sprax]

I was watching wide screen way before DVDs were popular and I wouldn't even buy the movie if it wasn't, then again its not like I had a huge VHS collection. I only own one film thats full screen, Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase, it was cheap so I don't care.

[The Mad Hatter]

Let me get this straight. Not only do tons of people see the widescreen option as "black bars" that block the view (which is a stupid perception because, let's face it, why would anyone do that?), but after carefully describing what widescreen really is, they STILL think that the screen is being blocked?

[political comment snipped. --Brian]

[Robin2099]

I used to hate widescreen because of the black bars. But they don't bother me anymore, and now, I don't like the movie as much unless its in widescreen.

[James]

Originally posted by Dick Grayson
The only FULL FRAME DVDs that I have that I can think of offhand are RETURN OF THE JOKER, BATMAN BEYOND: THE MOVIE, the three X-MEN: TAS discs, and ROUGHNECKS. The rest are all widescreen (save the DVDs with both FULL/WIDESCREEN versions).

As a rule I NEVER buy full screen - or more specifically - pan and scan. As far as I know, Batman Beyond ROTJ, was made full screen and isn't a re-processed pan and scan job so I would be happy to get that on DVD (having only the video at the moment, I await the holy uncut version).

I wanted to get Drop Dead Gorgeous on DVD, but here in the UK you can only get it cheap, with no extras and in full screen. A definate no no. I may have to look towards the R1 for that film...

Answer is: I'm okay with Full Screen if that was the way God intended it - no pan and scan, it's the 21st Century dudes!

[Brian Cruz]

It should be pointed out that only certain scenes in A Bug's Life were reformatted to squeeze the characters together. Many other scenes are panned-and-scanned like any other fullscreen version of a widescreen movie.

It seems that with very few exceptions, most animated movies are produced at a 1.33:1 or 1.66:1 aspect ratio, and that whether they are theatrical releases or not, they'll keep important things out of the top and bottom of the screen to allow for a widescreen presentation. Mask of the Phantasm is a perfect example. If you have the MOTP DVD, you can easily compare the two versions and see how it works. Many WB direct-to-video movies were animated with widescreen in mind, like Sub-Zero and Wakko's Wish, even though they were released to video in full screen. I actually have a rare widescreen copy of Wakko's Wish that Tom Ruegger sent me. And it's almost certain that Retun of the Joker was animated with a widescreen presentation in mind, which leads me to this question...

Does anyone feel cheated that the BB:ROTJ DVD is not widescreen, even though making it widescreen would remove part of the picture area? Or do you prefer seeing all of what was animated, depsite whatever allowances the producers made to allow for a widescreen showing?

[Calhoun07]

I don't feel cheated. I say if it's shot full screen, put it on the DVD full screen. Its pretty simple. I don't buy widescreen movies because I like the format on my TV screen. I could care less if it's full screen or wide screen, I just want the movie the way I saw it in the theater. And if on ROTJ they had to cut the top and bottom off the picture to make it widescreen, isn't that just as bad as cropping a widescreen movie to make it pan and scan?

[James]

Originally posted by calhoun07
I don't feel cheated. I say if it's shot full screen, put it on the DVD full screen. Its pretty simple. I don't buy widescreen movies because I like the format on my TV screen. I could care less if it's full screen or wide screen, I just want the movie the way I saw it in the theater. And if on ROTJ they had to cut the top and bottom off the picture to make it widescreen, isn't that just as bad as cropping a widescreen movie to make it pan and scan?

I totally agree. The reason widescreen is so important is less to do with ratios, but seeing the film the way the director intended it. Pan and Scan effectively redirects the film - and much of what was intended by the director becomes lost.

Equally, if the film was directed with full screen ratio's in mind it would be absurd to not watch it unless it was widescreen - even if it was possible to see a widescreen version.

Like all art you are looking to see the purest vision of the creative minds that went into the project. That is what we should be looking for and not screen ratios! :)

[Bird Boy]

I seem to remember (Before the whole crap about the edits happened) Timm said he was going to release it Widescreen too.

So, instead, of giving us a widescreen edited, he gave us a full-frame edited that resulted in a beautiful picture, but..well.. I just feel cheated about it.

Maybe the un-edited version will be Widescreen....

-BB

[Brian Cruz]

Originally posted by Bird_Boy
I seem to remember (Before the whole crap about the edits happened) Timm said he was going to release it Widescreen too.

So, instead, of giving us a widescreen edited, he gave us a full-frame edited that resulted in a beautiful picture, but..well.. I just feel cheated about it.

Maybe the un-edited version will be Widescreen....

-BB

It may be worth taking some screen shots from ROTJ and putting black bars on them to see what the widescreen effect would be like. I don't have the DVD handy at the moment to do so, but I do have shots from MOTP and Wakko's Wish I'm about to share...

[Brian Cruz]

Okay, here are a few exapmles of what I was talking about...

These are pics from the full screen and widescreen versions on the Batman: Mask of the Phantasm DVD:

http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp1-full.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp1-full.jpg) http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp1-wide.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp1-wide.jpg)

http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp2-full.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp2-full.jpg) http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp2-wide.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp2-wide.jpg)

http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp3-full.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp3-full.jpg) http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-batmanmotp3-wide.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/batmanmotp3-wide.jpg)


And here are some from Wakko's Wish (full screen from the released version, widescreen from my screener copy):

http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-wakkoswish1-full.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/wakkoswish1-full.jpg) http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-wakkoswish1-wide.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/wakkoswish1-wide.jpg)

http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-wakkoswish2-full.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/wakkoswish2-full.jpg) http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/t-wakkoswish2-wide.jpg (http://www.toonzone.net/dvd/faq/images/wakkoswish2-wide.jpg)

I may take some pictures from Sub-Zero later. So which versions of these two movies do you consider the "real" versions, widescreen of full screen?

[James]

Originally posted by Brian Cruz
Okay, here are a few exapmles of what I was talking about...

So which versions of these two movies do you consider the "real" versions, widescreen of full screen?

No offense, but this seems a really bizzare POV :) . If WB had released the your 'version' of MOTP and then owned up to having a more detailed version that was the intended release format (and thus the closest to the creative teams vision), I think their would have been a large outcry.

Putting the black bars is an illusion which makes the mind think it looks better because we crave for that format. Not out of style, but because that format normally offers us both a fuller picture as well the original platform for the films direction. Blinding ourselves by putting films into this format just for the sake of illusion seems crazy to me, man!!! :)

[Bird Boy]

well, I consider any movie with the most picture the "real" version...be it fullscreen or widescreen.

On the MOTP DVD, the widescreen version shows more picture. The black bars just "Squash" the picture, making it show more length wise.

That's what I thought Widescreen was anyway..

-BB

[Calhoun07]

Well said, SJJ, What would the point be to add these black bars to ROTJ??? We can see from these screen shots that the black bars obscure the animation in these shots. This is the very argument that supporters of widescreen use against pan and scan, that pan and scan cuts out parts of the movie. Doesn't this strike you as contradictory if you use that argument with people who prefer pan and scan and then go and watch a movie like MOTP in letterboxed format? And those full frame images from these movies are not pan and scan, it's the way they were intended to be watched. Watching something in widescreen just for the sake of watching it in that format makes no sense to me. Like you said, SJJ, it's more about the ratio the movie was originally made in.

[Calhoun07]

Originally posted by Bird_Boy
On the MOTP DVD, the widescreen version shows more picture. The black bars just "Squash" the picture, making it show more length wise.
-BB

How do you see that? when I look at those screen shots, I can see more artwork in the full frame version, where as the tops and bottoms are just cut off when they letter box it. And they do letter box it, that's putting the black bars on the picture to give you the illusion it was made in widescreen. It wasn't widescreen to begin with, so how could you ever call it widescreen? It's letter boxed.

[Bird Boy]

I didn't mean the pictures..I mean the regular widescreen. For instance:

In Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back SE, in the regular version, you don't see anything but a shoulder of IG-88 (bounty hunter aboard the star destroyer). In the widescreen version, you see all of him.

That's what I meant by widescreen..and the "preserving it's original theatrical aspect ratio" thing. MOTP was released in theaters, therefore, it had to be widescreen..right?

-BB

[Calhoun07]

They did the same thing to MOTP in theaters that they did to David Byrne's True Stories in theaters. Both were meant to be seen in full screen, so you missed out on some of the picture to get it on a wide screen. That doesn't mean that's the way it was intended to be seen. True Stories is a perfect example of a movie that's better to be seen in full frame than letter boxed. If you ever seen it, you'd know how several shots were framed exactly for a full frame effect.

[oranthal]

i visited a website one time that talked about the the widescreen/pan-and-scan issue. the site is www.widescreen.org/ratios.html. scroll down to until you see "Super 35." they showed an example of T2 with one image in widescreen and another in pan-and-scan. the widescreen image was what the theater audience would have seen. compared to the pan-and-scan, the widescreen version shows more on left and right side, and the pan-and-scan actually shows more on top and bottom of the screen. this does not mean that black bars were simply placed over the image to have that widescreen effect. i don't know if that is what they did to MotP was Super 35 or not, but from the description from the website seem to suggest that.

[Sveven Dvorking]

I don't like widescreen because the black bars bother me. I would never know how much image was cut if I wasn't told so.

[Maxie Zeus]

Originally posted by Bird_Boy
That's what I meant by widescreen..and the "preserving it's original theatrical aspect ratio" thing. MOTP was released in theaters, therefore, it had to be widescreen..right?

Not necessarily. It is still possible to show a film shot "full frame" on a widescreen, it's just that the sides of the screen on either side of the image are blank--unilluminated. To its very great credit, this is what Warners did with their 75th anniversary film festival when it toured the country, so you got to see the full images of their 30s and 40s films.

I mentioned this on the "Wonka in Widescreen" thread (just moved over to the DVD Board): I saw "Singing in the Rain" in an art-house theater once, and the idiots projected it widescreen, cutting off the top and bottom of the image. As a result, you only got to see Gene Kelly from the ankles up during his dance routines.

Now that was evil.

[James]

Originally posted by Maxie Zeus


Not necessarily. It is still possible to show a film shot "full frame" on a widescreen, it's just that the sides of the screen on either side of the image are blank--unilluminated. To its very great credit, this is what Warners did with their 75th anniversary film festival when it toured the country, so you got to see the full images of their 30s and 40s films.

I mentioned this on the "Wonka in Widescreen" thread (just moved over to the DVD Board): I saw "Singing in the Rain" in an art-house theater once, and the idiots projected it widescreen, cutting off the top and bottom of the image. As a result, you only got to see Gene Kelly from the ankles up during his dance routines.

Now that was evil.

Did you complain? (The Bugs Bunny Bull Avatar seems to conjure the perfect image! :D)