"1.85:1" Aspect Ratio difference between Blu-ray and DVD question

[groove93]

I made and argument about 1.85:1 films displaying properly on my display in the Saving Private Ryan thread. I've come to the conclusion that other contributors to the conversation, and myself are both correct, to a point.

Last night my shipment from Amazon came in. One of the movies was "The Terminator" which is a 1.85:1 film. I had a copy of this movie on my DVR from when it aired on HDNet Movies last year, but since I dropped Direct TV and the newer DVRs are locked down when the service is cancelled, I decided to purchase the movie on Blu Ray.

Anyways, for the first time I noticed black bars on the top and bottom of the screen which to me was rather odd and it makes me wonder about the actual aspect ratio of 1.85:1 films on DVD. DVD Releases, such as Finding Nemo, Planes Trains and Automobiles, Aliens, the first Spider Man, all appear with no black bars on my display, so I'm wondering why all of a sudden these movies are scaled more accurately ( I guess that's a way to put it) with Blu Ray.

I'm not a black bar hater so don't get me wrong because I love scope films, but I want to see what the film maker intended for us to view in with regards to Original Aspect Ratio.

[Grubert]

1.85:1 - thin black bars on top & bottom

1.78:1 - no black bars

[progers13]

Originally Posted by groove93

I made and argument about 1.85:1 films displaying properly on my display in the Saving Private Ryan thread. I've come to the conclusion that other contributors to the conversation, and myself are both correct, to a point.

Last night my shipment from Amazon came in. One of the movies was "The Terminator" which is a 1.85:1 film. I had a copy of this movie on my DVR from when it aired on HDNet Movies last year, but since I dropped Direct TV and the newer DVRs are locked down when the service is cancelled, I decided to purchase the movie on Blu Ray.

Anyways, for the first time I noticed black bars on the top and bottom of the screen which to me was rather odd and it makes me wonder about the actual aspect ratio of 1.85:1 films on DVD. DVD Releases, such as Finding Nemo, Planes Trains and Automobiles, Aliens, the first Spider Man, all appear with no black bars on my display, so I'm wondering why all of a sudden these movies are scaled more accurately ( I guess that's a way to put it) with Blu Ray.

I'm not a black bar hater so don't get me wrong because I love scope films, but I want to see what the film maker intended for us to view in with regards to Original Aspect Ratio.

Hi groove. As you may recall, I was one of those that was discussing the issue with you in that thread. I'm as baffled by this as you are. I've got the Saving Private Ryan DVD and blu-ray, and I put them both in for a comparison. No doubt about it, the blu-ray has the tiny black bars on top and bottom; however, the DVD did not. I posted screen shots of both the DVD and blu to show the difference. Also, both cases list the movie as 1.85:1. I speculated that the anamorphic format of the DVD has something to do with it, that maybe it is stretching it to fill the 16x9 screen. It could also be some sort of forced overscan, or even that the DVD format is 1.78:1 (not 1.85:1, despite what the case says). Unfortunately, I don't have the means to play the DVD and blu-ray simultaneously to try to figure out which of these is the culprit. I'll be watching this thread, as hopefully someone who has more knowledge in these matters can offer some insight.

[progers13]

Originally Posted by Grubert

1.85:1 - thin black bars on top & bottom

1.78:1 - no black bars

Hi Grubert.

This is not what the OP is asking. What he's referring to are discs (from what we've found so far, primarily DVDs) that are listed as 1.85:1 on the case but do not have the tiny black bars on top and bottom. We've been trying to figure out why. As far as we can tell, the reasons could be one of the following:

• Case is wrong and the DVD is actually 16x9 (1.78:1 NOT 1.85:1)
• DVD is anamorphic and might be stretched to fill the screen
• Display might be forcing some overscan

Are there any other possibilities we've missed?

[Deciazulado]

As far as I recall, the PS3 doesn't "stretch" (alter) the picture of a 16:9 coded DVD when upscaling 480i to 1080p in the Normal mode, so if you're watching the 1080 x 1920 PS3 raster output w/o overscan on your display, so the 1.85 BD has letterbox bars, and the "1.85" DVD hasn't, the actual image on the DVD must be "1.78"




*I use "1.78" in between " " because umm DVD mmm... NTSC standards... 486 x 710.85 mmm... long story.

[progers13]

Thank you Deciazulado. I was thinking along the same lines. I only wish I had the ability to play both versions side by side to see the differences.

[steve_dave]

Here is the short version:

Mostly every studio/distributor in the US except for Paramount, Warner, and The Weinstein Company presents their films in the original aspect ratio. Be it 1.66:1, 1.78;1, 1.85:1, 2:1, 2:35/40:1, etc.

Paramount, Warner, and Weinstein open the mattes on 1.85:1 framed films to 1.78:1 due to...wait for it...

Overscan.

Overscan means that a display is over scanning the image. This is in English means that the display is actually cropping the picture due to the way the tube/projector is positioned.

DVDs were introduced during the VHS and Laserdisc era, which is when 16:9 displays were very rare. Most people watched these on a 4:3 television with black bars on the top and bottom. 16:9 displays became more popular but stlll sufferred from overscan.

Paramount, Warner, and Weinstein decided that since most displays are going to crop the image anyway due to the overscan, they would open the mattes to 1.78:1 and the TV would "correct" the aspect ratio.

However, many television manufacturers became aware of the overscan issue and with plasmas & LCDs began including an overscan correction feature. This displays the image exactly as it is encoded on the disc.

So you get thin black bars for most 1.85:1 framed films for both DVD and BD.

[groove93]

I'm assuming Avatar is 1.78 and the Imax sequences from The Dark Night and Revenge of the Fallen are of the same aspect ratio as well so I didn't bother to take those into consideration.

I know in the past where I've rented a few movies from Netflix that were 1.85:1 and did not notice any black bars on them, I'll have to think back to what movies I may have viewed with that aspect ratio.

[progers13]

Originally Posted by groove93

I'm assuming Avatar is 1.78 and the Imax sequences from The Dark Night and Revenge of the Fallen are of the same aspect ratio as well so I didn't bother to take those into consideration.

I know in the past where I've rented a few movies from Netflix that were 1.85:1 and did not notice any black bars on them, I'll have to think back to what movies I may have viewed with that aspect ratio.

Yes, you are correct. Avatar is 1.78:1, and the IMAX scenes in Dark Knight and Transformers: RotF were cropped to also be 1.78:1.

The 1.85:1 movies are less common than the 2.35:1 movies, but they are out there. I have a few of them on blu. Off the top of my head, I know of Hulk (2003), Van Helsing, Saw 1 - 6, District 9, Hellboy 1 and 2, Hurt Locker, Resident Evil 1, Sin City, Starship Troopers, Terminator 1 that are all 1.85:1 on blu and display the black bars on top and bottom. There are others; those are just the ones in my collection.

[phansson]

Originally Posted by progers13

I speculated that the anamorphic format of the DVD has something to do with it, that maybe it is stretching it to fill the 16x9 screen.

Good thinking progers, I would go with this as the reason!

[Grubert]

Originally Posted by steve_dave

Mostly every studio/distributor in the US except for Paramount, Warner, and The Weinstein Company presents their films in the original aspect ratio. Be it 1.66:1, 1.78;1, 1.85:1, 2:1, 2:35/40:1, etc.

Paramount, Warner, and Weinstein open the mattes on 1.85:1 framed films to 1.78:1

Yep - with some exceptions. Paramount just released Saving Private Ryan in 1.85:1



I think some little-known filmmaker might have had a say in that

Wouldn't be surprised if War of the Worlds also is in the proper 1.85:1 when it comes out.

[Lincoln6Echo]

Originally Posted by progers13

Thank you Deciazulado. I was thinking along the same lines. I only wish I had the ability to play both versions side by side to see the differences.

You shouldn't need to do that. Unless of course you have extreme short-term memory loss.

Just take note of what you see in terms of bars or no bars and that's all you need to know.

I'll pop in my SPR DVD here shortly to check this out. But I could have sworn that my 1.85 DVDs have always had those tiny bars in them.

Well, OK, just did the above and to my surprise, SPR does NOT have the 1.85 black bars. SO...what that tells me is that the 1.85 discs were either all manufactured incorrectly, OR the anamorphic characteristic of DVDs overscans not only 1.85 films but probably 2.35/2.40 films as well.

[progers13]

Originally Posted by Lincoln6Echo

You shouldn't need to do that. Unless of course you have extreme short-term memory loss.

Just take note of what you see in terms of bars or no bars and that's all you need to know.

I'll pop in my SPR DVD here shortly to check this out. But I could have sworn that my 1.85 DVDs have always had those tiny bars in them.

Well, OK, just did the above and to my surprise, SPR does NOT have the 1.85 black bars. SO...what that tells me is that the 1.85 discs were either all manufactured incorrectly, OR the anamorphic characteristic of DVDs overscans not only 1.85 films but probably 2.35/2.40 films as well.

Another member, Steve Dave, postulated that only 3 studios produced the discs this way - Paramount, Warner, and Weistein (and presumably only the DVD versions of these movies back in the day). I'm going to go home and check out that theory tonight. I have a much more extensive DVD collection than I do a blu collection, so I'm going to look at different studios 1.85:1 movies and see if I can confirm this. I also seem to recall the 1.85:1 DVDs playing with small black bars, so it could well be that those studios didn't screw with the OAR while the others did.

[groove93]

Originally Posted by Lincoln6Echo

SO...what that tells me is that the 1.85 discs were either all manufactured incorrectly, OR the anamorphic characteristic of DVDs overscans not only 1.85 films but probably 2.35/2.40 films as well.

That's a good question with regards to 2.35/2.40 films because I wonder if they are scaled properly on DVD as well.

I do recall when I had Direct TV and viewed 2001: A Space Odyssey on Universal HD, the screen width was much wider and it's comparable to the Blu Ray Release. I do recall watching this film on TCM years ago and the black bars were thicker (Same with Ben Hur but I'm aware of the rare aspect ratio this film was made in). Taking into consideration that Universal HD was an HD channel and TCM was not, many films that aired on TCM were "picture boxed" as well.

[Deciazulado]

Originally Posted by Lincoln6Echo

I'll pop in my SPR DVD here shortly to check this out. But I could have sworn that my 1.85 DVDs have always had those tiny bars in them.

Well, OK, just did the above and to my surprise, SPR does NOT have the 1.85 black bars. SO...what that tells me is that the 1.85 discs were either all manufactured incorrectly, OR the anamorphic characteristic of DVDs overscans not only 1.85 films but probably 2.35/2.40 films as well.

There are no "1.85" discs, there are DVDs coded for 4:3 displays, DVDs coded for 16:9 displays, or 16:9 BDs, with images of diferent ratios and shapes within them.

The discs were not manufactured incorrectly nor the anamorphic nature of SD pixels overscans anything per se (The disc player or the displays either show the whole 480 x 720 pixels/1080 x 1920 pixels or they do not. But the discs just contain what's put into them)

The movies with OARs of 1.85 that fill a 16:9 display either were open matted slightly in the transfer (more image from the exposed negative than intended is shown) or were cropped slighly (less image from the exposed nagative than intended is shown), or a combination of both.

A small variance in image area is accepted practice:

From the TAP manual:

Screen image (Image quality, aspect ratios & dimensions)

The desired condition is to precisely project the following common image dimensions:

35mm Flat image (1.85:1): 0.446" x 0.825" 1.33mm x 20.96mm
35mm Anamorphic image (2.39:1): 0.690" x 0.825" 17.53mm x 20.96mm


The projected image on the screen should have sharp edges, and the corners should be square (90º angles). The dimensions above should correspond to the placement of the masking when the 35-PA test film is projected on screen. Note: The screen size limitations, aperture plate dimensions, masking placement and image distortion should not cause the projected image to be cropped more than 5% (3% cropping is the maximum preferred).

Reference: 35mm: ANSI/SMPTE 195-1993
SMPTE RP 40-1995 / 35-PA & 35-IQ Test Film

The RP-40 test film is what's used to align the image area that should be seen.

This post Basic 35mm Standard Widescreen primer (1.85 =>1.78) explains more and shows examples with the RP-40 image of the different 1.85 -> 1.78 variations.

Now whether a transfer follows these standards and stays within them or goes way off is another matter altogether

[Grubert]

Back to the original question:

Originally Posted by groove93

Last night my shipment from Amazon came in. One of the movies was "The Terminator" which is a 1.85:1 film. I had a copy of this movie on my DVR from when it aired on HDNet Movies last year, but since I dropped Direct TV and the newer DVRs are locked down when the service is cancelled, I decided to purchase the movie on Blu Ray.

Anyways, for the first time I noticed black bars on the top and bottom of the screen which to me was rather odd (...)

Well to give a definitive answer I just grabbed my Terminator DVD and did a screencap to match one from the site review.

DVD:


Blu-ray:


Both of them have thin black bars at the top and bottom.

If you were seeing it 1.78:1 on HDNet it may be because they reframed it.

[Socko]

The bluray shows a tad more on top and bottom. Nice comparison!

[Lincoln6Echo]

Wow...getting back to SPR, doing that experiment with the DVD, just once again reminds me why BD is just so much more superior in terms of PQ and AQ. I couldn't get over the lack luster detail in the DVD, (I have the 60th Anniversary SE - DD 5.1 version). And just judging from the screenshots here from the BD, I can already guess just how much better the BD will be. I haven't gotten my copy yet, probably come tomorrow... I also noticed how piss poor the audio was too. Getting spoiled on lossless audio as well.

[QuasidodoJr]

Hey, groove - it may be your player zooming in to 1.78:1 when it upscales. My standalone Sony player does that. Even to films with a 1.33:1 frame. the only aspect ratios it displays properly are 1.78:1 and scope.

[dcowboy7]

I didnt know robin williams was in the terminator.