Cropping/Reformatting Tv/programs/movies for the 16:9 display era

[BillieCassin]

Originally Posted by nametag

I understand what you're saying, and not wanting to be argumentative, I guess I'm just wondering why you think a 16x9 conversion would be a 'worthy' upgrade rather than the conversion from SD to HD? I watch so many old film and TV shows in 4x3 that it really doesn't bother me either way, I don't really notice, and as someone who obviously knows about ratios and presumably watches lots of things in 4x3 I guess I just don't understand why you feel it needs to have it changed in order for you to 'experience TNG in a whole new way'? Basically, if an SD-HD upgrade is good enough for however many other films and TV shows you watch, why not for TNG?

It's a combination of factors, really.

TNG is on TV all the time. I watch about 5-7 episodes a week, but my TiVo picks up 20 a week from various stations, from which I pick and choose the ones I want to watch. It's plenty available.

The versions they are showing on TV now are actually rather good. The DVDs of the show looked awful, but while they certainly aren't reference material, whatever they are using for syndicated masters right now are better than the DVDs, certainly, and I see far enough detail that I really need. In fact, the cheapness of some of the early sets, etc., that people are talking about in this thread, are apparent even there. So it's not like we are talking something like Twilight Zone, where we'd been seeing fuzzy almost kinescope looking versions for years and suddenly the veil is lifted - yes, it will be more clear, but how many wrinkles do I really need to see in the same Starfleet uniforms that compromise the majority of the wardrobe for the show, for example? And do I really need to see in clear HD how terrible the Worf make-up was when you could see the clear line of the prosthetic? (It's already bad enough in the current SD-blown-up-to-HD syndicated episodes.)

I have no doubt that these Blu-rays will look incredible compared to current broadcast versions, but still not enough for me to want to spend the huge price these sets are going to command, for episodes in the early seasons that I'll probably watch once or twice only anyway (as opposed to my favorite episodes from S3 to S7, which I can watch dozens of times), just to see how the sets and makeup look more cheesy.

If they were reframed for 16x9, that would have been a different story to me. The episodes I would only watch once or twice anyway I still probably wouldn't watch that much, but I'd actively watch them - put away the laptop, and experience the show in a more cinematic form. If it was done properly, shot by shot, it would really look good. And it will. When they release them to syndication like that, because they know no HD TV station wants 1.33 HD content.

It's not about "not wanting black bars", it's the fact that I've seen examples (they've been posted in this thread) of what Trek as well as other shows look like when the original film source materials are given 16x9 treatment. You have people who can't get past the rhetoric of the concept and say they don't see the difference between a slight top and bottom crop and the additional side information available on a full-frame 35mm print and the old days of "pan and scan" where they would squash a 2.35 film into 1.33 for VHS.

There is a massive difference there in my opinion, but the reason I haven't posted in this thread for many months is that it's impossible to discuss this release in particular if people are so attached to a concept they can't see how it's practically applied. In all the Trek watching I have been doing in the past year or so, I've been careful to look up and notice the framing. In most cases, even a blind reframing looks great in almost all scenes; if done carefully, as they have done here, and with the additional side information, it could be a whole new experience.

I feel the same when I watch Buffy. I think Joss is a TV God. He brought what I honestly believe is the best TV show in the modern era to us. But I disagree with him on one thing - I greatly prefer the widescreen versions of Season 4 thru 7. When I watch Buffy now, I grab my PAL sets and watch them - in spite of the speed-up, it's like watching a whole new show. It opens up the world. I understand that was not his intention - but I own both versions, I am the one sitting here and spending hours watching it, and I don't think I'm violating some cosmic law by doing so.



All that said, here's the kicker here : they have already done it. They prepared the 16x9 versions along with the 1.33 versions. So the artistic integrity has already been violated, it's just not coming to Blu-ray that way right now. I've been thinking about this a lot lately, and you have to hand it to the Paramount guys, they are being smart with TNG because they front-loaded too much with TSO.

TSO has always been their cash cow. When it was released 2-eps at a time on VHS, they sold gangbusters. Not a lot of shows can do that, nor did they. Because of the limited run (only 79 episodes) it was mildly reasonable to own them all. It's also the only TV show I can recall seeing at brick and mortar video stores (before anyone would think of describing them as brick and mortar). They also were on Laser - the only other show I can think of that was able to do that in small batches was X-Files, and even then it wasn't every episode.

Now, the Blu-rays of TOS put both the original versions and the new versions on the same disc. I appreciated that when going through them. I only watched the remastered ones, really, but for everyone's sake I'm glad they included both and gave the choice. I'm always for choice.

Thing is...they realize they shot themselves in the foot (a lesson they should have learned from Lucas, and Lucas has obviously learned by the magnificent-yet-missing-quite-a-bit-of-stuff Star Wars box). That was it for TOS. And a lot of us stayed away (I Netflixed) from purchase because they were very expensive. They stayed that way for a long time (and still certainly are not cheap). It's because they burned that cow out - the originals in HD, and the "remastered" versions on the same set means they can't milk that one again until they do the inevitable 3-D versions (it's horrible to think about, but you know they've had that meeting). That's all she wrote for TOS on Blu-ray.

Now, this time, they have preped both 1.33 and 16x9 versions. 1.33 for Blu-ray, and 16x9 for syndication. They know that no syndication is going to pay anything more for simply higher resolution without widescreen. From the popularity (it keeps getting shown and shown and shown) that TNG currently is showing in syndication, blown-up-SD seems good enough for most folk. But give them a widescreen version with updated FX - and you've got a new cash cow.

My guess is this is the first version of TNG on Blu. I was astonished at the 1.33 choice once it was announced simply for the commercial aspect - but they are smarter than I am, of course. Why do it now when they will be sitting there on a whole new set of TNG to release later in a few years. Completests will want both (and believe you me, even the "1.33 or die crowd" would still pick them up, especially if there was added content like commentaries, etc.), people like me will then get them, and then they can also sell mass-market to "joe sixpack".

And this whole "sampler" disc now makes PERFECT sense as well. They are testing the markets to see who will buy a Blu-ray in 1.33. What I said above is so accurate it's kinda scary, because you know the guy at the electronics counter at Wal-mart is going to hear, "this said in HD, they aren't in HD, black bars on sides! it's old TV!" from the guy who liked the show as a kid, and dropped $70 or $80 on it. They know this. It wouldn't surprise me if the retailers had a hand in the "sampler" as well (I mean, half the content of the sampler disc is coming on the full season later this year, we've been waiting this long, I don't think we couldn't have waited until the full season was available - if this were any other title people would be SCREAMING "Double Dip!!"). They will test the market and base print runs and such on that.

While it may be "wrong", to the vast majority of consumers (those ones the industry keeps begging to join the Blu-ray squad), HD and 16x9 are interchangeable (if they know what 16x9 is). Blu-ray is HD, and HD fills the screen. You know, and I know, we all know that technically this is wrong; however, from what they have available to them (mostly theatrical films and current TV shows), the evidence they have certainly supports their claim.

It's sort of like how we assumed the Sun revolved around the Earth before we knew enough that it was the other way around - it didn't really matter to "them" (early man) as it was a purely academic question. Since they weren't sending rockets into space, it didn't really matter to them 'cause all they needed to know was that the sun would come back around the next day. Almost all of the Blu-ray content available to consumers, especially in stores, is 16x9, so they expect it to be 16x9 when they buy a Blu. That may not be right, and we may have mostly won when it comes to them understanding that black bars on top and bottom are meant to emulate a movie screen, but it will be far harder to explain why they are watching it in "old square" TV, as technically it's not as easy to explain.

Basically, there are enough Trek fans who collect Blu that they will make enough on these sets to pay for the costs of doing this and I'm sure some extra. But in a couple years, when Blu-ray penetration is even higher, there will be a "Special Edition" of TNG in 16x9 on Blu they will spruce up some other ways (perhaps more like they did with TOS and the new effects - which would be relatively simple now as all the work has been done and the episodes all exist as digital files now). And I'll get those.

Now, normally I'm not a "I'll wait for the next set" type; I bought and love the Star Wars set (UK version - I prefer the case) even though I know in a few years I'll be buying it again. Fanatically it wouldn't kill me to collect this round, though I have so little time to watch Blu's I've cut back severely (which means I'm only adding 5-10 a month to my stack, LOL), I'd pony up the dough. But they already said the versions I really want to see are going to syndication, and God invented the TiVo, so I can keep the whole series (I have plenty of drive space, thanks to God's other invention, USB) as it airs in precisely the way I want to see it, and when they bring those to Blu I'll pick them up.

So I won't be missing out - if it was a matter of this is the only way to ever get TNG in HD, I'd have to bite. But since I don't really care much about this version, the version I do want will be available on TV for "free" (and, although I'll store digitally, I could easily make my own Blu's of if I wanted - completely legally), and I'm pretty sure what I want to see will hit Blu eventually...that's why. It's not that I don't appreciate the difference between HD and SD, or that I hate the original directors that were forced to work in a 1.33 square, or I'm not enough of a Blu-ray fan or enough of a Trek fan. It's that I'll get what I want to watch for free on TV, and if they do deign to release these mutilated 16x9's on Blu, I'll gladly pony up the $500 or so plus bucks this entire series will probably cost.

People can totally disagree, on principle or practically, but it's how I feel. I'm very glad some people are getting what they want, and I'm glad they are at least somehow making what I want available to me, even if it's not on Blu. Yet.

I get aspect ratios. I was the guy in the video store folding up a piece of paper trying to explain to people why their copy of "Pulp Fiction" was "broken" because it had black bars at the top and bottom. And remember, even a couple of years ago before 1.33 sets effectively became "outlawed", a decent amount of DVD releases (mostly family genre at the end) still came in "Fullscreen" and "Widescreen" editions - even though the DVD spec specifically allows for a disc to hold both, and even the earliest DVD's 15 years ago had the capability of "choose full or wide" on disc load if the studio chose. But there is a large segment of the public that has that bias.

If they can't convince me that a 16x9 version, done with proper care and respect, shot by shot which they had to do anyway (which they DID anyway, for the 16x9 versions they made at the same time as these) wouldn't be more pleasing (if not "artistically correct" by some people's principles), it's kind of good luck to the other 99% of the Blu-ray market that doesn't come to sites like this, and doesn't know even the rudimentary technical info that I do (I am no expert, by any means, but I do know what I am talking about when it comes to size and percentages, etc.).

Thing is, those are the people we need for Blu-ray to thrive. That part of the market that, yes, as their DVD players have died have started to replace them with Blu-ray players, largely on the spec that they will play their existing DVDs (and make them look better than before - most people have never had the connections to see their DVD's properly, using RCA or S-Video at best). But those people are still often making the choice to buy a $5 DVD vs. a $20 Blu-ray, even if they do see a quality improvement.

Thankfully, the aspect ratio is largely moot due to how little content it affects, which is a good thing since we are fighting the opposite battle as before - getting people to accept a "cropped" (even though it really isn't "cropped") picture vs. a fuller picture. It's only really going to come up with classic films (of which don't sell well at those markets anyway) and old TV shows, and there aren't THAT many TV shows that still exist in 35mm that this kind of care would be taken with (and probably only one or two others on the scale of work they are putting into TNG). But just like the fact not every transfer of every film is going to be reference quality (or many wouldn't get released), the intolerance for "dumbing down" Blu-ray is exactly why it's advancing so slowly and so many people, even those with Blu-ray players, are still buying so much DVD (if they are buying at all).