Why Blu-ray don't had the option of full or widescreen like DVD do?

[mugupo]

DVD has choice of choose full screen and wide screen in certain movies, but why none of the blu-ray do this? Do You wanted to see blu-ray offer this option?

[P@t_Mtl]

I personaly have no need with a full screen BD, I want to watch my movies in OAR and nothing else.

I suppose if they want to release a second version like they did with DVD with full screen I don't truly don't mind, I sure know I wont be buying any of them. But the chances of that are a bit slim I would think. Chaging aspect ratio of a movie to fill in the screen cost more to a studio then leaving it as is for the BD. I am sure many others will be expalin all the full details of this much better then I could ever do it.

[Trix]

Originally Posted by mugupo

DVD has choice of choose full screen and wide screen in certain movies, but why none of the blu-ray do this? Do You wanted to see blu-ray offer this option?

I think the main difference is that DVD had to entertain two markets; people who had widescreen sets, or who liked wider aspects, and everyone else, who had a 4:3 TV didn't care for a rectangle peg in a square whole, so to speak.

With blu-ray, if you have a blu-ray player, then it is about 95% guaranteed that your television is in 16:9 format (except for older CRT HD sets, and possibly those who just want a blu-ray player but not for HD quality). Thus, "full screen", which is 4:3 aspect, is absolutely useless.

Sure, they could re-screen movies to be 16:9, but because 2.85:1 is not as drastic a difference on a 16:9 screen as it was on a 4:3 screen, where nearly 45% of your viewing area was not used, I don't see any incentive for studios to do this.

[Rob J in WNY]

In DVDs heyday, most people owned 4:3 televisions, and it was already common for movies to be "formatted to fit your screen" as the intro to most movies pointed out. This was done for broadcast standards as well as DVD. There was a lot less concern over OAR (original aspect ratio). Today's 16:9 TV screens bring us closer to cinematic standards, and so Blu-ray movies are kept at or near OAR.

Also, I'm not sure the format is ready to offer aspect choices for the same movie title. It may never be - or have to. It's actually easier to just keep it at OAR than to add extra production for 4:3 cropping and "pan & scan" formatting.

[Blu-Benny]

pan & scan was so pointless in my opinion....i worked @ best buy as dvd was taking off and the most annoying thing to listen to all day long was "why do the movies now have those black bars???"

um....b/c that's the way the movie was filmed and intended to be seen!!!

[Infrared Sight]

Because pan&scan is stupid. If you buy a film, you should watch it in only one ratio, and that is how it was shot and composed. End of story.

[blindcat87]

One of the big things I celebrated about the advent of HDTV was the beginning of the end of P&S. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to take a step backwards when HDTVs are becoming the norm. I don't know how many times I ended up in exchange lines after Christmas and my birthday because somebody bought me a movie not knowing that there was both a P&S version and a widescreen version and grabbed the wrong one. Pan and Sccan was a salve to the masses that couldn't get past the fact that the original aspect ratios of films didn't use all of their screen real estate and couldn't figure out that a signifigant portion of the image had to be removed to fill up their screens. Movies should be released in their OAR or as close to it as possible and if people don't like black bars on their 2.35:1 and 1.33:1 OAR movies, most players or displays come with a zoom function and they can mangle the image to their hearts' content without needing to ruin the experience for the rest of us and without taking up disc space and bandwidth pointlessly with an alternate version that is not needed or wanted by most.

Chris

[obiwopkenobi62]

Originally Posted by blindcat87

One of the big things I celebrated about the advent of HDTV was the beginning of the end of P&S. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to take a step backwards when HDTVs are becoming the norm. I don't know how many times I ended up in exchange lines after Christmas and my birthday because somebody bought me a movie not knowing that there was both a P&S version and a widescreen version and grabbed the wrong one. Pan and Sccan was a salve to the masses that couldn't get past the fact that the original aspect ratios of films didn't use all of their screen real estate and couldn't figure out that a signifigant portion of the image had to be removed to fill up their screens. Movies should be released in their OAR or as close to it as possible and if people don't like black bars on their 2.35:1 and 1.33:1 OAR movies, most players or displays come with a zoom function and they can mangle the image to their hearts' content without needing to ruin the experience for the rest of us and without taking up disc space and bandwidth pointlessly with an alternate version that is not needed or wanted by most.

Chris

I couldn't have said it better. I would actually show friends the difference between widescreen and P & S on DVD's that had both so they could see how much of the picture was missing with P & S. Way back when, when I worked at Movie Gallery I kept printed screen shots from the digital bits to show customers the difference. I converted many people that way. I would also tell people"hey you're paying for the whole movie, but you're not getting the whole movie". Once they were shown how much they were missing they were OAR all the way. The majority of us on here know about it because we are moviephiles, the average consumer doesn't know. We just have to keep teaching people the difference.

[I_Luv_The_Blu'z]

Originally Posted by mugupo

DVD has choice of choose full screen and wide screen in certain movies, but why none of the blu-ray do this? Do You wanted to see blu-ray offer this option?

No, because Full Screen cuts off a good 30%-40% of the image if I'm not mistaken. The version you see on Blu-Ray is the ratio they originally shot the film with. If Blu-Ray offered Full Screen it would be a step backwards. Full Screen cuts some of the image off to make it fit your screen. Wide Screen is the way you see it in the theater if that makes sense. Why would you want Full Screen, when Wide Screen maintains picture quality and is the original aspect ratio of the film?

[krazeyeyez]

I doubt many people are buying blu-ray for their 4:3 tv's, and if you are referring to filling up your screen on your 16:9 tv with 2.35 content, well i would not advise it imo, but you got a couple options on your tv to do just that. I for one would rather have them pay more attention to the transfer then wasting time cropping for a niche group of a niche market that wouldn't recognize a difference between professionally cropped and the zoom function on their set anyways.

[Branden]

DVD gave you the option of fullscreen or widescreen: fullscreen for people who wanted to fill their standard 4:3 screen, and widescreen for people who wanted to see all the film.

Blu-rau does not give you that option because, afaik, there is no such thing as a 4:3 HDTV.

anyone who wants 4:3 most cerainly has a SDTV, a 4:3 blu-ray caters to virtually nobody.

[richieb1971]

When I lived in the States I couldn't believe how many 4:3 TV's were still for sale. Back in the UK, it would be rather difficult to find a 4:3 display of any kind. You can't even buy CRT's anymore in the UK, people are throwing perfectly good working CRT's into the landfill.

I don't understand why people want to get rid of the black bars. They serve a purpose of getting the full picture into the screen.

If you have a 4:3 monitor zoom this picture until the black bars are gone.

See how much your missing -



Right click, SAVEA$, DESKTOP.. Then use any app you have on your PC to zoom it in. When your realize how much of the sides went missing, you'll realize how much of the movie your missing.

[Canada]

The only reason I own 4:3 DVD's is if there arn't 16:9 out there like Grumpy Old Men.

[BluRoo98]

Originally Posted by mugupo

DVD has choice of choose full screen and wide screen in certain movies, but why none of the blu-ray do this? Do You wanted to see blu-ray offer this option?

If you really want a "full-screen" movie - we assume you mean 4:3 aspect ratio on blu-ray - YOU CAN!!!

Wizard of Oz
pinocchio
Snow White
Cassablanca (I think)

actually most people complain about it - see all the responses like... "Wizard of Oz has these black bars on the side that won't go away!! Why?"

I echo everyone else's response so far - blu-ray is for HD-TVs - they dont sell HD-TVs with 4:3 aspect ratio -that would be counter productive- only when orginal aspect ratio is 4:3 is there a need to display this image.

[Afrobean]

The zoom button on HDTVs make pan and scan obsolete.

I wouldn't mind them adding something to the BD spec to simulate pan-and-scan to limit loss for people who would zoom (that is, an intelligent zoom function), but it's not necessary. And it's especially not necessary to offer two different versions of the same film. Most people who would be willing to use the zoom button probably wouldn't even notice when things are framed very badly.

One thing I think "black bar haters" would like though, is movies shown in open matte to 16:9. I honestly say that all the data on disc should be open matte when possible, and any mattes should be applied by the player. I'd even go as far as saying that players should come with built in options for matting pictures to any aspect ratio the viewer wants, so that in cases of things like The Dark Knight, the aspect ratio could be fixed to the 2.4:1 ratio that it appeared at in traditional theaters.

[Kryptonic]

Heh. Good one.

[blueshadow | Kosty]

With bigger screens in a 16x9 format, any letterbox bars are less of an irritation than it was with a smaller 4x3 display. It was a good call as there has been no mass of consumer complaints on the current practice.

[Reboscale]

I came across a Blu-Ray (horror film I believe) that was listed on the back of the packaging as "16:9 FULL FRAME". That struck me as odd, and I'm assuming this would not have been the OAR. I will try to find it again (don't remember which one it was).

[onemorechance]

cuz blu-ray aint soft like dvd

[Suntory_Times]

Originally Posted by HD2Blu

If you really want a "full-screen" movie - we assume you mean 4:3 aspect ratio on blu-ray - YOU CAN!!!

Wizard of Oz
pinocchio
Snow White
Cassablanca (I think)

Those titles are 1.37:1 not 4:3 (or 1.33:1). Sorry, there close, but not quite the same, as black bars would still be present on a 4:3 tv if displayed in there OAR,