Blu Ray, HD question...?

Question

I have a 56" Toshiba HD TV with a 16:9 aspect ratio. When I watch HD or Blu ray movies they are filmed in 4:3, and according to "experts" this is the proper way to watch them leaving empty space at the top and bottom of my screen. However, if I watch the same movie on a hi def channel on my cable, it takes the whole screen and looks great. Why? If I enlarged the picture on my Blu ray and HD movies to fit my screen would it compromise the HD aspect of the movie? Anyone else having trouble with this?

Answer 1

First HD DVDs and Blu-ray are not 4:3, they are widescreen. And bars top and bottom are not a "problem" ... they are inevitable unless you crop or distort the original image.

The reason you see bars on top and bottom is because many movies are a wider aspect ratio (AR, ratio of width to height) that your 16:9 (i.e. 1.78:1) screen. Some common ARs are 1.78:1 (will fill a 16:9 screen), 1.85:1 (small top and bottom bars) and 2.35:1 (wide top and bottom bars).

Sometimes TV stations zoom the image to fill a 16:9 screen. This means you lose information and unlike if you watch at home you can't change it.

The director designed the film to be watched in the aspect ratio it was filnmed in, and altering it risks losing info. See the images at the link for some examples.

So, learn to appreciate widescreen and don't feel you have to "fix a problem". If you can't feel free to zoom or stretch the image if it works for you.

Answer 2

This is because the movies are filmed in theatrical widescreen. The picture would be a bit less quality if you zoomed in, but most noticeably, the sides of the picture would be cut off. All widescreen DVDs, HDDVDs and Blu-Ray Disks are this way. Television isn't filmed in theatrical widescreen because of cost, and lack of a huge amount of HD users.