I have HD TV and HD source why do I still sometimes get black bars on the top and bottom of HD movie?

Question

I have HD TV and HD source why do I still sometimes get black bars on the top and bottom of HD movie?

Answer 1

Your TV resolution has nothing to do with it.  It all has to do with the aspect ratio of the film.  Just because it is HD does NOT mean it is in 16:9 ratio.  The aspect ratio is determined by the director of the movie and can be larger than 16:9 and is in most cases.  You can use the stretch feature to fill the screen but then your missing parts of the film on the edges and not watching it as the director intended it to be watched.

It also makes the everything look short and squatty.  You'll get used to it if you give it a chance.

weeder

Answer 2

Change the aspect ratio in your tv's settings section of the menu, if you do not have this feature, then your program is broadcast that way and your tv can not automaticly size it to the screen.

Answer 3

the black bars look cool

Answer 4

Black bars on top and bottom is letterbox and that means that the resolution of your TV and your movie sources are different.In this case the movie resolution is bigger than the resolution your TV is. HD resolution are 720p, 1080i and 1080p. If you are watching a movie that its resolution is 1080 (the I or the P are irrelevant in this case) and your TV is 720p(in 720 there is no I or P) then letter boxing may occur.

I believe that HD DVD and Blue Ray  both use 1080p as there resolution on the movies they release. There may be a setting on your player that will allow for down conversion of the video so it wont be letterboxed or maybe your TV has a setting that will do the other ay around. Although this would lower the quality of the image. The former would be more likely.

Now when the aspect ration of the movie is 4:3 then the black bars will be present on the sides and this is called Pilar Box.

Good Luck

Answer 5

The black bars are due to the aspect ratio and not the broadcast format of the movie.  Though the HDTV format standardized to the widescreen format, some movies are still natively in the full screen format.  This is because until 1932, movies were filmed in full screen (4:3 ratio) and switch to the widescreen (16:9 ratio) afterwards.  All television broadcasts were still in 4:3 until the introduction of HD.  

If you are watching a "full screen" formatted movie, it will show the black bars.  There are still some more recent movies that were converted to digital format only at the full screen ratio...many movies filmed in the 1980s for example are currently only available as full screen.  Alll movies made for TV are at this ratio also.

Hope this helps!