Blockbuster To Close More Stores

[The Fat Man]

I have HD everywhere except my bedroom, I really only watch the news or occasional TV show rerun, and with my K not having HD functionality on that tv, I am waiting to upgrade one of the other two rooms in the future and moving the smaller HD TV to that room.

Anyway, I got to say that I still appreciate DVDs. I don't see any point for me to convert my DVD selection to Blu-Ray when my Blu-Ray player will play and upscale the production quality (not to the level of Blu-Ray by any means). I still rent them,and have bought a few occasional old 70s and 80s B and C movies that aren't available on Blu-Ray, because they were discontinued on DVD. They are also usually $5. One good that about that also, is that all my old widescreen DVDs will not fit the whole screen of my widescreen tv.

That's something I'm finding in Blu-Ray's lately and is pissing me off. In order to have a modern HD TV, you have it widescreen, so why make the Blu-Ray's so that they are in widscreen with blackbars on top and bottom. This is something else that Hollywood and these movie companies are screwing up lately. Blu-Ray's don't need to be in widescreen. I bought my cheaper HD TV in 2006, and it's widecreen! If you have an old standard screen HD TV then I don't feel sorry for you. My brother had one, and used to say that he didn't see the big deal with HD. I told him that the lady at Tweeter (yes, Tweeter) sold his girlfriend a piece of crap for it's time, and that she should have waited six months for the price of the old 720p plasmas to go down a little. He finally upscaled when it broke and sees that he had crap before.

 

[DodgerKing]

There are a lot of fly-over states with substantial numbers of towns and villages without high-speed internet access (despite the administrations best efforts). So I wouldn't write off mail delivered DVDs just yet. In twenty years maybe when fiber is laid to every village and farm house in the country I'll agree with you.

Not just fly over states, but even smaller communities in very populated states. Here in Mammoth Lakes high speed internet is non existent. A town of 15,000 people has three mom and pop video rental places and all three do very good business.

 

[Laddyboy]

That's something I'm finding in Blu-Ray's lately and is pissing me off. In order to have a modern HD TV, you have it widescreen, so why make the Blu-Ray's so that they are in widscreen with blackbars on top and bottom. This is something else that Hollywood and these movie companies are screwing up lately. Blu-Ray's don't need to be in widescreen. I bought my cheaper HD TV in 2006, and it's widecreen! If you have an old standard screen HD TV then I don't feel sorry for you. My brother had one, and used to say that he didn't see the big deal with HD. I told him that the lady at Tweeter (yes, Tweeter) sold his girlfriend a piece of crap for it's time, and that she should have waited six months for the price of the old 720p plasmas to go down a little. He finally upscaled when it broke and sees that he had crap before.

The black bars, top and bottom, are because the original film was in super widescreen (2.39 to 1) and your TV is 1.78 to 1 or 16 x 9. The 1.85 films fit nicely on the TV. The 2.39 aspect ratios need some boxing. To conform the super widescreens to fit the TV would require lopping off the right and left portions of the film image.

 

[bobvick]

Yes except the U.S Postal service is laying off thousands and dropping Saturday mail, so I wouldnt
count on them being around either.

They are considering stopping Saturday delivery that is not set in stone. As far as the Postal Service not being around, the constitution will have to be changed, Article 1, Section. 8, Clause 7, known as the "postal clause" it charges Congress "To establish post offices and roads."
So, there is a constitutional obligation for the government to provide postal service. It will be around for a long, long time.

 

[steve4810]

As far as the Postal Service not being around, the constitution will have to be changed, Article 1, Section. 8, Clause 7, known as the "postal clause" it charges Congress "To establish post offices and roads."
So, there is a constitutional obligation for the government to provide postal service. It will be around for a long, long time.

Good catch! I definitely didn't know that. Or if I did, forgot it 40 years ago after high school civics class.

 

[steve4810]

The black bars, top and bottom, are because the original film was in super widescreen (2.39 to 1) and your TV is 1.78 to 1 or 16 x 9. The 1.85 films fit nicely on the TV. The 2.39 aspect ratios need some boxing. To conform the super widescreens to fit the TV would require lopping off the right and left portions of the film image.

Whats even worse. When checking this out (I was going to post a long list of aspect ratios but got bored) I found this interesting tidbit:

"2.37:1... as of 2010, TVs have been introduced with this aspect ratio and are marketed as "21:9 cinema displays."

Great. 50 million flat-screens headed for the landfill!

Oh yeah, as long as I looked them up, some aspect ratios:

2.93:1 - Ultra Panavision & MGM Camera 65.
2.76:1 - Ultra Panavision 70.
2.37:1 - 21:9 cinema display HDTVs (but nobody else!!)
2.59:1 - Cinerama
2.55:1 - Cinemascope
2.39:1 - Panavision
2.35:1 - All Bollywood films released after 1972
2.20:1 - Todd-AO & some MPEG2s
2.00:1 - SuperScope

So cropped edges, oval wheels or black bars are going to with us for a long long time.

 

[inazsully]

Vizio has introduced a 21:9 aspect ratio LED/LCD TV this year. But if you're not watching a movie shot in 2:35 to 1 (which will fill the entire screen) you will have black bars when watching any TV broadcast and movies shot in 1:85 to 1, which is the second most prevalent size after 2;35 to 1. Iw will appeal to true movie buffs or those that can afford a 2nd TV just for 2:35 aspect ratio movies.

 

[steve4810]

In the day of actual film in theaters they dealt with this by changing what are called "aperture plates"; pieces of metal with different aspect ratio rectangles cut into their centers slid into the projector. Then the bigger houses had electrically operated curtains that closed or open to the right width.

So mount your TV in the wall and have a couple of picture frames with different aspect mats cut out and open to the back and hang the right one for the movie your watching in front. Viola! Black bars gone.

 

[meStevo]

Yeah, flat and scope, that takes me back to being a projectionist at a theater in college, a lot of fun until you have to watch the same awful movie 3 times in one night back to back starting at 12am.

 

[steve4810]

Ah, film. Those were the good old days.

My son tells me that his company's customers are now more than 50% digital projection equipment houses. He says it makes him feel old because when he started in the business there wasn't any such thing.

He feels old?? HTF does he think I feel!!

And no, smart a's. I didn't attend the premier of "Gone With the Wind". "The Ten Commandments", yes the Galesburg, IL premier (sometime after the Hollywood one).

 

[meStevo]

I learned much more as a projectionist than I did going to an Art Institute (both dealing with film and general on the job stuff, as well as becoming a supervisor for the first time in any job). Dealing with film was pretty awesome, especially when they got to be huge films like Beloved, or needing to rig 2 projectors to run the same film at the same time (one platter -> through projector -> across the cieling -> through another projector -> onto another platter). Knowing that messing that up or too much static accumulation could cause the night to end early for 2 theaters of 230+ people was intense.

 

[steve4810]

A projectionist has to be a "self starter" as they almost always work alone.

My son started as a favor to a friend who worked as an assistant manager while he went to grad school. He knew my son wouldn't invite a crowd of losers or loose women into the booth.

Not that long after he had his first supervisor job too. Head projectionist for a 12 screen theater. Then as he watched the company technician maintain the equipment he started calling him to ask of he could take care of some small thing or other as he was pretty sure he knew how.

Long story short, when the tech retired my son was offered the job. He took it and and maintained 100+ screens in southern California (except LA of course).

Then as he keep running into the Dolby engineer when getting ready for press screenings and previews he told my son he ought to apply at Dolby because they were adding two field engineers.

He did and now hangs around Hollywood pushing producers out of the way when they're standing around the booth getting in the way.

 

[jerryez]

Spell check does not catch "both" vs "booth".

 

[steve4810]

Spell check does not catch "both" vs "booth".

Like i said: Damned Spellcheck!