I think this has been over a bunch of times but has Voom said if they are going to move to showing movies in their original aspect ratio or only in 16x9? What was strange is I watched part of one of the Godzilla movies on MonstersHD today and it was in it's original aspect ratio in letterboxed format. This is the first I've seen of this. This is one thing I really wish Voom would do more of, it's nice filling the whole screen but I still want to see 100% of the movies I am watching, not 85% or whatever the number is for 2.35:1 movies....
Voom and original aspect ratio? (Please send your comment to VOOM)
- Thread starter negreenfield
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I agree with you. Those old Gozilla movies improve by watching them letterbox. We all really hope that VOOM decides to change their policy on this. At least give us 50%. Right everything seems to be 16x9.
!protest
Any chance of a petition or poll on this to show Voom we mean business? Anything other than OAR is a travesty. Either run it letterboxed or pillarboxed to give us the full intended effect, or don't show it at all.
Nothing will make me turn the channel faster than a zoomed, stretched or cropped movie. People who want to see their widescreen filled at any price, or who are not capable of preventing burn-in without professional help, are too dumb to own, configure or watch HDTV.
My local NBC affiliate is one of those that broadcasts SD content stretched on their digital channel. The engineer and the news staff hate it (they become talking fatheads.) But when they tried it the other way the station manager got calls from people complaining that there was something wrong with the picture because it was "squished on the sides," and one jerk threatened to sue them for causing burn-in on his plasma.
Sorry to turn my first post on this forum into a rant, but I've be disgusted for years by people who buy butchered "fullscreen" DVDs to fill their 4:3 sets, and I'm no less disgusted with people who demand butchered movies to fill their 16:9 sets.
Voomers should be more sophisticated than that. We pay for HD content because we want to see the best PQ available, and distorting it or lopping off bits of it before transmission is unforgiveable.
Any chance of a petition or poll on this to show Voom we mean business? Anything other than OAR is a travesty. Either run it letterboxed or pillarboxed to give us the full intended effect, or don't show it at all.
Nothing will make me turn the channel faster than a zoomed, stretched or cropped movie. People who want to see their widescreen filled at any price, or who are not capable of preventing burn-in without professional help, are too dumb to own, configure or watch HDTV.
My local NBC affiliate is one of those that broadcasts SD content stretched on their digital channel. The engineer and the news staff hate it (they become talking fatheads.) But when they tried it the other way the station manager got calls from people complaining that there was something wrong with the picture because it was "squished on the sides," and one jerk threatened to sue them for causing burn-in on his plasma.
Sorry to turn my first post on this forum into a rant, but I've be disgusted for years by people who buy butchered "fullscreen" DVDs to fill their 4:3 sets, and I'm no less disgusted with people who demand butchered movies to fill their 16:9 sets.
Voomers should be more sophisticated than that. We pay for HD content because we want to see the best PQ available, and distorting it or lopping off bits of it before transmission is unforgiveable.
An OAR Poll has been done at least once: http://www.satelliteguys.us/showthread.php?t=10902&highlight=oar+poll
Send VOOM your comments/complains/recommendations: http://voom.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/voom.cfg/php/enduser/cci/std_cont.php?page=null
Riff...<EOT>
Send VOOM your comments/complains/recommendations: http://voom.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/voom.cfg/php/enduser/cci/std_cont.php?page=null
Riff...<EOT>
You know what's really strange, anyone else notice that promo bit about why you need movies in widescreen.. all about aspect ratio.. "I want to see all of the movie!" Kind of odd when they crop and zoom so much cutting out so much of some movies. But it's nice that they've been doing some things right. I wish they'd pillar box old cartoons they show and I wish they'd show some older theater released cartoons that were originally widescreen.
is it my imagination or do movies look worse when cropped. I don't mean just that the sides are missing, but the PQ isn't as good. it's as if the movie was transferred OAR, and then zoomed in, rather than transferred in 16x9. you know what I mean?
sean you should definitely do a poll and forward result to wilt.
sean you should definitely do a poll and forward result to wilt.
Ok, I voted in the old poll, another thing I would like is not to see any dubbing, just my opinion. I can't stand hearing some crappy American guy faking a French accent in a few of the movies I've seen on WorldCinema. Subtitles are your friend... unless it's something like Cowboy Bebop, that was actually pretty good dubbing...
I agree on dubbing. There are only a handful of films that do it well, in my experience. I know there are people who claim reading subtitles distracts them, but I find bad lip synch and poor voice acting much more so.
Let's hope Voom hears the message.
Let's hope Voom hears the message.
Does anyone know a good site the get the OAR of movies? Not the DVD OAR but OAR of the movie as shown in the theater or as it was shot?
Go to the IMDB Database, Search for the movie you want, and on the left hand side click on "technical specs" under "Other info"
Jerry
Jerry
Getting back to the original question of OAR. How do we know that Voom is not using Anamorphically Enhanced HD Transfers of these movies. I looked at one example today. The Woman in Red. Original Aspect Ratio is 1.85.
One of two scenarios can happen:
1- HD Transfer of 1.85 would result in letterbox when watch on 16x9 HDTV
or
2- HD Transfer "Anamorphically Enhanced" of 1.85 will result in filling the screen with no loss in OAR and more definition added to the transfer.
My question is: how can I tell if the HD Transfer has been Anamorphically Enhanced or not? Is it possible to do this?
One of two scenarios can happen:
1- HD Transfer of 1.85 would result in letterbox when watch on 16x9 HDTV
or
2- HD Transfer "Anamorphically Enhanced" of 1.85 will result in filling the screen with no loss in OAR and more definition added to the transfer.
My question is: how can I tell if the HD Transfer has been Anamorphically Enhanced or not? Is it possible to do this?
Ok, I got my answer. So even if the HD transfer was "Anamorphically Enhanced" there will still be small black bars at top and bottom.
Anamorphically enhanced only applies to DVD's, not HDTV. There is no support for anamorphic HDTV and there are VERY few people who could even handle anamorphic HD - like maybe 1% of the hardcore users on AVS forum. Heck, even I cannot handle anamorphic HDTV with my current systems (i.e. a 2.35:1 film is shown full frame in 16x9 for use with an anamorphic lens) because even though I have an anamorphic lens, I cannot display a 1080p display fully on any digital projector that can use the lens. You are basically looking at people with a Sony Qualia 004, a JVC QX1 or one of the commercial LCD/DLP 1080p projectors and an anamorphic lens. There is currently no support in the standards for anamorphic HDTV and there really isn't a need for one unless you have a Qualia or a $100K projector and the anamorphic lens.
I noticed The Terminator on Monsters HD in 2.35:1 aspect ratio.
I noticed The Terminator on Monsters HD in 2.35:1 aspect ratio.
I really do not know why is VOOM debating so much this topic. I sent an email to a contact at the programming department and he fowarded my email to someome in charge of HD Cinema. Here's my correspondence. Everyone in favor of OAR should follow the link above and send in your comment. I really hope we get this. Here's the link:
http://voom.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/voom.cfg/php/enduser/cci/std_cont.php?page=null
My Comment/Question to VOOM:
I see that HD Cinema has made quite excellent improvements. Now 2 movies
per channel per day. Some of the channels has been named to show specific
movie gendre. These are good improvements but one improvement that will
greatly enhanced the HD Cinema experience will be keeping the Original
Aspect Ratio (OAR) of the movie. For example, "The Woman in Red" and "The
Towering Inferno" have 1.85 as the OAR of the 35mm film. When the HD
tranfer of these movies is done, it should be kept at 1.85 (OAR) and
therefore it will show letterbox (black bars top and bottom). This will
greatly enhanced the viewing because the resolution of the HD Transfer will
be better and some parts of the movie are not lost.
The way it is right now every HD Cinema movie is filling the 16x9 HDTV
screen. This is not good if the OAR of the movie was not meant to fill the
16x9 HDTV screen. What is happening is that some parts of the movie is lost
and quality of the movie also loses because it has to be strecthed
vertically and horizontally to fill the screen. Most people that get VOOM
are well knowledge in Home Theater and can tell the difference between the
two methods. Please pass this information along because this is one
drawback that is keeping people from signing or dissapoint a lot of people
once they sign on and find out this. These people will eventually end up
leaving the service.
Hope we can talk once more.
My Answer from VOOM:
I was passed your comment along to me and I am glad to hear from you.
This aspect ratio for movies has been a lively debate here at VOOM, will
all of the movie enthusiasts lined up squarely on your side. Your
comment gives me renewed support to shift this policy, which I hope to
do within the next month. I'll keep you posted.
http://voom.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/voom.cfg/php/enduser/cci/std_cont.php?page=null
My Comment/Question to VOOM:
I see that HD Cinema has made quite excellent improvements. Now 2 movies
per channel per day. Some of the channels has been named to show specific
movie gendre. These are good improvements but one improvement that will
greatly enhanced the HD Cinema experience will be keeping the Original
Aspect Ratio (OAR) of the movie. For example, "The Woman in Red" and "The
Towering Inferno" have 1.85 as the OAR of the 35mm film. When the HD
tranfer of these movies is done, it should be kept at 1.85 (OAR) and
therefore it will show letterbox (black bars top and bottom). This will
greatly enhanced the viewing because the resolution of the HD Transfer will
be better and some parts of the movie are not lost.
The way it is right now every HD Cinema movie is filling the 16x9 HDTV
screen. This is not good if the OAR of the movie was not meant to fill the
16x9 HDTV screen. What is happening is that some parts of the movie is lost
and quality of the movie also loses because it has to be strecthed
vertically and horizontally to fill the screen. Most people that get VOOM
are well knowledge in Home Theater and can tell the difference between the
two methods. Please pass this information along because this is one
drawback that is keeping people from signing or dissapoint a lot of people
once they sign on and find out this. These people will eventually end up
leaving the service.
Hope we can talk once more.
My Answer from VOOM:
I was passed your comment along to me and I am glad to hear from you.
This aspect ratio for movies has been a lively debate here at VOOM, will
all of the movie enthusiasts lined up squarely on your side. Your
comment gives me renewed support to shift this policy, which I hope to
do within the next month. I'll keep you posted.
Good move, Sean, I hope they do shift over to OAR. Believe it or not, there are a lot of HD guys over at AVSForum that actually prefer 16:9 over OAR, beats the hell out of me why, but they do. Joe 6 Pack strikes HD I guess.
The cropping of Bergman's Persona from its original 1.37:1 to 16x9 as shown on World Cinema resulted in a drastic loss of quality. Voom's advertisements saying "you're missing half of the picture!" if you're watching 16x9 on a 4x3 tv apply equally as well to what Voom does to Bergman.
Rings a little hollow....
Rings a little hollow....
I totally disagree I enjoy good quality 16x9, the little 10% you are missing isn't the huge chunk you miss with 4:3 formatted movies, I want to fill the whole screen most of the time... unless the movie in question is real scenic like Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon or Lord of the Rings...
I don't need bars to watch 1967 Godzilla Vs Mothra.. please...
I don't need bars to watch 1967 Godzilla Vs Mothra.. please...
