For christmas, my family got two copies of the same DVD. We have an old 27" television which works just fine and have no plans to replace it. One DVD is Wide Screen and the other is Full Screen. I know that, with the wide screen, I get to wee the whole image that I would have seen at the theatre. But there are black boxes at the top and bottom of the screen. With the full screen version, the screen of my television is filled.

What are the preferences of the people here?

One of my tapes needs to be returned.

When they do Regular or 'Full screen' version, the editors pan and crop the image to fulfill their idea of the best part of the picture. Therefore, you see the best of the 'letterbox' original. It will fill the screen completely. Widescreen viewing shows the same perspective as the movie screen. Therefore, there is NOTHING that is cut off. The fact that you have the black boxes above and below is just the 'shrinking' of the image to fit the side to side part. The whole image will be 'smaller'ie, character sizes on your screen will be smaller, but with more overall information along the edges. It is just fitting the widescreen information to the standard TV size.

Of note, even on 'wide screen' TVs, typically on 'widescreen' movies, there are boxes top and bottem unless different settings are made. That is because the aspect ratio for most 'widescreen' TVs is 16:9 and the typical movie screen ratio is something longer and narrower like 2.95 to 1 or something like that. So even thought I bought a widescreen TV, I still have boxes above and below (although smaller than without the widescreen). You can set a 'zoom' function which in essence crops the outside edges of the image so that it will fit the vertical space.

I remember when I used to watch a 'spaghetti western' on TV as a kid, when it was over and the credits would role, the pictures or the images would get REEEAAAALLLL long and tall, kind of stretched out. I always wondered why. It was because due to the credits, they couldn't 'crop' that part of the film, so instead of switching to an aspect that gave the letterbox ratio so the credits would role properly, they would put it in letterbox width, and then stretch the picture top to bottom. No one noticed the differences in the font being tall and skinny, but I remember seeing Clint Eastwood sitting on a horse, looking somewhat like Picaso's 'Don Quioxte'.

More than you might have wanted to know. But thought I would give it to you anyway.

<small>[ January 10, 2004, 01:59 PM: Message edited by: Formerly Confused ]</small>

I'd return the full screen version if it were me. Everything on TCM and other classic movie channels is 'Letterbox' anyway.
My latest passion is 'burning' DVD movies...
Harold

Yeah, I think the wide screen version is what I'll keep. You never know when you're missing something wonderful with the full screen pictures.

Keep the widescreen... in a few years, the HDTV standard will make widescreen the "default" for all TVs anyways.

With an eye to the future...

I'm dittoing. I try never to have to watch the full screen versions. Sometimes I know what I'm missing and it makes me made. Seabiscuit was the worst in full screen!

It's one the best reasons for buying a DVD player.

Widescreen it is, then. Thanks, friends!

<small>[ January 14, 2004, 07:31 PM: Message edited by: cinderella ]</small>