TVNZ showing UK shows 14:9 centre cut rather thn 16:9

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sbiddle

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#26424 22-Sep-2008 13:00

Is there anybody out there who knows why TVNZ are displaying many UK shows that are shot in 16:9 as 14:9? Unlike TV3 and C4 who run all 4:3 content as 12:9 in a 16:9 frame TVNZ display all 4:3 content as 14:9 in a 16:9 frame.

These shows are all filmed in 16:9 - are TVNZ receiving these as 4:3 and then displaying them as 14:9 or are they receiving them as 16:9, running them as a 4:3 centre cut and then broadcasting them as 14:9?

I emailed them and didn't hear back, I'm just curious if anybody else knows why it's happening..

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#166255 22-Sep-2008 13:06

Slight aside, but isn't it mildly funny that widescreen TV is still not full screen on a widescreen TV. DVD's with 1.85:1 ratio fill my widescreen TV, but 2.40:1 gives black bars top and bottom. Watching freeview TV on my TV as letterbox/not scaled output gives black lines top and bottom.

sbiddle

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#166269 22-Sep-2008 13:39

Jaxson: Watching freeview TV on my TV as letterbox/not scaled output gives black lines top and bottom.

What type of STB and TV do you have? Something is set up wrong if this is happening. All Freeview channels are sent as a full 16:9 frame and with full 16:9 content you should get no bars anywhere assuming you have a 16:9 TV set to 16:9 and have the STB set to 16:9 output. If the content is 4:3 you will however get black bars on the left and right.

digitalepsilon

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#166281 22-Sep-2008 14:18

Jaxson: Slight aside, but isn't it mildly funny that widescreen TV is still not full screen on a widescreen TV. DVD's with 1.85:1 ratio fill my widescreen TV, but 2.40:1 gives black bars top and bottom. Watching freeview TV on my TV as letterbox/not scaled output gives black lines top and bottom.

There's TV content and there's movie content. New content shot for TV should fill your widescreen (1.78:1) just fine, so "widescreen TV (as opposed to movies) should be full screen on a widescreen TV". But the aspect ratios you mention (1.85:1 and 2.40:1) are movie aspect ratios, and it's true your widescreen TV still isn't wide enough for these formats, though it is very close to 1.85:1 such that overscan hides any black bars there.

Movies aren't usually filmed with the shape of your widescreen TV in mind -- they're filmed with the best cinema experience in mind and the aspect ratio choice is based on achieving that. The black bars (especially when the movie was shot in cinemascope/2.35:1) are the only way to preserve the shape the director intended for the frame even in bluray, but you knew that already. Many DVD players can (if you really want) get rid of the black bars by zooming in.

Sorry to hijack this thread. I agree with the OP query though

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#166282 22-Sep-2008 14:21

I wonder how long it will take for the world's first cinemascope plasma?

digitalepsilon

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#166296 22-Sep-2008 15:57

sbiddle: I wonder how long it will take for the world's first cinemascope plasma?

Not sure about flat panels, but in recent years more high-end home theatre projectors are coming with built-in 2.35:1 ratio support, particularly new models shown at CEDIA 2008. They use anamorphic lenses mounted on the front of the projector to optically stretch the output to a cinemascope size. This technology is particularly useless when watching non-cinemascope content though (eg. 1.78:1 TV) and the lens needs to be removed in those cases so the appeal of cinemascope in the home will always be limited to the ultra-purists as far as I can see.

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#166307 22-Sep-2008 16:36

digitalepsilon: so the appeal of cinemascope in the home will always be limited to the ultra-purists as far as I can see.

I think they said the same about 16:9, didn't they?

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Jaxson

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#166499 23-Sep-2008 12:50

Hi all, thanks for the replies. I thought something was up with this. I have ET box and when output is fullscreen the picture looks slightly stretched up and down - meaning people look taller/thinner. A round O looks more natural when set to letterbox, but I have an older TV with DVI input only, so something maybe up with this. I'll set it back to full screen if this is really the way it should look, (which I suspected), and see if I get used to it. Cheers.

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#166595 23-Sep-2008 18:42

I noticed the bars side of picture on Torchwood. Been bars on sides of other programs to, but only on TV2.

Yet Dr Who on Prime is good as gold. Fills whole screen perfectly, yet Dr Who was made before Torchwood!

I'm finding TVNZ a very strange company, they've already lost my viewing of some programs because can't record HD on sky.

Do have zinwell but it won't record. Olympics DD5.1 and now back to two channel sound on TVNZ, they just don't seem to be with the program.

Pretty poor them not responding to your email to.

old3eyes

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#166605 23-Sep-2008 19:11

Actually the whole Freeview HD picture in NZ is pretty bleak at present with very little HD content especially no movies. Sky seems to have way more HD content these days but I refuse to pay their price..

Regards,

Old3eyes

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#166652 23-Sep-2008 23:31

my apologies for being slightly off topic.

i have a slightly older samsung 46" square crt rear projection tv.

it's set to 16:9 so has the black bars above and below the picture naturally.

i was watching the warriors vs storm game on my tv and at half time i left home and went to watch the 2nd half at a relatives house.

he has a panasonic 50" widescreen lcd or plasma.. his tv was set to 16.9 and the picture filled the screen. what i noticed was that..

the picture still had a reasonably obvious "stretch" to it. eg the sides had been pulled out to make the picture wider.. i asked the mate if his tv was set to 16:9 and he said yes.

the picture didnt look natural and the players etc didnt look in proportion.. got home and watched a replay on my tv and it looked perfect widescreen wise..

anyone noticed this? maybe i just need to get used to watching widescreen broadcasts on a widescreen tv??

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#166677 24-Sep-2008 09:25

Damager: my apologies for being slightly off topic.

i have a slightly older samsung 46" square crt rear projection tv.

it's set to 16:9 so has the black bars above and below the picture naturally.

i was watching the warriors vs storm game on my tv and at half time i left home and went to watch the 2nd half at a relatives house.

he has a panasonic 50" widescreen lcd or plasma.. his tv was set to 16.9 and the picture filled the screen. what i noticed was that..

the picture still had a reasonably obvious "stretch" to it. eg the sides had been pulled out to make the picture wider.. i asked the mate if his tv was set to 16:9 and he said yes.

the picture didnt look natural and the players etc didnt look in proportion.. got home and watched a replay on my tv and it looked perfect widescreen wise..

anyone noticed this? maybe i just need to get used to watching widescreen broadcasts on a widescreen tv??

He had the TV set to JUST rather than 16:9. The JUST mode takes a 4:3 picture and progressively stretches the picture the further away from the centreline it gets. A Full Height Anamorphic (FHA) picture is broadcast as a picture that fills the screen vertically and then stretched by the TV (if 16:9 is selected). So using anything other than 16:9 will cause distortion.
He needs to consult the Panasonic manual which clearly indicates with circles what affect each mode applies.
I watched the same game on my widescreen TV and saw no problems with it. The number of people I see with their STB still set to centre-cut and then stretch the picture using a WIDE mode astounds me.

Edit: And as for Torchwood, it appears if you sit on a series for a couple of years then you get caught out with 14:9 stock when you should have ordered 16:9.

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Jaxson

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#166680 24-Sep-2008 09:39

Also some earlier Panasonic Plasmas are not 720 or 1080 resolution, but rather an american NTSC SD resolution, something x 480. These do a terrible job of displaying some inputs, but yeah it's probably the JUST setting as mentioned by Dingbatt.

Set my box to fullscreen aspect mode and to be honest it looked somewhere in between. I spent a while looking for proper shaped circles where possible to check etc. The letterbox is too squashed but there's a fair bit of overscan on fullscreen on my particular TV. Glad you guys let me know that it is supposed to be fullscreen really with the freeview broadcast. I'll leave it on fullscreen. Everything else is set at 16x9 on box and tv.

Sky, I can't help throwing my 2c's in here either. Bstards is all I can say. Used to offer UHF base package with Sky1 and Sports1 for around $36 a month. That I could live with until the sports ended and I didn't use it on the off season. Now UHF is not being offered and the digital price doesn't compare. They're even not showing major games on Sky1 to ensure the UHF subscribers can't get it.

$50 for base free to air channels, now provided better on freeview UHF, and other channels nobody really wants.
$16+ for sports
$18 odd+ for movies.
$15 or one off $599 for myskyhdi
$10 more if you want to see the channels you have in HD when it's available.

$66 for sports, or $90+ for sports only in HD when available, -seriously?!

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#166720 24-Sep-2008 12:42

Jaxson: Also some earlier Panasonic Plasmas are not 720 or 1080 resolution, but rather an american NTSC SD resolution, something x 480. These do a terrible job of displaying some inputs, but yeah it's probably the JUST setting as mentioned by Dingbatt.

Actually you can still buy 480P panel sets under the Soniq brand. I wonder how many dummys have bought these and wonder why their nice new MySkY HDi looks crap..

Regards,

Old3eyes

Jaxson

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#166731 24-Sep-2008 13:10

Yes I know a lot of people scored 'excellant deals' from Harvey Norman just prior to HD-ready and Full HD terms/TV's became standard.

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#166761 24-Sep-2008 15:09

Sky, I can't help throwing my 2c's in here either. Bstards is all I can say. Used to offer UHF base package with Sky1 and Sports1 for around $36 a month. That I could live with until the sports ended and I didn't use it on the off season. Now UHF is not being offered and the digital price doesn't compare. They're even not showing major games on Sky1 to ensure the UHF subscribers can't get it.

$50 for base free to air channels, now provided better on freeview UHF, and other channels nobody really wants.
$16+ for sports
$18 odd+ for movies.
$15 or one off $599 for myskyhdi
$10 more if you want to see the channels you have in HD when it's available.

$66 for sports, or $90+ for sports only in HD when available, -seriously?!

i cannot agree more! we dumped our mysky last year ... some said we were silly when the new mysky hd was coming ... but nah, the new mysky hd - $90 bucks for 2 f1 and 1 test match every now and then ...

ok ok we shall stop hijacking this thread ... zip!

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