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Editor's note: Bill Hunt editor of The Digital Bits (www.thedigitalbits. com) and frequent Video Store Magazine contributor, is an outspoken advocate of the studios releasing DVDs in anamorphic widescreen. Here he explains the in and outs of anamorphic, and why he believes it is important
To knowledgeable DVD fans, seeing the terms"16x9"or"anamorphic"on a disc is like having the Good Housekeeping seal of approval. It tells them that in today's blistering consumer electronics marketplace, where change and obsolescence can happen in the blink of an eye, the DVD they're spending their hardearned cash on is at least a little future-proof That's important, and here's why.
Let's step back a minute, and start from the beginning. No doubt you all know that modern movies are filmed in aspect ratios that are wider than a normal TV screen. For years, there have only been two choices available when presenting these movies on home video: pan-and-scan or letterboxed transfers.
Now, you won't find many serious film buffs who prefer pan-and-scan over letterboxing.That's one of the reasons laserdisc became a favorite format of movie loversthe films were most often presented in the widescreen aspect ratio that the director originally intended. But that preference came at a steep price-a loss of vertical picture space. After all, if those black bars are going to take up part of the screen on yourTV, that leaves less picture area for the actual film image. And since some movies are filmed in very wide aspect ratios (Lawrence of Arabia for example, which is a"scope"film at a ratio of 2.20:1) the problem becomes even more apparent.
Then there are the "average" consumers. You know the ones-the folks who come back after mistakenly buying a letterboxed videotape and say,"Why are those black bars there? I don't like them. I want my money back."As a serious film aficionado, I maintain that if these people really knew what they were missing by watching a pan-and-scan transfer they would change their minds in a hurry. I've converted lots of people to letterbox simply by showing them the difference between the pan-and-scan and letterbox versions on a DVD that includes both formats. This simple question usually gets them start ed on their way:"Look ... when you go to 'a movie...