I've been under the impression that you need a DVD recorder with an ATSC / QAM tuner to record HD programming in anamorphic widescreen. I noticed I had a Prog Out (regular RCA for audio and composite for video) on my Panasonic plasma and decided to try and connect it to the input on my Panasonic DVD recorder to record something in HD expecting at most for it to record the HD feed in standard def in letterboxed widescreen. It did record the HD feed in standard def of course but it retained the anamorphic picture. I also thought that to get an anamorphic picture, youd need at least a component cable. I used a composite cable.Can someone explain how this is possible w/out the dvd recorder itself having an HD tuner ?

The anamorphic picture you recorded is really just a fullscreen picture that you squash vertically on playback (or looking at it a different way, you stretch horizontally) to get your 16:9 AR. I.e. it has as many scanlines as a 4:3 image. So when you play it back, you re-squash it, and get your widescreen picture again. When you see letterboxed widescreen on a widescreen TV, you are seeing a picture that is composed of less actual picture scan lines, as well as a number of black scan lines on the top and bottom of the picture.

I realize this explanation is somewhat contrary to the actual explanation for anamorphic images, which involves the image being stretched horizontally, but I think it makes the point clear enough in a relative way. Actually, I think the horizontal squashing is more appropriate on a 4:3 TV when you watch anamorphic playback by using vertical compression.

As you already pointed out, your recorder did NOT record HD, so it didn't need a HD tuner.

I hope some of the above made some sense, and at least answered your question.

Well, in terms of making a disc, anamorphic is a flag on the DVD. Most recorders don't put in the flag, a few do. The flag allows the picture to be correct, not squished or stretched, on both 4:3 and 16:9 displays.

Your recorder must have this ability. As I recall, the HDD models often had it. The basic models never did. Although I should ask....did you actually try the disc on both kinds of displays? If you haven't, you don't really know it is anamorphic.

Also, anamorphic has nothing to do with the display, really. It has to do with the encoding on the disc. That's why it doesn't matter what kind of connection you use.

Okay with the flag being there on anamorphic DVDs, but in that case it is because the DVD player will do something different depending on whether you have set it to output to a 4:3 or 16:9 TV.

Whether or not the flag is set, if you've set your player to output to a 16:9 TV, you will get the proper aspect ratio as long as your TV itself is set to the appropriate ratio.

If you have a 4:3 TV, but have a vertical compression option on it, you can still set your DVD player to 16:9 TV, and always get the right ratio. You either use vertical compression for anamorphic DVDs, or you don't use it for non-anamorphic, and end up with a lower resolution image, occupying approximately the same screen area. This is how I have one of my TVs set up.

If you have a 4:3 TV that doesn't support vertical compression, you have to set your DVD player to 4:3, or else an anamorphic DVD will appear too tall.

The poster does know that it's anamorphic, because if it wasn't, he would get a picture that didn't appear to be 16:9 unless he switched his TV to 4:3 mode, and even then he would get a small 16:9 picture with bars at the top, bottom, and both sides.

I have a widescreen TV . Thing is, I played this disc back on my computer , and it definetely was not widescreen. It was 4:3 ratio with the widescreen image kind of smushed into the frame.

Then it sounds like it's anamorphic, but that the flag has not been set. So whichever media player you're using to play it on your PC, is using 4:3. Some media players (like VLC media player) let you override the aspect ratio, so you could try that for PC playback.

Uh, that sounds like it is NOT anamorphic, BECAUSE the flag is not set.

You can record 3 ways:
Anamorphic
4:3
16:9

And as I mentioned before, most DVDRs do not record anamorphic. So you have to pick whether you want it permanently stretched on 4:3 TVs (unless they have image compression, most do not) or with lower resolution and have to zoom on 16:9 TVs. I always record HD shows in 16:9 aspect (stretched vertically on the disc) so I can get the best resolution on widescreen TVs, which is what you did. VLC should definitely play it properly once you adjust.

The flag is only an 'indicator' for anamorphic data. The data is stored as anamorphic, which is why it didn't look right in a 4:3 display. Note that he described it as 'smushed' into the frame. I supposed I am making the assumption that he means 'smushed' horizontally, I.e. people look too tall and thin.

4:3 and 16:9 (non-anamorphic/letterboxed) recordings will both look correct on a 4:3 display.

Anamorphic will not look right unless you compress the image, or scale the image vertically (which your DVD player does if it is set to 4:3 display, AND the anamorphic flag is set on a DVD). You can get an anamorphic image on regular broadcast TV, which doesn't have any such flag. Again, this is something I've seen.

I think we're getting into technical semantics here. I'm just saying it doesn't matter how a textbook describes "anamorphic". If it isn't done 100% properly on the physical disc, it is something else. And from the standpoint of a recorder, most of them cannot make proper anamorphic discs.

Normally, my recorder will not make an anamorphic recording. The only way it is able to do this is with the progressive out cables going from my TV into the recorder and recording HD content.

The point I'm trying to make is that you should be able to record anything as anamorphic that is anamorphic to begin with. I.e., as long as you record from an anamorphic source, any device should be able to capture it, since you are capturing a 4:3 image that has to be compressed or stretched (depending on your relative point of view) to appear correctly on your output device.

I see your point, Spiky, about semantics. And your last statement speaks volumes, in that most of them can't make 'proper' anamorphic discs. This is in the sense that they won't conform to the DVD specification of an anamorphic disc which I would expect is anamorphic data PLUS the anamorphic flag being set. I was just saying that their data is anamorphic in the sense that it can be viewed in higher resolution 16:9 on a 4:3 TV with compression, or in 16:9 mode on a 16:9 TV without any borders. If the data is not anamorphic, you will only be able to view it in normal resolution 16:9 on a 4:3 set, or letterboxed on all 4 sides on a 16:9 set (excluding the use of a zoom button which is usually detrimental to picture quality).

Putting it a simpler way, if data is anamorphic (in the case of 16:9), the data stored does not contain any black bars, so all the data stored is picture information. If it is non-anamorphic, the data will contain the black bars (top and bottom) as part of the picture information. This is why you get an effectively higher resolution during playback with anamorphic data.

There's actually a good link on it here (It appears that there are a number of possible settings for the flag, which can restrict behaviour of the DVD player on a 4:3 TV.): http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#3.5

For a visual description of anamorphic, see this: http://gregl.net/videophile/anamorphic.htm

The situation that JZ1276 describes is being discussed at some of the direct broadcast satellite forums. Seems that playing back HD recordings from their DVR's results in anamorphic *data* coming out of the composite and S-Video jacks - which a DVD recorder will record (but without the anamorphic flag).

Does anyone know how one might find a DVD recorder that can be configured to set the anamorphic flag - so the DVD becomes a true "anamorphic" DVD?