View Poll Results: How Do You Usually Watch 4:3 Material On Your 16:9 Display?
In a 4:3 Windowbox with black bars on the sides
184
83.26%
Stretched to fill the 16:9 Display
18
8.14%
Zoomed to fill the 16:9 Display
0
0%
A Combination of both Stretch and Zoom to fill the 16:9 Display
10
4.52%
Use multiple methods above with no preference
7
3.17%
Other
2
0.90%
Voters: 221. You may not vote on this poll
How Do You Usually Watch 4:3 Material On Your 16:9 Display?
#1
DVD Talk Limited Edition
Thread Starter
How Do You Usually Watch 4:3 Material On Your 16:9 Display?
An anonymous poll just to see how people prefer watching 4:3 non-letterboxed material on their 16:9 HDTVs.
#2
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OAR all the way: 4:3 pillarboxed. I hate watching a stretched/zoomed picture.
EDIT: Ooops, I didn't know this was supposed to be an anonymous poll. You didn't see me here.
EDIT: Ooops, I didn't know this was supposed to be an anonymous poll. You didn't see me here.
#4
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Even though I have a LCD, I'm paranoid about burn in so I usually like to have the screen filled at all times despite my support for strict OAR. But Lately I've been leaving it alone.
#5
Banned by request
If it's native 4x3, I stretch it on my color tube to avoid burn-in, and on my LCD I windowbox it. For non-anamorphic material (i.e. the unaltered Star Wars trilogy on DVD), I stretch it.
#8
DVD Talk Hero
I don't understand how people can watch squished heads all day. My uncle has his TV set for squish mode and it drives me batty every time I'm over there.
I know they say you get used to it... but you can get used to watching TV with static and rabbit ears too.
Some people just like to get every inch out of their screen, I guess. Get your money's worth.
I know they say you get used to it... but you can get used to watching TV with static and rabbit ears too.
Some people just like to get every inch out of their screen, I guess. Get your money's worth.
#10
DVD Talk Legend
There isn't an option for this in the poll, but I watch 4:3 content properly pillarboxed in its OAR on my 2.35:1 screen.
#11
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Originally Posted by Thor Simpson
I don't understand how people can watch squished heads all day. My uncle has his TV set for squish mode and it drives me batty every time I'm over there.
I know they say you get used to it... but you can get used to watching TV with static and rabbit ears too.
Some people just like to get every inch out of their screen, I guess. Get your money's worth.
I know they say you get used to it... but you can get used to watching TV with static and rabbit ears too.
Some people just like to get every inch out of their screen, I guess. Get your money's worth.
My Sony KDF-46E2000 has an excellent stretch mode. You can barely tell it's stretched. Doesn't bother me one bit and no one has ever mentioned it looked bad to me. And if I wanted a 32" 4x3 TV I would have bought one
#13
DVD Talk Special Edition
My Sony 46 in. has a "Wide Zoom" mode and it looks fine to me. I'd rather not have bars on the left and right. I watch non HD, non digital broadcasts that way.
Watch in Wide Zoom - Battlestar Galactica, Doctor Who - Sci Fi Channel
G4 content
South Park - Comedy Central
Watch in "HD" even though not HD - The Simpsons, Family Guy - Fox
Watch in Wide Zoom - Battlestar Galactica, Doctor Who - Sci Fi Channel
G4 content
South Park - Comedy Central
Watch in "HD" even though not HD - The Simpsons, Family Guy - Fox
#14
DVD Talk Hero
Originally Posted by Mopower
My Sony KDF-46E2000 has an excellent stretch mode. You can barely tell it's stretched.
Squished heads bother me profusely... maybe it's my years in the video studio and animation fighting aspect ratios and any type of distortion.
I know a lot of people who say they can barely even tell a set is stretched. I do not understand these people. They must have funny looking neighbors.
Honestly though, while it bothers me personally to the level that I would not set my own TV that way, it doesn't bother me that other people do make the most of their screens and go ahead and stretch. It's just a matter of personal preference, and I strongly prefer it one way over the other for my own set.
I simply don't watch all that much 4:3 content to begin with because we have a good selection of HD channels and my television watching is limited mostly to shows that are available in HD. So watching 4:3 content on a "smaller screen" isn't all that bothersome to me. I still watch TV on our 17 inch screen in the bedroom so there's no reason I can't be happy with a 32 inch screen for the lamer shows as long as I get to enjoy the good stuff in the full 46".
#15
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Originally Posted by cornflakeguy
My Sony 46 in. has a "Wide Zoom" mode and it looks fine to me.
Non-anamorphic DVDs (or letterboxed LDs) are different. They end up playing windowboxed (bars on all 4 sides) on a 16:9 set, so I assume zooming them doesn't result in any picture loss or distortion?
#19
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How many days at a time do you people leave your set running that you are worried about burn in. I mean really, damn. It takes a long time to develop burn in, it don't just happen - I mean days of the same thing.
I always leave mine OAR. Like other I will do a 1:1 zoom on non-anamorphic widescreen releases and LD in order make the picture a little larger since it does not tamper with the image.
I always leave mine OAR. Like other I will do a 1:1 zoom on non-anamorphic widescreen releases and LD in order make the picture a little larger since it does not tamper with the image.
#23
DVD Talk Hero
Like most everyone here, I'll take the black bars on the sides, unstretched and undistorted.
The funny thing is that a friend of mine, who's a cinematographer, and shoot many things from documentaries to TV show, watches 4:3 shows on his TVm stretched out, all the time. I make fun of him for it, but he just doesn't care. It's amazing to me that the peroson that should care most about proper presentation, is the guy that really doesn't. So I ask him how he'd feel if people watched stuff that he shot all zoomed in and stretched out. And he just says that as longs as he's paid for his work, he doesn't care...
The funny thing is that a friend of mine, who's a cinematographer, and shoot many things from documentaries to TV show, watches 4:3 shows on his TVm stretched out, all the time. I make fun of him for it, but he just doesn't care. It's amazing to me that the peroson that should care most about proper presentation, is the guy that really doesn't. So I ask him how he'd feel if people watched stuff that he shot all zoomed in and stretched out. And he just says that as longs as he's paid for his work, he doesn't care...
#24
I watch everything window-boxed.
I cannot stand to watch stretched 4:3 material. OAR for 4:3 material, just like OAR for 16:9 material. Shouldn't matter, if you care about OAR, you should be stretching the source.
I cannot stand to watch stretched 4:3 material. OAR for 4:3 material, just like OAR for 16:9 material. Shouldn't matter, if you care about OAR, you should be stretching the source.