What is widescreen?
All new televisions today are “Widescreen”. If you visit Myer, Good Guys, Harvey Norman, Megamart, JB-Hifi, or any other store you will see that most televisions are in this format – generally all LCD and Plasma televisions. Basically it is fitting more content in the sides of the picture. We film in this format but we can also can film or down-convert to the normal format.
Digital television will be broadcast in widescreen mode. Widescreen television has a different aspect ratio (ratio of width to height) than traditional analog. The aspect ratio of a widescreen is 16:9, while Australian viewers have been accustomed to viewing a 4:3 aspect ratio since television began in this country. Widescreen will, in many cases, literally mean you see more of the picture. Most movies are currently made in 16:9 and are converted to 4:3 to allow us to watch them on television or video, so there is a lot of information that you don’t see on your television that you would see in the cinema version of the film. Live sporting events will benefit in particular from the extra detail and wider frame. For some time now television production has been converting to widescreen, both locally and overseas. Widescreen programming is becoming more readily available and will eventually become the global standard.
Widescreen is the characteristic ‘rectangular’ image favoured by film presentations since the 1950’s. There are several aspect ratios but the most common are expressed as, in order of width, WS 1.66:1, WS 1.78:1 (also referred to as 16:9), WS 1.85:1 and WS 2.35:1. Each of these denote the width to height ratio of the particular widescreen presentation; i.e. 1.85:1 illustrates the frame is 1.85 times wider than it is tall. On a standard television, a widescreen image will be characterised by the black bars visible at the top and bottom of the screen. How thick these bars are will depend on the aspect ratio of the widescreen presentation; the wider the image frame, the thicker the black bars.
Widescreen is the ‘rectangular’ image favoured by film presentations since the 1950’s. There are several aspect ratios but the most common are expressed as, in order of width, WS 1.66:1, WS 1.78:1 (also referred to as 16:9), WS 1.85:1 and WS 2.35:1. Each of these refers to the width / height ratio of the particular widescreen presentation. On a standard television, a widescreen image will be produce black bars visible at the top and bottom of the screen. How thick these bars are will depend on the aspect ratio of the widescreen presentation; the wider the image frame, the thicker the black bars.
