My Fox affiliate (on cable) airs reruns of "The Simpsons" with black bars on the sides (even though my TV screen is what used to be normal) AND at the top.
I can't imagine what this is about.
I can't imagine what this is about.
-
Get involved.
We want your input!
Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.
After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.
After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/
Thanks in advance and have fun!
RadioDiscussions Administrators
A new kind of letterboxing problem
- Thread starter vchimpanzee
- Start date
The station at their end probably began to send out the AFD 10 code to providers in their PSIP flag, which forces the station on 4:3 sets to display the picture in 16:9 letterbox, no matter what, thus letter and windowboxing appears.
On the surface, cable and satellite providers must obey this presentation if requested (and Fox makes it compulsory for their programming to air in 16:9 in all forms), especially if the station goes to full 16:9 with all programming. However, once the grumpies who call in to say "Vanna White is too tiny on the Wheel and I'm paying $80 to have half the screen show black", the providers switch back to 4:3, but show the station in a format they don't want anymore. In Green Bay, WLUK and WFRV went full widescreen, but Charter shows them in 4:3, cutting off info and graphics all the time there.
On the surface, cable and satellite providers must obey this presentation if requested (and Fox makes it compulsory for their programming to air in 16:9 in all forms), especially if the station goes to full 16:9 with all programming. However, once the grumpies who call in to say "Vanna White is too tiny on the Wheel and I'm paying $80 to have half the screen show black", the providers switch back to 4:3, but show the station in a format they don't want anymore. In Green Bay, WLUK and WFRV went full widescreen, but Charter shows them in 4:3, cutting off info and graphics all the time there.
I did mention this was the reruns.
Are you getting the same thing with the FOX station over-the-air? Here in New Britain, CT with no converter, I get Comcast airing WGBY-TV (PBS) channel 57 of Springfield, MA twice: The primary 16:9 HD feed one one channel and then a 4:3 digital simulcast with the window box effect you describe on another. When I record an HD show on my DVD recorder, it will play back on my TV with the window box effect (since the recorder is only capable of recording a 480p 4:3 SD signal).
I work at a FOX affiliate in Nashville, TN. We also air Simpsons reruns. Every other year we get a batch satellite feed of new episodes. They are recorded straight to server for playback on air as full-frame 16:9. We also record to digital tape for backup. The tape machines are not capable of 16:9 so the feed to tape is converted to 16:9 letterbox. If we need to replace an episode from tape we run through a frame sync that will up-convert to full-frame 16:9. Some operators skip this step and we end up with a letterboxed version hitting air. Something like this might be what's happening.
I hadn't thought to check this. I keep one of the TVs with a converter box on ABC and the other on another Fox affiliate. Maybe one of these days I'll remember and have time to check on that.KML-224 said:
PirateJohnny said:
Since the Simpsons is a non-barter show, does your station prefer to air certain episodes or seasons?
I've seen the same problem with letterboxing on all 4 sides with WJKT Fox 16 in Jackson, TN with some shows from Fox. I saw it last Saturday on one of Fox's infomercials. (Not watching, just channel surfing.) The same infomercial was also on WHBQ Fox 13 in Memphis in 4:3. When WJKT went to SEC football at 11:00 they went back to 4:3.
If it happens on a show I actually want to watch I usually will adjust the zoom to cut the black bars back as much as possible, but in some cases like Vchimpanzee described even with zoom it still doesn't eliminate the bars on all 4 sides.
If it happens on a show I actually want to watch I usually will adjust the zoom to cut the black bars back as much as possible, but in some cases like Vchimpanzee described even with zoom it still doesn't eliminate the bars on all 4 sides.
F
FreddyE1977
Guest
DirecTV would SO make my day if they would provide a zoom feature on their
analog converter boxes so that I could eliminate this on my old-school receivers.
analog converter boxes so that I could eliminate this on my old-school receivers.
Most newer televisions have a zoom feature. some converter boxes do also. The problem with zoom is that it will work when watching letterboxed window box programming, but the picture will often look worse because all its doing is blowing up the center of the screen. the picture will look fuzzy, just like an overly cropped photograph or one of those awful "digital" zooms some cheap cameras have. Another problem is when a show that is properly framed or is on another channel. You TV is set where everyones head is cut off. You'd be surprised how many times I've been to someones house or resturant and seen a beautiful widescreen TV displaying an old SD 4:3 program or channel with headless people running around, and you can see the scoreboard ticker at the bottom. The crazy thing about is, the owners of the TV are clueless and don't seem to notice that their TV is screwed up. As long as they fill up the screen and there are no black bars, whether it be "Stretch O Vision" "Crop-O-Vision, or "Squeeze-O-Vision" they seem to be happy, and will often brag about how great their new expensive HDTV is, and have never seen any actual over the air true HD before, and don't know any better.
D
Darth_vader
Guest
Those "black bars on the sides" of the screen are called "pillarboxes", vchimp.
"The Simpsons" have been around before HDTV existed. If you are watching a rerun from several years ago, it will be pillarboxed. Because thats the way it was made. widescreen tv didn't exist. all old television shows and old movies made before the 1950's should be shown with black bars on the sides because that is the way they were made. There is no way on God's green earth to make widescreen out of a 4:3 film unless you crop the top and bottom of the picture off. which will often result in chopped off heads and feet. One local station tried to crop Andy Griffith into semi-widescreen. it didn't work. everyone looked too close to the camera because of the cropping, and the tops of heads were cut off. it looked terrible. thankfully they stopped doing it after a while.
Fly, you hit it on the head. Many TV viewers are simply clueless morons. If I had a $20bill for every time I saw a "flat screen" TV in a business establishment running in "s t r e t c h o v i s i o n" , I'd be a rich man....
...including the Charter Cable system office lobby in La Crosse, Wisconsin...rgseark2009 said:
D
Darth_vader
Guest
Heh, if I had a $20 for each time I'd seen my Mum's widescreen running in "s t r e t c h o v i s i o n" over the last several years, I'd at least be a multi-hundredthousandaire! ;o)
To add insult to injury, her Philips 32PF7320A/37 (whew!) has a function which automatically stretches and squashes the picture to fill the screen based on the "unoccupied" (letter/pillar/windowbox) space outside the picture. Of course, she thinks it looks alright that way. Watching the 1700 "news" on KATU on that screen can be even more dizzying than seeing footage of a roller coaster ride in an OMNIMAX screen. Yikes.
To add insult to injury, her Philips 32PF7320A/37 (whew!) has a function which automatically stretches and squashes the picture to fill the screen based on the "unoccupied" (letter/pillar/windowbox) space outside the picture. Of course, she thinks it looks alright that way. Watching the 1700 "news" on KATU on that screen can be even more dizzying than seeing footage of a roller coaster ride in an OMNIMAX screen. Yikes.
D
Darth_vader
Guest
I guess. My 78-year old Grandma has a Samsung widescreen with a similar dys/feature, along with two or three manual zoom/aspect ratio presets, and she refuses to run it in automatic mode. Gran's actually pretty good about keeping things in their intended aspect ratio*. Mum, Dad and Mum's current hubby all seem to share the philosophy of "every single pixel absolutely must be illuminated at all times". I guess you can figure out what the first setting is that Gran disables on Mum's widescreen when we have her over!
[size=8pt]* I like to think it's because of the work she did as a 35mm cinema projectionist when she first came out here in the early '50s, right as Hollywood's "widescreen mania" was really starting take off.
[size=8pt]* I like to think it's because of the work she did as a 35mm cinema projectionist when she first came out here in the early '50s, right as Hollywood's "widescreen mania" was really starting take off.
It's not just this generation that is clueless. I remember as a kid going to peoples houses (usually old people) and the tint on their TV would be green. or the vertical hold was messed up and the picture would be flipping. (ask a kid if they've ever seen that) and nobody in the house seemed to notice. It would drive me crazy wanting to get up and fix it for them. Another thing that drove me crazy is people with antennas pointed the wrong direction. The picture is snowy or ghosting and nobody wants to adjust the (tinfoil) on the antenna. I still drive by people's houses and notice that many outside antennas are pointed the oposite direction. How about someones stereo equipment where both left and right speakers are wired to the same channel. Or a surround sound system wired where dialogue is is being heard from the rear speakers, instead of the center. How about old folks that only watched 2 VHF channels and didn't even know about the other UHF channels because they never bothered to hook up the UHF coupler to the back of their set, or couldn't figure out how to use the UHF tuner knob on their TV. (my grandmother) But with every generation the technology gets better but the usage gets worse. case in point. Widescreen HD video that some idiot has taken with the camera turned the wrong way. its called "Vertical Video Syndrome" on youtube. and they keep sending these unwatchable chopped off skinny videos to facebook, youtube, TV news shows and "America's got talent" Even AGT has started running segments on the proper way to turn a camera to no avail. Why don't people start turning their Televisions on their sides, since thats the way most of these cell phone users like to watch video. Walmart actually does that with small sideways TV sets all over the store running commercials. How many remember useing a pair of plyers to change channels instead of buying a $3 knob from Radio Shack? But of course my all time pet peeve is when people watch crappy SD video in stretch-o-vison, or even worse in zoom with the heads cut off even when proper HD is available in their area, and for free.
One more rant: Some sets have a "Panoramic" mode which stretches the sides of the picture while leaving the center somewhat normal. This makes everything look like a fun-house mirror. Try watching NASCAR on a TV like this. The cars suddenly turn in to stretch limo's whenever they go around the track. It looks like your having some strange LSD trip. Very annoying
One more rant: Some sets have a "Panoramic" mode which stretches the sides of the picture while leaving the center somewhat normal. This makes everything look like a fun-house mirror. Try watching NASCAR on a TV like this. The cars suddenly turn in to stretch limo's whenever they go around the track. It looks like your having some strange LSD trip. Very annoying
a lot of people feel cheated if they have to watch black bars on their TV, TBS is afraid they'll change the channel
- Status