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A new kind of letterboxing problem

"Case in point: widescreen video that some idiot has taken with the camera turned the wrong way. It's called "vertical video syndrome" on You Tube. People keep posting these unwatchable, chopped-off, skinny videos to social networks or You Tube and sending them to TV news shows. Even "America's Got Talent" has started running segments on the proper way to orient a camera, to no avail."
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I don't recall encountering such a video file on You Tube with those specifications myself, but I believe I have some idea what you're getting at: it's where everything's shown in a tall, narrow "strip" in the centre of the viewport, correct? If that's what you're saying, I have seen things like that on KGW's "news" broadcasts, where narrow amateur cell phone video (and a lot of it is *very* amateurish-looking) apparently seems to pass as an acceptable substitute for professionally-gathered footage these days. Brutal.

Seems to me that it isn't so much the way the camera's rotated as it is the way the cell phone's software is designed. Surely there must be some way to set it so everything records in the proper wide "landscape" aspect ratio, instead of the tall "portrait" ratio.
 
An update: I tried over-the-air and got "No Signal". That hasn't happened before. I should try it with the other antenna. But neither antenna is actually pointed toward the station in question.

As for cable, they have switched to the newer episodes which are letterboxed but wide.
 
Darth_vader said:
"Case in point: widescreen video that some idiot has taken with the camera turned the wrong way. It's called "vertical video syndrome" on You Tube. People keep posting these unwatchable, chopped-off, skinny videos to social networks or You Tube and sending them to TV news shows. Even "America's Got Talent" has started running segments on the proper way to orient a camera, to no avail."
Click to expand...

I don't recall encountering such a video file on You Tube with those specifications myself, but I believe I have some idea what you're getting at: it's where everything's shown in a tall, narrow "strip" in the centre of the viewport, correct? If that's what you're saying, I have seen things like that on KGW's "news" broadcasts, where narrow amateur cell phone video (and a lot of it is *very* amateurish-looking) apparently seems to pass as an acceptable substitute for professionally-gathered footage these days. Brutal.

Seems to me that it isn't so much the way the camera's rotated as it is the way the cell phone's software is designed. Surely there must be some way to set it so everything records in the proper wide "landscape" aspect ratio, instead of the tall "portrait" ratio.
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Tom Bergeron advises people as to how to hold their phones. Some videos still have to have a blue background on the right and left.
 
If the home video was taken on older analog tape or a standard def camera in 4:3 aspect radio it will have sidebars. What I was talking about are widescreen 16x9 cameras that were turned the wrong way. this creates such a skinny picture that it is unwatchable. the problem is that these cellphones have a feature that automatically flips the picture when your turn the phone over. This feature should be disabled when video is being shot. Since it looks right side up to the amatuer photographer when they are viewing on the phone, they are clueless as to how it will look on TV or monitor. I've seen priceless wedding a vacation pictures taken this way. The worst are people mountain pictures, that would look great as a panoramic, but instead are skinnyvision.
 
Well, in that case, I'd think the recording should still be a horizontal 16*9 "landscape" with the action in the frame simply being rotated 90 degrees to compensate, not (hypothetically) vertical 9*16 "portrait", even if it's being triggered by the rotation detector. The fact that these so-called "smart" phones apparently change the aspect ratio of the recorded output depending how they're oriented indicates a pretty stupid design flaw.

Of course, if I were in Tom's boots, I'd be advising everybody that the proper way to hold a cell phone camera is not at all. Shut it off and leave it set on the table; that's what these things called "video cameras" are for. Telephones are for *talking* on.
 
I noticed the problem last night when Cartoon Network was showing How The Grinch Stole Christmas. I did better with the Cinema (large zoom) setting.
 
nomadcowatbk said:
PirateJohnny said:
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.
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Since the Simpsons is a non-barter show, does your station prefer to air certain episodes or seasons?
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Actually, I believe the syndicator (FOX) still schedules which episodes are to be broadcast.

And the proper term for an image that is both letterboxed and pillarboxed is postage stamped.
 
I tried the other antenna. No letterboxing.

I tried cable and briefly saw the "postage stamped" commercial. The next one was letterboxed.
 
I never thought about the postage stamping term before but it makes sense. In any case, why stations or cable systems do this makes no sense to me.
 
There is a chart on the engineering shop wall at the TV station I work at with all kinds of images, terms and explanations. That chart says "postage stamp". We are being driven nuts with clients bringing in their own commercial productions that end up wrong by the time they get into our system. We have 16:9 images squeezed to 4:3, postage stamped video, 4:3 stretched out to 16:9 and quite a few "home-brew" spots have graphics outside the 4:3 safe area. We are still concerned about that because a large number of viewers are still watching on analog cable systems that show a 4:3 cropped image.
 
PirateJohnny said:
There is a chart on the engineering shop wall at the TV station I work at with all kinds of images, terms and explanations. That chart says "postage stamp". We are being driven nuts with clients bringing in their own commercial productions that end up wrong by the time they get into our system. We have 16:9 images squeezed to 4:3, postage stamped video, 4:3 stretched out to 16:9 and quite a few "home-brew" spots have graphics outside the 4:3 safe area. We are still concerned about that because a large number of viewers are still watching on analog cable systems that show a 4:3 cropped image.
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On a weather subchannel I watch there are plenty of ads optimized for 16:9, but the video image box is only 4:3, so bye-bye to plenty of video information and text there. And whenever I see 16:9 video downgraded to 4:3 letterboxing on an HD screen that drives me crazy.
 
As soon as everybody throws away their old 4:3 analog TVs and buys a new 16:9 TV we'll all be in good shape. All the local thrift shops are getting full of old analog TVs. But who's gonna buy them?
 
PirateJohnny said:
As soon as everybody throws away their old 4:3 analog TVs and buys a new 16:9 TV we'll all be in good shape. All the local thrift shops are getting full of old analog TVs. But who's gonna buy them?
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At the places I've checked out they've pretty much cleared out entire hotels of their tube TVs and are offering them between $2-$7; they have no remotes and still have the ethernet-like jack connection to the hotel's PPV network. Nobody's jumping on them. I replaced my bedroom set with a good Vizio 26" set a year back and thought of offering it on craigslist but once I saw the thrift prices, it was laughable to even offer $20 for one, and that was with the coupon digital converter box included.
 
mrschimpf said:
PirateJohnny said:
As soon as everybody throws away their old 4:3 analog TVs and buys a new 16:9 TV we'll all be in good shape. All the local thrift shops are getting full of old analog TVs. But who's gonna buy them?
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At the places I've checked out they've pretty much cleared out entire hotels of their tube TVs and are offering them between $2-$7; they have no remotes and still have the ethernet-like jack connection to the hotel's PPV network. Nobody's jumping on them. I replaced my bedroom set with a good Vizio 26" set a year back and thought of offering it on craigslist but once I saw the thrift prices, it was laughable to even offer $20 for one, and that was with the coupon digital converter box included.
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cheap hotels still have tube sets
 
So do expensive ones.

Last time I was at the Red Lion in Pendleton (2011) they still had the mid-'90s Philips Magnavox CRT sets that were left over from the "On Command" days. Chances are, even if they were to install 16*9 ATSC sets, they'd probably all be fed from the same 4*3 NTSC source that's currently feeding the hotel's internal cable system. (I mean, look through just about any of the "hotel cable TV report" threads on here and you'll get an idea.)

If the system isn't broken, why fix it?

Besides, if you're going to a place like Pendleton just to sit in the hotel room and watch television, it's very obvious you're there for the wrong reason.
 
Darth_vader said:
So do expensive ones.

Last time I was at the Red Lion in Pendleton (2011) they still had the mid-'90s Philips Magnavox CRT sets that were left over from the "On Command" days. Chances are, even if they were to install 16*9 ATSC sets, they'd probably all be fed from the same 4*3 NTSC source that's currently feeding the hotel's internal cable system. (I mean, look through just about any of the "hotel cable TV report" threads on here and you'll get an idea.)

If the system isn't broken, why fix it?

Besides, if you're going to a place like Pendleton just to sit in the hotel room and watch television, it's very obvious you're there for the wrong reason.
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I do spend most of my time after supper in the mountains watching TV because I don't have the channels at home.

At the beach I have to watch after supper because shows I like are on.

I find that when I watch on cable, most programs have inform ation missing on the right and left. It's frustrating. But it's not that much of the program.
 
New development: Now the episodes are no longer letterboxed. They fill the screen, which must mean they're cut off on the right and left.
 
vchimpanzee said:
New development: Now the episodes are no longer letterboxed. They fill the screen, which must mean they're cut off on the right and left.
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If you're watching on a 4:3 TV, probably so. It also depends on the season. Only in the last few years have The Simpsons been produced in 16:9.
 
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