• 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

Is it just me or is this happening to you too?

C

CrankyYankee

It seems as if just in the past week or so I'm noticing more cutoff at the top and bottom of my TV screen. I see some cutoff on the sides as well, but I really see it at the bottom and top. When the digital conversion took place, I didn't notice any difference on my old reliable
analog set which is connected to Comcast cable. Is this just me or have other people noticed this too? I saw a spot the other night with the spokeswoman's entire head cutoff at the shoulders.
 
If you have standard-definition cable TV service, some programs produced in the 16:9 aspect ratio may appear cropped rather than between black bars from top to bottom. I have noticed this problem before and after the end of analog broadcasting for TV stations in the United States operating at full power.
 
Mario-500 said:
If you have standard-definition cable TV service, some programs produced in the 16:9 aspect ratio may appear cropped rather than between black bars from top to bottom. I have noticed this problem before and after the end of analog broadcasting for TV stations in the United States operating at full power.
Click to expand...

I had a similar cropping issue (but only the sides) right after Fox began all sports shows in 16:9 but before Cox had the right broadcast equipment.
 
I've seen some cutoffs at the top and bottom from time to time, but not a whole newsreader head that I remember.
The worst is always on the sides. No matter what network or syndicated channel "The Office" is on, the credits are ALWAYS half there.
It doesn't seem to happen on any paid programs when I flip by them though. Maybe they are ahead of whatever curve causes this?
 
More and more programs are being shown in 16:9 format - even in SD. All they do is down-convert the HD signal to SD for the cable feed. It's just an easier way of presenting shows that are now filmed/taped/covered live in 16:9 to people with 4:3 sets.

Another side effect of this (which is becoming increasingly important) is that the cropping allows those with newer 16:9 sets who are watching SD feeds from cable companies can utilize the built-in zoom feature in their TVs to see the show in 16:9 format without HD. Now, those of you who get your TV from OTA antennae or who have the HD box from your cable company/sat provider may question this, but there's a pretty large group of people who have cable without an HD box - or who have the HD box, but only on 1 TV in the house. The cropping is a convenient way for those people to get an HD-like experience by utilizing all of the real estate of their 16:9 TV's without the nasty effect of stretch-o-vision.

Disclaimer: we have an HD/DVR box on our big set downstairs but I refuse to spring for one in the bedroom. We have a standard digital box there. However, I use the zoom feature on my Vizio up there (Zoom 2 is perfect) whenever one of those 16:9 shows comes on and it looks great. FOX is providing a lot of programs in 16:9 (including NFL football) as are NBC, History and Discovery. Of course others do too, though not quite as often.

It's my understanding that the use of 16:9 sets finally outnumbered 4:3 sets sometime earlier this year.
 
FOX looks awful on a regular tube tv. I don't know if its my cable or if thats how FOX goes out to everyone. But having the black bars looks bad. Looks fine on my LCD sure. I noticed when NFL on CBS runs highlights from a game on FOX, it fulls up the whole screen instead of how FOX shows it.
 
Ken said:
FOX looks awful on a regular tube tv. I don't know if its my cable or if thats how FOX goes out to everyone. But having the black bars looks bad. Looks fine on my LCD sure. I noticed when NFL on CBS runs highlights from a game on FOX, it fulls up the whole screen instead of how FOX shows it.
Click to expand...
Yeah, same here, and I only have a 20" tube set in the living room, so it makes the picture equivalent to about an 18" widescreen TV, which is wholly inadequate. I read somewhere that FOX is doing all its sports broadcasts that way (they did the NLCS and World Series that way, and some of their Baseball Game of the Week shows), and it's really kind of annoying. The other effect showing downconverted HD on a standard SD set has is that you get a lot of aliasing with the narrower lines in the picture, especially yard lines in football. Really headache-inducing. But I guess that's FOX's way of saying, hey, if you want to watch our shows you have to go buy a widescreen TV.
 
Ken said:
I don't know if its my cable or if thats how FOX goes out to everyone. But having the black bars looks bad. Looks fine on my LCD sure. I noticed when NFL on CBS runs highlights from a game on FOX, it fulls up the whole screen instead of how FOX shows it.
Click to expand...

It's how FOX goes out to everyone on their network. CBS still runs football in 4:3 on their SD feeds which is why you see their highlights in that ratio. I believe that, even in HD, FOX has to run color bars to the left and right of most of their highlights. But don't get me started with CBS and they abysmal graphics package for NFL Football!

NBC does this too on many shows - SNL is a prime example. Get used to it because more channels will do the same, it's easier for them and - with most people now having 16:9 sets - it makes more and more sense. It looks GREAT on a 16:9 set when you have the display set properly.

Those who have the older 4:3 sets will see more and more of this so prepare yourselves....
 
Personallly I wish television manufacturers would ban the zoom button on televisions. It serves no purpose whatsoever. If you zoom in on an widescreen picture it cuts the top bottom and sides off, If its a 4:3 picture the top and bottom gets cut off (you CAN NOT create a widescreen picture from a 4:3 source unless the camera was far enough back to prevent cutting heads being cut off) Zooming in on a windowboxed program doen'st always work either because the resolution goes to pot. Another pet peeve of mine is that the tv producers are punishing people with HD, so that people with old SD or analog cable don't get the sides cut off, so they frame everything with everyone framed in the middle of the screen, with not much happening on the sides of the screen. They also put the screen clutter and bugs in the center of the screen for people who still watch a cropped 4:3 cable version. The crawls and other screen clutter is also too high on the screen for bozos who insist on using the zoom button, so it won't get cut off. I personally want to see EXACTLY what the director intended. Just because you too ignorant to know how to adjust your set or too cheap to go out and get a decent antenna or upgrade to TRUE HD, don't ruin my viewing pleasure, I wish the stations would stop catering to these people. Just run the show as-is and let the cable folks figure out for themselves why the picture is cut off. My picture is not cut off unless the station cuts if off.
 
The only time I've noticed this problem is on WLJT PBS 11 in Jackson/Lexington, TN. A show that is in 16:9 in analog will look fine on my HD set, but on my old 4:3 sets it's either cropped or compressed, and it varies from one show to another. I've commented on this on their comments webpage, but it appears they're doing nothing about it, at least on the shows I watch.

I personally like the zoom button on widescreen movies or shows that are letterboxed for 4:3 sets. At least on the Insignia set I have if you try to watch something letterboxed on the normal setting, you end up with black bars on all 4 sides, and the zoom setting eliminates that with little or no picture lost. And on some movies that use even wider screens there are still some black bars still left on the top and bottom even in zoom. My set also has a cinema setting that zooms in even further. I recently rented The Day After Tomorrow and there were still bars on the top and bottom even in the cinema setting. So for me as long as it's only eliminating black bars, I definitely like the zoom feature.
 
I watch my programming OTA, & I see the programming the way it would be intended for 16:9 programming. I still have a CRT TV with a DTV box, because at the moment, I can't afford to replace my TV. I have it set to letterbox. So the channels that are set to pillarbox will have the blackbars on the top & bottom on the screen, but don't lose any of the picture. For channels that are set to 4:3, I find that some widescreen programs end up being zoomed in instead of the program being pillarboxed. It annoys me when WTTW in Chicago does this with widescreen programming from 11.2, WTTW Prime. I would see shows that were in widescreen, but the sides get cut off. I can't zoom in on the channel either, because my box doesn't allow it on 4:3 channels.

As for cable, I don't have cable, but I've seen it at my Grandma's house, & the local channels get cropped from th sides, leaving any info on the sides unreadable. From my understanding, the local Comcast does this themselves. If you wanna see the channels the way they were intended, is to watch it from the digital tier. I don't know about cable only channels.

Since returning to work, my plan is to get a new TV, along with new outdoor antennas.
 
flytrap said:
Personallly I wish television manufacturers would ban the zoom button on televisions. It serves no purpose whatsoever. If you zoom in on an widescreen picture it cuts the top bottom and sides off, If its a 4:3 picture the top and bottom gets cut off (you CAN NOT create a widescreen picture from a 4:3 source unless the camera was far enough back to prevent cutting heads being cut off) Zooming in on a windowboxed program doen'st always work either because the resolution goes to pot. Another pet peeve of mine is that the tv producers are punishing people with HD, so that people with old SD or analog cable don't get the sides cut off, so they frame everything with everyone framed in the middle of the screen, with not much happening on the sides of the screen. They also put the screen clutter and bugs in the center of the screen for people who still watch a cropped 4:3 cable version. The crawls and other screen clutter is also too high on the screen for bozos who insist on using the zoom button, so it won't get cut off. I personally want to see EXACTLY what the director intended. Just because you too ignorant to know how to adjust your set or too cheap to go out and get a decent antenna or upgrade to TRUE HD, don't ruin my viewing pleasure, I wish the stations would stop catering to these people. Just run the show as-is and let the cable folks figure out for themselves why the picture is cut off. My picture is not cut off unless the station cuts if off.
Click to expand...

I disagree. For 4:3 programming, I hate using the "stretch-o-vision" preferring the 'normal' setting too - even though that means watching a lot of programs with black bars on each side. But when there is a show in 16:9 with the black bars top and bottom, I can use the 'zoom' function to have that program fit perfectly - as the program provider intended it to. For those programs it doesn't cut anything off. Um, that's why the engineers put it there. It allows YOU to correct for different formats.

Those who have such a function should probably figure out how to use it properly, which would solve the problem that you are referring to. Why would you "outlaw" such a handy function? Sounds like a silly suggestion, don't you think?
 
I sometimes ee the credits getting vut off on the left and right. I've even seen the V-chip ratings cut off on the left. I think this was just with My Network OTA.

The weird thing is I once taped part of George Lopez's old sitcom and it had black bars on the left and right on a traditional TV. George looked like he had lost weight.
 
vchimpanzee said:
I sometimes ee the credits getting vut off on the left and right. I've even seen the V-chip ratings cut off on the left. I think this was just with My Network OTA.

The weird thing is I once taped part of George Lopez's old sitcom and it had black bars on the left and right on a traditional TV. George looked like he had lost weight.
Click to expand...

I saw something like that on Salisbury MD's FOX 21 on Verizon FiOS.

FOX 21 just started broadcasting SD 16x9 and Verizon was squeezing the widescreen picture to fit their 4x3 SD channel which meant that think look and the pillarbox side bars on non widescreen shows. They fixed it after someone at Verizon figured out what WBOC was doing.
 
On my local cable system (which I am now ever-so-blissfully detached from), whatever aspect ratio they air from Mississippi Public Broadcasting causes a problem with some of the educational programming... imagine the programs which teach spelling and phonics - with the sides cropped. It's amazing how many letters get cut off, thus making many segments quite confusing for the little ones.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom