Video Technology: Aspect Ratio & Pixels

Aspect Ratio

Aspect ratio is the different screen sizes in which video is recorded in for example 16:9 is widescreen and 4:3 is standard. We have different aspect ratios but haven’t always had widescreen televisions, as that is fairly new technology. Despite this films have been being recorded in 16:9 for over 50 years, but viewers had to view them in standard viewing; the process for this to be possible is Panning and Scanning.

Pan and Scan

Panning and scanning is the process which is used in order to change widescreen format to the smaller 4:3 format which was widely popular in the 1950’s. But a lot of directors and people in the industry noticed that you often lose the full effect of the shots when this is done. Some films are composed specifically for widescreen for example in the screenshot of a film (below), you can see where it has been panned and scanned; also clearly showing how a whole character is cut out despite being able to hear her voice.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMJhM3So4y8

By panning and scanning or cropping, it may even leave some viewers confused, or even frustrated by the fact that they cannot see the whole picture. With the growing number of widescreen televisions being sold, it may be that buying a widescreen television is the only way to fully enjoy your movies.

Pillar boxing and letterboxing

Pillar boxing is when you have video which is in 4:3 formats but you are viewing it on a widescreen television, the effect of this is that you have to black “bars” either side of your image on screen. This is a better way to tackle to the problem rather than have the image stretched leading to distortion and people appearing fatter than they are.

Letter boxing is almost the same as pillar boxing but it is the other way round; it’s when you have a widescreen format video but you are watching it on a standard television, so you would have two black bars at the top and bottom of the image. Some people may prefer this rather than their film being “panned and scanned”.

TV Motion and Pixels

In the UK video is filmed 25 frames per second so that the images appear as a moving picture rather than a bunch of still images on screen. The more Pixels that we have in photographs or video means better quality. The TV Screen is made up of hundreds of horizontal scan lines, these make up each frame. Different countries use different numbers of lines and different amounts of frames per second.