I have a 40" Samsung flat panel LCD(LN-R408D. I have it set to an aspect ratio of 16:9. I have a Panasonic DVD player(SC-HT730)hooked up to it also set with an aspect ratio of 16:9 but I still have the black bars on the top and bottom of the screen when watching widescreen dvd's.
I am fairly new at this. Any input would be apreciated. Thank you.
DVD's all have different aspect ratios even if it says 'widescreen' on the DVD. Look at the back of the DVD near the bottom, you should see anamorphic, 2.35:1, or similar. That is the aspect ratio for that DVD. Unless you intend the stretch the picture to get rid of the bars (kills quality) then you will have horizontal bars on some DVD's. What you are seeing is the exact screen dimensions that the director wanted you to see. Some DVD's will fill a 16:9 screen exactly.
Here's a brief FQ on ratios: http://www.gromkov.com/faq/faq2004-0077.html
Thanks for the welcome and thank you for the info! It cleared a lot of things up for me.
kingleoM
Unregistered guest
Posted on
Even with the explanation, I still don't understand why DVDs have the black bars - wasn't the 16:9 format designed to accomodate the theatrical movie format? I would have assumed there would be no black bars in normal viewing mode for DVDs - as opposed to having to use the TV's zoom feature to get rid of the black bars. What am I missing?