List of Blu-ray with altered aspect ratios — Page 3

Army was probably theatrically exhibited in 1.85:1 in most theaters - like with RoboCop, the director's "preferred" AR would not have been what moviegoers saw.

That is very true

I wonder if 1.78 HDTV airings of Galaxy Quest have the beginning of the film framed the same as in theaters. The film was Super 35, and I *assume* the 1.85 was achieved more through opening up vertically than cropping horizontally. So would the 1.78 version seen on channels like AMC be opened up, too?

TServo2049 said:

I wonder if 1.78 HDTV airings of Galaxy Quest have the beginning of the film framed the same as in theaters. The film was Super 35, and I *assume* the 1.85 was achieved more through opening up vertically than cropping horizontally. So would the 1.78 version seen on channels like AMC be opened up, too?

 I am on it 

Galaxy Quest

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/104149

Beyond sad, but it's not far removed from super 35 

Well fuck, I guess the 16:9 HDTV version of Galaxy Quest was just a crop job.

I guess we'll have to get a 35mm print to know whether the theatrical prints were also cropped, or opened.

And scope isn't totally dead, as long as there are directors who shoot on film. Christopher Nolan and J.J. Abrams are still shooting in Panavision. I loved seeing that stretched-out lens flaring in the 35mm portions of Interstellar. (And it's going to be great seeing Episode VII in true scope.)

TServo2049 said:

Well fuck, I guess the 16:9 HDTV version of Galaxy Quest was just a crop job.

I guess we'll have to get a 35mm print to know whether the theatrical prints were also cropped, or opened.

And scope isn't totally dead, as long as there are directors who shoot on film. Christopher Nolan and J.J. Abrams are still shooting in Panavision. I loved seeing that stretched-out lens flaring in the 35mm portions of Interstellar. (And it's going to be great seeing Episode VII in true scope.)

 Just some of the reasons why I love the films that Nolan and Abrams put out.  :D  The shots in Interstellar were ridiculously awesome...  Also, I am really eager to see Episode VII with Abrams at the helm.  I read in the past that he wanted to bring back the aesthetic of the OT.  To do this, he was supposedly going to be using miniatures more rather than relying on CGI so much.  And if he's using Panavision, that's got me even more excited for it!  :-)

The Last Emperor is another film with altered aspect ratio. Originally 2.35:1, it has been cropped to 2:1 thanks to cinematographer Vittorio Storaro's supervision, who has become enamoured with the aspect ratio and has become a huge proponent of it in order to unify all movies, which is why I hate the BD, I want to enjoy the film in its OAR in HD. I would also like to add that I hate Super 35, since it means you have two versions of the same movie with different aspect ratios none of which is definitive.

Super 35 doesn't bother me. 2.35:1 is still the "definitive" ratio for all those films, they were shot protected for 2.35 and that's what everyone saw in theaters. Sure, we got a few films with altered ratios (the old transfers of Star Trek VI, the first DVD of Austin Powers, the HDTV transfers of The Abyss and True Lies, the 3D version of Titanic) but the vast majority of films were/are usually kept in 2.35.

I prefer Panavision, but I was never on the whole Super 35 hatewagon. Most of it usually seemed to be tied into the whole war to get home consumers to accept letterbox, and this idea that filmmakers who used Super 35 were pandering to those philistines who didn't like the black bars.

bigrob said:

FYI

Skyfall has just started on ITV HD in the UK and it's presented in 1.78:1

not sure if cropped or opened up but the framing certainly looks more taller

 damn never watch itv, will they have a movie on catch up, caught it on +1 it is the open version, pics to follow (bad cam ones)

ITV

NETFLIX

Love to get Skyfall in open matte, similar to the way I saw it in digital IMAX. Ironically, Servo mentioned True Lies, which I was just talking about with Doombot. I was trying to capture it off of my DVR:

D-VHS/Cable Broadcast

and also a cool one, Oblivion played on cable like it did in IMAX, opened up for most of the film but still in 2.39 for the flashbacks/dreams opposed to the constant 2.39 on the Blu-ray:

BR/Cable Broadcast

Oblivion looks neat, didn't know there was an imax ratio shift that major.

Is that version about? I find since hd media turned up no one rips from tv anymore 

True Lies 70mm blow up, like many was 2.20:1 

dvdmike said:

Oblivion looks neat, didn't know there was an imax ratio shift that major.

Is that version about? I find since hd media turned up no one rips from tv anymore 

True Lies 70mm blow up, like many was 2.20:1 

 Yeah, in regular theaters Oblivion was constant 2.39 like the BR. In digital IMAXs it was opened up to the full 1.90 (they finished the effect for that ratio) except the dream sequences are still 2.39. The US Cinemax presentation was 1.77 for all but the dream sequences which were still 2.39 so it duplicates the IMAX presentation nicely minus maybe cropped sides.

Not sure if that version is about the net, those pics were off my DVR which I'm still trying to make a good capture of.

US pay cable channels use to show everything in OAR, something I encourage, but in the last few years they seem to have gone cropped. Its crap but it does result in some nice treats every once in a while in the form of "open matte" presentations. In fact the first Hobbit was open too.

Is the Cinemax version about?

dvdmike said:

ITV

NETFLIX

 This looks wayyyyy better to me... and how I remember it looking in the digital IMAX screen I saw it on...

Several shots really benefited from the open matte, particularly the establishing shots in the city-scapes.  The cinematography just looked stunning... in the Shanghai scenes (city shot and the silhouette fight), also the scene which Bond is going to the Macau Casino.  Really showed off the beauty of the scenery.  And of course, the big explosion at the end was just awesome.  I remember being almost overwhelmed by the combination of the visual/audio element of the IMAX theater.  :D

I had a chance to see Skyfall the other night on ITV HD, and it definitely looked better opened up. It really did compliment the scenery and cinematography.

dvdmike said:

Is the Cinemax version about?

 To my knowledge no. But if I can ever get it captured I might make a project of it.

I shall unleash the Google fu and find out 

The 16:9 HD master of Prometheus is a strange beast (no pun intended). I only caught the ending and made a quick recording of it (off the channel FX in the US). Unfortunately, it not so easy to say its crop or open matte, since many shots are cropped but others are totally recomposed. For example:

Cable broadcast/BD

All these shots appear to have the sides cut (barring a little elbow room in the last one). I thought initially that it was just the CGI shots that were cropped from 2.35 to 16:9 but I found live shots that were cropped and some CGI shots opened up. So I thought the whole thing was cropped.

Nope, there are many shots that are opened up but not just a simple opening of the top and bottom from the digital captured, they are totally recomposed. Some have more on the top and bottom but lose on the sides or some variation thereof:

Cable broadcast/BD

You can see that the recomposing is all over the place. Add a little of the bottom frame here, lose the right side of the frame there. What's clear is it wasn't random, it was very specific. Its kind of like a S35 re-composition.

What I don't know was whether the Imax was like this or not. They said they opened it up for the Imax digital but that may not be that simple. I also don't know if all HD masters are like this.