Windowboxing / Pictureboxing: Now with a shiny new petition!

[zedz]

Plus, there's probably about 98% of Criterion customers who have never heard of overscanning and would have no idea about how to overcome it, but still would like to see their films uncropped. (Not that this argument has ever carried much weight hereabouts.)

Anyone who has no idea what overscanning is probably would not miss a relatively small amount of information cut off at the sides. Folks who do notice it and are bothered by it will likely want to address the problem at its source, rather than just tending to watch Criterions and the relatively tiny number of other pictureboxed discs.

But I think Criterion is looking at this issue through the other end of the telescope, that their customers ought to see the entire frame as the director intended whether or not they're technophiles / have adjustable sets / are aware of overscanning. Their rationale for the decision to picturebox has always seemed perfectly reasonable to me. Even more so now that it seems that overscan on TV sets is anything but a thing of the past associated exclusively with CRTs - which is how some of the anti-picture-boxing contingent initially framed their argument.

[David M.]

Are they really still doing this?

For title sequences with text near the very edges of the screen I could just about understand it, but it makes no sense in the long run. It is degrading the experience for people who have properly set up video equipment.

Logically, if they're going to window-box titles as a way of overscan compensation, then they should also blur the heck out of the picture so that a badly set up TV with the Sharpening set way too high won't produce a messy halo'd image, and they should also bump the white point to 9300k from the default mastering standard of 6500k again to cater for people with uncalibrated screens - no?

But I think Criterion is looking at this issue through the other end of the telescope, that their customers ought to see the entire frame as the director intended whether or not they're technophiles / have adjustable sets / are aware of overscanning.

You could argue that watching a film on a television is never going to show it as intended anyway.

[movielocke]

and theatres have overscan as well, as they don't show frame edge to frame edge.

[Norbie]

Do your new LCDs really not have a "native" or "pixel-to-pixel" input option? That surprises me.

Nope.

[Norbie]

Well, there were a few dvdbeaver comparisons showing where at least one of these picture-boxed titles did its picture-boxing by just removing the content, not shrinking the picture. And no, I'm not going to go back and figure out which one(s). Fairly sure I posted about it at the time, though not necessarily (here).

Sorry, this is NOT the kind of claim I'm willing to accept without some sort of evidence.

Since overscanning was an artifact of picture tube technology, why would LCDs ever do this?

Check my post at DVD and Bluray News and Discussions > Technical Issues and Question > QuestionsPosted: Sun Jul 04, 2010 12:30 am

You'll see my evidence for overscan on my TV with pictures.

[Norbie]

[splutter]But! But! There's a theoretical loss in resolution!!![/splutter]
Though funnily enough I can't recall anybody here boycotting Criterion DVDs on the grounds that they're NTSC rather than PAL. Shouldn't you also automatically prefer a PAL transfer on the same grounds - this resolution thing being theoretical and all?

The resolution is reduced because of all the unused pixels around the edge. I like to have the largest image I can for the size of screen I own, and when I use my projector to zoom in, it becomes just a bit softer. Also, I can only make it somewhat larger by zooming in (because the image moves upward off the screen and I don't want to physically move my projector), so I still have to view a slightly smaller image. Image size and resolution are important, and even slight reductions are noticeable and can impact my ability to notice small details at some moments in any given film. It's a small issue, but in my experience the difference is more significant than the limitations of NTSC per se.
None of these are major complaints, but I can understand complaints that Criterion is catering mostly to viewers who aren't concerned enough about overscan to overcome the problem.

Plus, there's probably about 98% of Criterion customers who have never heard of overscanning and would have no idea about how to overcome it, but still would like to see their films uncropped. (Not that this argument has ever carried much weight hereabouts.)

Anyone who has no idea what overscanning is probably would not miss a relatively small amount of information cut off at the sides. Folks who do notice it and are bothered by it will likely want to address the problem at its source, rather than just tending to watch Criterions and the relatively tiny number of other pictureboxed discs.

There is "NO SETTING" to turn overscanning off on my LG LCD (Model No. 32LC7D-AB).

[Gregory]

I'm sorry to hear that. Ideally, none of the newer LCD models would have this problem. My thought was that if someone were really bothered by overscan, they would make a point of researching whether a given model had the ability to correct overscan before buying it. For most of the better TVs, there are online reviews and other product information that would include this, right?

[HistoryProf]

Do your new LCDs really not have a "native" or "pixel-to-pixel" input option? That surprises me.

nope. it surprised the hell out of me too. and I bought this Panny in January, so it's not an old tv at all. I realized the issue the first time I watched a 1:66 to 1 film and noticed that the black bars at the top and bottom seemed awfully thin. I thought it must be zoomed or something so started playing with it...and an hour later and about ready to pull my hair out I couldn't for the life of me get it properly set without a sliver of the sides missing. I knew the information didn't really matter, but it was bugging the hell out of me. another hour of googling later and I discovered that this is an issue with a number of LCDs, Viera's included, which are otherwise beautiful looking presentations. I have no idea why they do it...but there is no way to get rid of it on mine, so I've come to accept it and actually be happy that Criterion Windowboxes.

I called Panasonic once to try and get an answer about it from them...but that was as pointless as I expected it would be. I could never get a person on the phone that new what I was even talking about.

[HistoryProf]

I'm sorry to hear that. Ideally, none of the newer LCD models would have this problem. My thought was that if someone were really bothered by overscan, they would make a point of researching whether a given model had the ability to correct overscan before buying it. For most of the better TVs, there are online reviews and other product information that would include this, right?

I couldn't find a single product review that even mentioned it for my TV - CNet, etc. - not one so much as mentioned it's existence, let alone how the tv fared with it. it's also nowhere to be found in my users manual, or on panasonic's website. It seems to simply be an inherent "feature" of the sets at the most basic level of their construction.

[Norbie]

... if someone were really bothered by overscan, they would make a point of researching whether a given model had the ability to correct overscan before buying it. For most of the better TVs, there are online reviews and other product information...

I completely agree.

I was so excited about getting a new fancy tv that i didn't do much research about the model, the pros and cons. I knew a little bit about LCDs and Plasma tvs, but nothing of substance. I knew nothing (or at least a little) about Overscan until I did a calibration test - i wish i didn't. Ignorance is bliss. To be fair its not that big of a deal, but it would have been nice to see everthing (especially when i watch my anime DVDs/BR; i'm also a big fan of anime). I've gone all over the world (internet wise) for an answer, but nothing.

The next time i'm looking at buying a new 4K tv, i'll know.

[David M.]

On most modern displays, you can always disable overscan for 1080p material.
Most still force overscan for SD signal input.

[Gregory]

I didn't know that. I understand why overscan existed with CRTs but I don't know of any reason it should have to exist with pixel-based displays. After hearing people talk about correcting overscan on their LCD sets, I thought this was becoming a thing of the past a few years ago. This does change my stance on the matter.

[movielocke]

even with CRTs overscan can usually be corrected if you access the service menu.

[Michael Kerpan]

As CRTs age, the degree of overscan increases. While we could cope with overscan (via the service menu) when our TV was new, after several years there was too much overscan and sacrifices (on one side or the other) were unavoidable.

[Norbie]

I know.

Lets get Criterion to windowbox "all" their releases, not only their 4x3, but widescreen as well.*





* You see, this is a post that would make more sense and be understood if those small faces/emotion thingis were available.
Those that get it - thank you, and pass it on.

[Matt]

Would it be funny, too?

[Michael Kerpan]

I would note that not only do most HD TV reviews ignore the overscan issue, virtually all ignore the quality of the TV tuner itself (and not having cable or satellite service, we would have appreciated some info on this topic).

[Luke M]

Has anyone bothered to make a list of which titles were windowboxed? Even better would be to see which titles were then corrected when released on Blu-ray.

[swo17]

I don't believe any Blu-ray releases have been windowboxed.

[macaca]

i have a spare blu-ray player in my basement hooked up to a normal crt tv, and crumb (blu-ray) was definitely pictureboxed on it.
no idea why?

[knives]

It has to be that way since it is set up for widescreen teevees. Any academy film will have large borders on all sides when shown on an academy teevee.

[alfons416]

Are Criterion still windowboxing their 4:3-titles? even on Eclipse-titles? that would make me avoid this set.

[TMDaines]

Are Criterion still windowboxing their 4:3-titles? even on Eclipse-titles? that would make me avoid this set.

Looking on Beaver at the last few Eclipse sets: only very slightly now. Nothing like the thick black bars that marred the War Trilogy set and so on.

Maybe someone can confirm?

I do have one minor disappointment, though - I can see that the set is conceptually structured around one short and one feature per director (the shorts making up Pearls of the Deep), but this means that the Eclipse edition of Pearls will be inferior to the Czech release, since that included all seven films that were made for the project - and the Ivan Passer and Juraj Herz contributions certainly weren't also-rans. (On the contrary, they were the two films judged strong enough to release separately!).

Perhaps some strong enough campaigning could get Criterion to reconsider? They've changed their mind on a few things before after previous reactions to the announcements.

[zedz]

Are Criterion still windowboxing their 4:3-titles? even on Eclipse-titles? that would make me avoid this set.

This is probably the stupidest comment to be posted on the forum this year. And there's been some stiff competition!

[TMDaines]

Are Criterion still windowboxing their 4:3-titles? even on Eclipse-titles? that would make me avoid this set.

This is probably the stupidest comment to be posted on the forum this year. And there's been some stiff competition!

In fairness, if you have a display with zero overscan - i.e. the ideal display - then the heavy pictureboxing was simply awful. Luckily watching on the PC allows you to get rid of it.