letterboxing in DVD Player

[cuestakid]

This may be a dumb question but when I watch a widescreen movie, I still get letterboxing even though I have a widescreen computer monitor-is there any way to fix this?

 

[swiftaw]

Widescreen monitor (16:10 or 1.6:1) Anamorphic Widescreen Movie (2:35:1) hence letterboxing

 

[cuestakid]

Widescreen monitor (16:10 or 1.6:1) Anamorphic Widescreen Movie (2:35:1) hence letterboxing

I dont follow

 

[swiftaw]

The ratio of width to height of a computer monitor is 16:10, or 1.6:1, for example 1680x1050. 1680/1050 = 1.6

Now, most movies, the ratio is somewhere between 1.83 and 2.4 to 1, so for example, if the ratio was 2:1, then if it filled your screen horizontally, using all 1680 pixels, it would only take up 840 of the 1050 pixels vertically, hence letterboxing.

 

[cuestakid]

ok thanks-I enabled the zoom feature in DVD player and at least made it full screen-I will have to watch and see which I prefer

 

[cuestakid]

i have noticed this same thing with all of my widescreen dvds.

makes me a tad upset that I sprung for a 24 in widescreen and that i have to deal with letterboxing. Just out of curiosity would the same thing happen on a huge widescreen tv? If so, then why buy a widescreen version of a movie?

 

[swiftaw]

i have noticed this same thing with all of my widescreen dvds.

makes me a tad upset that I sprung for a 24 in widescreen and that i have to deal with letterboxing. Just out of curiosity would the same thing happen on a huge widescreen tv? If so, then why buy a widescreen version of a movie?

Because it's better to have letterboxing and see the whole frame than to have the left and right edges of the frame chopped off to make it "full-screen"