Why are all music videos on YouTube now square?

[Ambrosia7177]

Hello.

Lately I have been feeling nostalgic and wanting to download and watch music videos from the 80's.

Unfortunately, anearly every music video on YouTube is now SQUARE.

I find this really frustrating, because YouTube is cropping off a lot of content and ruining my memories of the past.

I am watching and downloading videos on my MBP, so I'd expect things to be a 16:9 aspect ratio, which I believe is the standard format for any video.

Is everything going to be square moving forward becaues of mobile devices, or is there some way for me to find unaltered original music videos?

 

[bhagemann]

In the 1980's TVs were square 4:3 aspect. All our videos & tv shows from that era are formatted to fit the displays (CRT) from then. Like you I get nostalgic for older music videos and its not only the aspect ratio that suffers but some have only survived at TV (480p) quality as well. I've found that Vimeo seems to have _some_ older music videos in a better quality that they must have had from an original source at least.

And... if you find music videos or TV shows from that era (80s-early 2000s) and they're in 16:9 format, theres a good chance that that is actually cropped from the original 4:3 source to fill the wider screen -cutting off the top and bottom.

As a point of reference, the TV show "The Simpsons" ran in 4:3 aspect until the 20th season (2010) when they started airing in 16:9 and also upped the quality to HD.

 

[pugdude1321]

Old content from the 70s/80's/90's/early 2000's always was square/4:3 standard aspect ratio. Widescreen 16:9 didn't become the norm until the late 2000s for a lot of music videos and stuff.
Old video from that era was square and always will be square. There are also a lot of new music videos emulating the "retro look" and uploading in square aspects.

 

[Ambrosia7177]

@bhagemann and @pugdude1321,

You mean to tell me that I have it all wrong, and square videos - or nearly square - is how things used to be?

And that my memory of rectangular (16:9) music videos is wrong?

Wow, that is a shock!

I am a big fan of classic Canadian rock.

Yesterday after, I went to YouTube and did this search: "loverboy official music videos"

Are you telling me that these links are how the videos actually looked back in the 1980's?

Loverboy - Working For The Weekend (with Intro)

Loverboy - Turn Me Loose (Video)

Loverboy - When It's Over (Official Video)

 

[pugdude1321]

For the most part, yes! There may be some exceptions where some videos were shot in widescreen and then aired square, where you may have seen them in widescreen from remasters or something, but the video standard in the 80's was square, because all the TVs were square back then

 

[Rafterman]

It's hip to be square

 

[ericwn]

Yup, plenty of content was made in 4:3 aspect ratio and anyone from the time will remember that TVs often times came in that aspect ratio as well.

 

[Ambrosia7177]

For the most part, yes! There may be some exceptions where some videos were shot in widescreen and then aired square, where you may have seen them in widescreen from remasters or something, but the video standard in the 80's was square, because all the TVs were square back then

Like a lot of people, in the early 2000's, I was downloading everything.

Maybe the reason I remember all music videos as 16:9 is that during that period of time, people had taken the original 4:3 aspect ration and somehow changed things to 16:9 so that I thought the wideer-screen look was "normal"?

 

[Ambrosia7177]

It's hip to be square

So apropos for a thread on 80's videos! 👍

 

[Ambrosia7177]

Yup, plenty of content was made in 4:3 aspect ratio and anyone from the time will remember that TVs often times came in that aspect ratio as well.

@bhagemann and @pugdude1321,

You mean to tell me that I have it all wrong, and square videos - or nearly square - is how things used to be?

And that my memory of rectangular (16:9) music videos is wrong?

Wow, that is a shock!

I am a big fan of classic Canadian rock.

Yesterday after, I went to YouTube and did this search: "loverboy official music videos"

Are you telling me that these links are how the videos actually looked back in the 1980's?

Loverboy - Working For The Weekend (with Intro)

Loverboy - Turn Me Loose (Video)

Loverboy - When It's Over (Official Video)

So would you all say that the music videos linked above are likely how they were originally shot?

 

[ericwn]

So would you all say that the music videos linked above are likely how they were originally shot?

very likely

 

[Ambrosia7177]

Hmmm....

 

[Ambrosia7177]

To clarify, aren't those videos I linked to above completely square and not 4:3?

That is what set me off and why I started this thread - the videos I downloaded last Friday looked completely square like you'd expect to be served to a mobile device and not rectangular like you'd see on a TV or desktop computer.

Maybe they are not 16:9, but 4:3 is still somewhat rectangular, and a lot, if not all, of the *music* videos I see on YouTube these days look completely square.

 

[Eric5h5]

To clarify, aren't those videos I linked to above completely square and not 4:3?

Since nobody answered: they are not completely square. They are in fact 4:3. It's trivial to do a screenshot and verify it (cmd-shift-4, draw a box exactly around the video).

 

[Ambrosia7177]

Since nobody answered: they are not completely square. They are in fact 4:3. It's trivial to do a screenshot and verify it (cmd-shift-4, draw a box exactly around the video).

I think because of the player bar below the video, the 4:3 vido looks more 4:4 to me.

 

[maflynn]

Wow, that is a shock!

You're watching pre hi-def videos. What you're seeing is how we all used to watch tv.

 

[Ambrosia7177]

You're watching pre hi-def videos. What you're seeing is how we all used to watch tv.

In retrospect, I guess that makes sense. But what probably threw me off was the fact that starting in the late 90s/early 2000's when "downloading" became a big thing, most of the music videos online had a 16:9 aspect ratio.

And so that somehow re-wired my memories of watching the original music videos on TV when, of course, things were basically square.

I guess a lot of the msuic videos I downloaded in the late 90s/early 2000s must have been cropped?

It's interesting that more and more msuic videos I see on YouTube these days have the square 4:3 saspect ration.

Why do you think 20 years ago all of the music videos (apparently) got cropped to 16:9?

And why do you think all of those vintage 80s videos are now back to the 4:3 aspect ration?

And, is there any way to know really what is the "truth" of how the original videos looked?

I mean, maybe they took the original videos from film/TV and cropped them to 16:9 for the Internet and now they cropped those 16:9 hi-def videos some more and the original "look" is lost forever?

That is why I started this thread, because it feels like the original videos I posted above don't look quite right.

I duuno...

 

[orionquest]

I guess you didn't grow up in the 80's 🤷‍♂️

Well I guess they might have more music video's as 4:3 especially if they ae pre 16:9 format is to leave it in the true format, and possible fit more content on smaller screens like phones. You then have the video and some other content, information below it and whatnot.

Who knows, just enjoy the great music from the 80's, one of the best year's for it!

 

[iStorm]

A little bit of YouTube history... The YouTube player used to be in the 4:3 aspect ratio when it started in 2005. It wasn't until the end of 2008 when they changed the player to be 16:9. (link)

Non-16:9 content was letterboxed/pillarboxed in the 16:9 player. So if you watched a 4:3 video, it would have had black bars on the sides and looked somewhat like a 16:9 video because of the dimensions of the player. YouTube later made the player match the aspect ratio of the content in 2018...so no more black bars and is why the player is now "square" for 4:3 videos. (link)

It also depends on how the creator/uploader exports the video for YouTube. Here's a 21:9 video uploaded as a 21:9 video...notice it's in a 21:9 player with no black bars; and here's the same 21:9 video uploaded as a 16:9 video...notice it's now in a 16:9 player with black bars.

Like everyone else above, I think this may just be a false memory. I know the change made in 2018 tripped me up for a while.

I guess a lot of the msuic videos I downloaded in the late 90s/early 2000s must have been cropped?

Do you recall where you downloaded these videos from, considering YouTube wasn't around then? Maybe they cropped the video to match the new trend...kinda like how some old/classic TV shows are now cropped to fill our widescreen TVs.

And, is there any way to know really what is the "truth" of how the original videos looked?

Usually the owner/maker of the video will have the official one. Otherwise, if you still have the ones you downloaded, you could compare them with the ones on YouTube. Do your downloaded 16:9 videos show more content on the sides; or is YouTube's 4:3 video missing content at the top and bottom? That will determine which one has been cropped.

 

[Ambrosia7177]

I guess you didn't grow up in the 80's 🤷‍♂️

Oh trust me, I'm definitely an 80's child - slightly on the older end.

Where I grew up, we never had MTV, so maybe my memories of how things looked wasn't until things became available online in the late 90s?

It's most likely old-age /forgetfulness / pre-dementia!

Well I guess they might have more music video's as 4:3 especially if they ae pre 16:9 format is to leave it in the true format, and possible fit more content on smaller screens like phones. You then have the video and some other content, information below it and whatnot.

Just goes to show you how - at least I - am used to seeing "the (online) world" as wide-screen!

Also, since I don't use mobile, I'm still used to seeing and expecting things to be formatted for my MacBook Pro.

Who knows, just enjoy the great music from the 80's, one of the best year's for it!

Yeah, thank God I have the ability to watch all of the music videos that I did see growing up, plus a lot of other ones that I didn't get a chance to see because all we had was TBS and not MTV.

 

[Ambrosia7177]

A little bit of YouTube history... The YouTube player used to be in the 4:3 aspect ratio when it started in 2005. It wasn't until the end of 2008 when they changed the player to be 16:9. (link)

Interesting!

Non-16:9 content was letterboxed/pillarboxed in the 16:9 player. So if you watched a 4:3 video, it would have had black bars on the sides and looked somewhat like a 16:9 video because of the dimensions of the player. YouTube later made the player match the aspect ratio of the content in 2018...so no more black bars and is why the player is now "square" for 4:3 videos. (link)

So what is the accepted aspect ratio for online videos in 2023?

Is it still 16:9, or something else?

And what is the accepted aspect ratio for TV's these days? (I don't own a TV!)

https://gizmodo.com/for-better-or-worse-youtube-now-adapts-to-multiple-asp-1827936921

It also depends on how the creator/uploader exports the video for YouTube. Here's a 21:9 video uploaded as a 21:9 video...notice it's in a 21:9 player with no black bars; and here's the same 21:9 video uploaded as a 16:9 video...notice it's now in a 16:9 player with black bars.

I never knew there was such a thing as 21:9 - that is crazy!

Like everyone else above, I think this may just be a false memory. I know the change made in 2018 tripped me up for a while.

Yep, I guess I am officially an old-timer with faulty memory now!

Do you recall where you downloaded these videos from, considering YouTube wasn't around then? Maybe they cropped the video to match the new trend...kinda like how some old/classic TV shows are now cropped to fill our widescreen TVs.

Well, I got into the craze of downloading from websites similar to Napster in the late 90s and early 2000s. (I forget which network/app I used.)

I never really got into YouTube untila few years ago, because - as far as I know - there wasn't a way to download the videos on YouTube, so that is whiy I preferred file-sharing sites in the late 90s/early 2000s.

Now that I bought 4K Video Downloader, it is easy for me to download a copy of music and educational videos for later viewing, so I get everything from YouTube now.

Usually the owner/maker of the video will have the official one. Otherwise, if you still have the ones you downloaded, you could compare them with the ones on YouTube. Do your downloaded 16:9 videos show more content on the sides; or is YouTube's 4:3 video missing content at the top and bottom? That will determine which one has been cropped.

Unfortunately all of the video I downloaded in the 90s/early 2000s is in a storage unit over 1,000 miles away - on an old Windows PC that I wonder if it even boots?!

Some day I will have to get access to those videos and do a side-by-side comparison.

However, the reason I started this thread is because I clearly recall some of my favorite music videos looking for 16:9 than the boxy looking ones linked above.

I do recall some music videos had the two horizontal black bars which is what happens when a 16:9 video is formatted for a 4:3 format. But I also swear that a lot of the music videos I have seen in the past just simply fille dup a 16:9 screen with now black bars.

If the original videos were indeed 4:3 - and I agree that was the shape of older TV's - then that means the person posting these videos cropped the original 4:3 into a 16:9 videoo.

Aside from the videos I downloaded 20 years ago, it seems to me that most music videos on YouTube - maybe 2-3 years ago - appeared to be a 16:9 format.

When I saw the "sqaure" looking videos above, I just assume dthat they cropped the 16:9 videos to make them fit better ionto mobile. But then as some of you have pointed out, TV's were 4:3 pre 2000, so any music videos that I have or saw that appeared to be 16:9 were the ones that were cropped and not the other way around.

Human memory is a funny thing for sure! ;-)