Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater 235:1 screen size input

I see... But what about 1.85? It usually would have small black bars when watched on a 1.78 projector. They're usually not seen since most of them overscan and therefore hide them. But with an HTPC you can get 1:1 mapping and the black bars would show up (I did see them when I tried playing some DVDs on the Z2 with my Linux box). Do you see some with TheaterTek?

Hey Randy! Is that little guy in your avatar looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack?

ahhh now I understand your question, yes your right. With the Z2 and Panny DVD player the overscan took care of it. With the Theatertek software you have total control of the Aspect ratios, and you can save custom settings. So basically for each ratio, 1.85, 2.35, 2.40, etc... you adjust the picture to fill the screen, and Theatertek remembers that for other movies of the same AR's. I really like it a lot...They have a free 14 day trial download of the full version if you want to play with it...

Funny Jack,

That picture was taken last fall of our youngest son. He was playing up at my in-laws farm in NE Iowa.

When you're that age, a farm can be a LOT of fun. At my age, they're just a lot of WORK!

We always enjoy taking the kids upto Grandma and Grandpa's farm.

Also, in follow up to my last post, here is a feature in TheaterTek.

"- Automatic Aspect Ratio detection for DVD's for constant height users.
On the General tab choose 'Smart' from the Auto Aspect Ratio detection dropdown. When you start playback on a new DVD, TT will briefly blank the screen when the main title is reached and calculate the AR. For this to work successfully, you need to define some new AR's corresponding to the calculated AR. For example, if you define an AR called "2.35:1", TT will select this AR if it detects the movie AR to be 2.35:1. Detected AR's are 1.66:1, 1.78:1, 1.85:1, 2.20:1, 2.35:1, 2.40:1 and 2.55:1. Define as many of these as appropriate for your environment."

What setting do you use for 1.85? Do you zoom in cutting a little bit of the sides so that the black bars disappear? Or maybe the vertical stretch would be tolerable and thus I could stretch the image vertically to remove the black bars? (I guess losing some of the sides seems a better idea... 1.85 to 1.78 isn't that far).

Your losing me,

My screen is a 2.35 design, so 2.35 movies take the full width when I add the lens. Other movies stay the same height, but the black space/bars on the sides varies, depending on the material. Theatertek automatically adjusts for different aspect ratios and you can even setup custom ratios. So while your watching the intros/trailers/ and finally the main feature, you just sit back and enjoy the software does the rest. It automatically detects the AR on the DVD. I never mess with my Zoom/Lens shift unless the kids have been running upstairs and knocked my Z2 out of alignment.

Don't worry I lose myself most of the time

What I'm trying to figure out is this:

*For 2.35 material you let Theatertek stretch the image vertically so that it removes the black bars, which means it will fit the whole lcd panel but the image will look stretched. Your lens stretches the image horizontally so that it now is back to the right ratio (which means that the height is the max height of the lcd panel - and screen- and the width is now the max width of your screen, right?

* For 1.33 Theatertek will display the image in a 1.78 format (the full size of the lcd panel) but with black bars on each sides (so I guess you would use the max amount of masking on the screen to hide them).

*For 1.78 it will display the image fully in the lcd panel without any need for black bars.

*For 1.85 Theatertek could zoom the image so that it fills the lcd panel but if I lock the aspect ratio so that the image doesn't distort that means I will lose a little bit of the image on each sides right? The other solution is to get Theatertek to stretch the image vertically so that the black bars disappear (kind of like what you would do with 2.35) but that would distort the image a little bit since you wouldn't have any other way to correct that with a lens.

I don't know if I make much sense here, or whether what I'm wondering about is even worth worrying about. The reason I ask is that for now I can't afford an anamorphic lens and so I will have to live with black bars for 2.35>= material and I don't want to have to put up with small black bars on 1.85 material if I don't have to.
Basically my current DVD player overscans slightly anything it displays through component (or it's the Z2 that does), thus the black bars that would appear on 1.85 material are just hidden in the overscan.

*2.35 correct

*1.33 Yes, I don't watch much 4:3 material on my projector, but if I did, your right, the height would be the same, and if I masked the sides, it would require to mask the side bars, and the excess screen.

*1.78 Yes this is true for HD material and a few dvd's that believe it or not, are in 1.78.

1.85 I'll have to test this some more when I get a chance. I know Theatertek also has Overscan custom settings, so I assume it would treat it just like a standard DVD player. It has what is called a "Smart" mode which automatically adjusts to various ratios.

hmmmm you have me curious now.