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Do black bars bother you (movies)?
- Thread starter bubulol
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I love watching movies on my iPad. But ever since Widescreen became a thing, I have hated the black bars. Its annoying to me honestly. I will watch Netflix on my TV or iPhone in most cases before I settle for my iPad. Unless Im using Picture-in-picture, I rather watch on another device.
A tablet that is sized to show widescreen movies without black bars would be tall and narrow. So it'll have less screen space than a current iPad. It'd be nice for watching movies but be terrible for everything else.
Doesn't bother me on a massive tv, when the ratio isn't 16:9.
Does bother me on a (relatively) tiny iPad sized screen, so I make a deal with the devil and, if the source is 16:9, I distort the ratio in, for example, Infuse. Accordingly, the actors/scene look marginally taller and thinner than originally intended, but not so much they all look like basketball players (not the other ratio option that merely expands vertically and you lose the sides). I'd be dead against this on a massive tv as you're bastardising the creators vision, but in the context of watching on a 9.7" or 12.9" screen, I'd rather it fill the screen. Films etc aren't really made for such small screens anyway, so it's hardly a culture crime.
On really wide source material I leave the black bars visible as the distortion is ridiculous.
I remember Tarantino saying he was horrified at the thought of anyone watching one of his works on a phone or tablet, heh!
Vaguely related, I'm very happy Apple stick with 4:3 personally. Had 16:9 tablets in the past briefly, everything except video suffers. Not a worthy trade off imo.
Does bother me on a (relatively) tiny iPad sized screen, so I make a deal with the devil and, if the source is 16:9, I distort the ratio in, for example, Infuse. Accordingly, the actors/scene look marginally taller and thinner than originally intended, but not so much they all look like basketball players (not the other ratio option that merely expands vertically and you lose the sides). I'd be dead against this on a massive tv as you're bastardising the creators vision, but in the context of watching on a 9.7" or 12.9" screen, I'd rather it fill the screen. Films etc aren't really made for such small screens anyway, so it's hardly a culture crime.
On really wide source material I leave the black bars visible as the distortion is ridiculous.
I remember Tarantino saying he was horrified at the thought of anyone watching one of his works on a phone or tablet, heh!
Vaguely related, I'm very happy Apple stick with 4:3 personally. Had 16:9 tablets in the past briefly, everything except video suffers. Not a worthy trade off imo.
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At first, yes.
Then I get into the movie and don't realize it's there.
Then I get into the movie and don't realize it's there.
This pretty much. The aspect ratio is one of the reasons I prefer the iPad over other tablets.
As for the black bars, I actually prefer to have letterboxing (when watching widescreen on fullscreen) or pillarboxing (when watching fullscreen on widescreen) rather than have distorted images. Besides, I usually watch in an almost completely dark room so the black bars kinda just fade into the background. On the upside, watching old series (Buffy, Charmed, etc) on the iPad is pretty great.
That said, I can't wait for the PS4 Neo and Playstation VR. Should be nice for watching HD/UHD videos in bed.
As someone who gets motion sickness when they use "shakey camera" - the black bars help me. I like them because I know it's widescreen when it has the bars and I prefer wide-screen to cut off full screen. lol.
That said, shakey camera bothers me the MOST about movies today. Makes me sick to my stomach.
That said, shakey camera bothers me the MOST about movies today. Makes me sick to my stomach.
Ugh, I thought I was the only one! Hate that so very much. Gives me a headache makes me sick to my stomach. Not fun.
As for the black bars, I hardly ever notice them or are bothered by them. They just fade in the background to me.
Do the people hating the black bars have white iPads?
I had one briefly and the bars did seem more noticeable.
All of my other iPads have been black and the bars aren't that much of an issue.
I had one briefly and the bars did seem more noticeable.
All of my other iPads have been black and the bars aren't that much of an issue.
I only watch movies and TV shows in their original aspect ratio. If that means black bars, then that's just fine. I hate cropping a movie just to fit my screen. I dealt with that for years before LD and DVD became big enough to eliminate pan-and-scan. BLEH.
Unless I am immersed in a IMAX movie theater, there are always areas in my peripheral vision where there is not a movie image. So it does not bother met.
I once watched a guy on Youtube rant about the size of the bezels on his flatscreen TV, while he had TV placed against a white wall in his apartment....
I once watched a guy on Youtube rant about the size of the bezels on his flatscreen TV, while he had TV placed against a white wall in his apartment....
I actually like the black bars. This way, I can have the media controls available on-screen without blocking any part of the show.
I don't mind the bars at all. (and I have white iPads) Much better than cropping the content to fit. And as others have noted, a 16x9 screen might be good for movies, but on a tablet it is a pain for everything else.
Not in the least. Ever since I started watching DVDs I appreciated being able to see the entire picture, regardless of format. Do they bother you on a TV set? Would you rather the image was cropped dependent upon aspect ratio?
I don't mind it, the only thing I find stupid is that movies can play on my widescreen device but often still have the black bars (essentially defeating the purpose of widescreen TVs.) I don't know why companies do that.
Kallum.
Kallum.
Thanks, I totally forgot why they did it.... but it's still annoying, lol.