Letterbox

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Letterboxing is the practice of transferring widescreen films to video formats while preserving the original aspect ratio (image). Since the video display is most often a more square aspect ratio than the original film, the resulting video must include masked-off areas above and below the picture area (often referred to as "black bars," or, more accurately, as Matte (filmmaking)). Letterboxing takes its name from the similarity of the resulting image to a horizontal opening in a postal letter box. LTBX is an acronym used for programming using this format.

Letterboxing offers an alternative to the pan and scan or full screen method of transferring a widescreen film to video. In pan and scan, the original image is cropped to suit the 1.33:1 (or 4:3) ratio of the television screen. In contrast, letterboxing preserves the original composition of the film as seen in the theater.

Letterboxing was intended for use on a 4:3 display in a time when widescreen TVs had yet to catch on. Any "Academy ratio" picture (i.e. 1.33:1) will usually be stretched to fill the display on a widescreen TV and look distorted, however, Pillar box (film)ing the image on the TV or DVD player will correct this. Occasionally, an image on a program originally broadcast 4:3 can appear letterboxed on a 4:3 on a screen with a 16:9 or wider display. This is most common on personal video sites and documentaries of old footage. This is usually disliked for two reasons. The first is simply the top and bottom of the original image is cropped out. Secondly, the original image may be stretched, and therefore everything will appear wider than normal. This is especially apparent where most people appear overweight.

Letterboxing in cinema and home video Some filmmakers state a preference for letterboxed videos of their work. Woody Allen, for instance, insisted on a letterboxed release of Manhattan (1979 movie). Director Sydney Pollack expressed a preference to preserving the widescreen in a bonus segment of the DVD of his film The Interpreter despite that film existing in pan & scan as well as letterbox versions. One exception to this preference is Miloš Forman, who finds the matting distracting. In any case, most video releases are made without consulting either the director or the cinematographer of the film. Videocassettes of films were often only released in pan-and-scan versions, but DVD releases tend to offer the option of pan-and-scan or letterboxed versions.

Letterboxing on television Current digital video high-definition television (HDTV) systems use video displays with a wider aspect ratio than standard television. The wider screen makes it easier to make an accurate transfer of widescreen films. In addition to theatrical films, some contemporary television programming is being produced in widescreen and high definition; and, when viewed on a conventional television, it appears in letterboxed format. Programs broadcast in HDTV are sometimes letterboxed in standard-definition television (SDTV) sets.

In Europe, letterboxing has long been the standard for showing widescreen theatrical movies on TV, partially because the PAL TV system with its higher resolution does not degrade letterboxed images as much as the American NTSC system. Together with the advance of digital broadcasting, which allows widescreen, 1.78:1 (or 16:9) transmissions without loss of resolution, 1.78:1 widescreen television is now slowly becoming common on European television for made-for-TV materials. Although this is not true high-definition TV, it does use the same aspect ratio. The majority of programming in countries like United Kingdom and France is now made in letterbox format (in part due to the late-90s adoption of analogue widescreen TV in the former); in Germany most made-for-TV programming is still broadcast in 1.33:1 and full screen.

Of course, on a true widescreen television set a 1.78:1 picture is no longer letterboxed since it fills the entire screen. However, movies made in even wider aspect ratios, such as 2.39:1, are letterboxed to some extent even on 1.78:1 television sets, but with thinner black bars. Since the widescreen film aspect ratio 1.85:1 does not perfectly match the 1.78:1 (or 16:9) aspect ratio of Widescreen DVDs and High Definition Video, extremely minor letterboxing often exists for 1:85:1 film to DVD and HD transfers. The resulting black bars are so thin that they are generally not visible on televisions and can be more easily viewed on computers, where every pixel of the image is displayed. Much of the time the extreme edges of 1:85:1 film is cropped in the transfer process to match the 1.78:1 ratio of DVDs and HD.

Most current models of consumer camcorder support a wide-screen mode, which will often be shown letterboxed on standard ratio TVs.

Pillarboxing and windowboxing image:pillarboxed.jpg imageimage:windowboxed.jpg imagePillarboxing (or reverse letterboxing) is when an image is displayed within a wider frame, adding bars on the side. For instance, 1.33:1 and 1.85:1 images displayed within a wider, 2.40:1 frame require pillar boxing. "Pillar box" comes from the similarity of this display to free-standing mailboxes in the UK and the British Commonwealth.

Sometimes, by accident or design, a standard-ratio image is presented in the central portion of a letterboxed picture, resulting in a black border all around. This is referred to as windowbox (film).http://www.jeremymoore.com/AdobePremiere/PAR_Displays/http://www.acmehowto.com/howto/hometheater/glossary/glossaryw.php It is also referred to as "matchboxing," "gutterboxing," or the "postage stamp" effecthttp://broadband.motorola.com/consumers/hdtv/glossary.asp. It is generally disliked because it wastes a lot of screen space and reduces the resolution of the original imagehttp://rtfm-nub.blogspot.com/2007/08/thoughts-on-some-hbo-hd-broadcasts-810i.html. This can, for instance, be seen on some of the DVD editions of the Star Trek movies whenever the widescreen documentaries included as extras use footage from the original TV series. It can also be seen in The Crocodile Hunter: Collision Course, which is a mainstream American feature film that displays widescreen pillar boxing (windowbox (film)) with numerous scenes of 1.85:1 within a 2.40:1 frame.The alternative would be to crop the original 1.33:1 TV images horizontally to fit the 1.78:1 ratio. This is referred to as "tilt and scan." This was a characteristic of video from the Fisher-Price PXL-2000 camcorder of the late 1980s. In addition, several 8-bit home computers from the 1980s included gutterboxing as part of their standard display modes. In particular, the Commodore 64, VIC-20, and Commodore 128 (in 40-column mode) all featured colored gutterboxing around the main text window, while the Atari 8-bit family featured a blue text window with a black border.

On rare occasion, a picture will be windowboxed on purpose. During the opening, documentary-style sequence of Rent (film), the picture is letterboxed to suggest an older camera meant to present at a 4:3 aspect ratio; as the movie transitions from that segment, it then grows from windowboxed to full widescreen (or letterboxed on a 4:3 display). Sometimes, opening credits on older films may be windowboxed, so that none of the letters in the credits will be "chopped off".

See also

Active Format Descriptor (AFD)
List of film formats
Motion picture terminology
Pan and scan
Widescreen

References External links

The Widescreen and Letterbox Advocacy Page
Why Widescreen?
Widescreen Resources & Information

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