screen aspcet ratios

I was wondering what most people prefer. full screen picture which has the ratio 1.70.1or 1.85.1,or the 2.35.1 with the black bars.
On a small screen the black bars were annoying but now tv's have got bigger personally i don't mind the bars.I think the films look better and you get that panaramic cinema feel where as full screen the tv seems to shrink.The reason i was wondering is because ive just got the new narnia film and on the ps3 it's fullscreen as the ps3 doesn't have the letterbox option that blu ray/dvd players do.

The PS3 does show all formats. You need to adjust your picture settings.

hi,could you tell me how to change the settins so i can watch narnia with black bars.the only setting i can find is pan and scan and letterbox which is what its set to but ive still got the film showing in full screen.the new narnia is 1.70.1 ratio so is it still poss to watch in letterbox format.

It's listed as 1.78:1 on blu; which means, it will just about fill your widescreen tv (with very slim bars on the left and right sides - not the top and bottom). The film was originally released as 2.35:1, so I don't know why it is not the same on blu.

I have a Sony blu-ray player and it plays great blu-ray discs. It also plays 14:9 and widescreen dvds in the correct aspect ratio. But when I try to play dvds of TV programmes from the 70's and 80's, or older films which were made in the 4:3 aspect ratio it stretches the picture, thus distorting it. I've tried all combinations of settings on the player, but to no avail. My Sony TV will allow me to change the ratio to 4:3 for other inputs (like my old VHS recorder and my Humax PVR - and the dvd player I gave away!) but when switched to the blu-ray player it only gives me the options of Widescreen, Zoom or Smart - which, again, distort the 4:3 picture. Anyone have any ideas?

W.K.Jones - Video Settings/Screen Format/Fixed Aspect Ratio.

That's what I currently have it set to.

WKJ - That is the correct setting, perhaps your TV is doing the stretching? What do you have under Set-up/Screen Settings? If you have been using the button (with the sort-of criss-cross grid) to switch formats you might need to reselect Auto Format (even if it's set to On). If all else fails, select it, switch it off, then back on again. And try to avoid using that button in future, auto format should be all you need unless you want to distort ratios.

One other piece of advice: next time post in the high definition forum. Hardly anyone seems to read this one!

Shazzerman - Narnia? The first one? That's not in 1.78:1 it's scope! And 1.78:1 doesn't leave thin black bars at the side, an HDTV is 1.78:1=16:9. It is rather 1.85:1 that leaves thin bars top and bottom, so thin you might not have noticed them ;-)

Well, it was set to auto, so I de-selected, went back to viewing the dvd, switched the tv off, then on again, then to setting and switched to auto - no change.
Incidentally, while I was in settings I noted one, "Display Area", gave the option of "normal" or "full pixel". What's this all about?
Re the High Def forum, I had a look at that but decided against it as it seemed to have been hi-jacked by 2 or 3 guys going on endlessly about interlacing, frequencies, 1080i50 - and organs!

I had problems with a DVD that is 4:3. I wanted to watch the film in 4:3 and not auto adjusted to 16:9. It took me a bit and I had to change the settings both in the Blu-ray player and the TV. In the end I got it right and never changed it again so any film I play is not distortioned. I had no problems with Narnia 3 maybe because of this.

Don't remember exactly what I did. Will try to find out later at home and tell you. But I guess that will depend on your TV and player models.

Well, I'd just about given up. I'd tried all the advice I'de been given and tried all the different combinations. Last night I decided to - at least for the time being - concentrate on enjoying my blu-ray discs, which had always played in the correct ratio. I put on my latest purchase of The Maltese Falcon (4:3). Of course it played back stretched across the screen! This was worse than when I started.
I went into the TV settings and, just for the hell of it, changed the screen format back to wide. And the disc played back perfectly.
This morning, out of curiosity, I tried a 4:3 film on dvd. And lo and behold it played back in correct ratio.
If I ever touch any of these setting again I'll deserve all I get!

Hey there, Mr Blu. I'm so pleased to talk with you... The "new" Narnia film, Blu - the "new" Narnia film. And I beg to differ: 1.85:1 - practically a screen filler; 1.78:1 - extremely thin bars ON THE SIDES (1.66:1 - thicker bars on the sides...1.37:1 - very thick bars on the sides). Now, if that's a fact, am I lying?

Full pixel shows the whole screen and doesn't crop the picture.

Shazzerman, 1.78:1 (rounded up from 1.777... recurring) IS 16:9 ie. 1920x1080. There are no black bars anywhere. If you're seeing very thin side bars then either your TV has slightly more than 1920 pixels on the horizontal or it's doing some pre-processing on the picture.

Hi Shazzermen - my bad, I assumed the original film was meant for some reason. You're right on 1.66 and 1.37, but no bars with 1.78, thin horizontal bars with 1.85. Trust me, it's clear as anything when you're projecting :-)

Just bought the devil rides out on on blu-ray and thhat is presented as 1.66:1 so you do get slight black bars on the sides of the image.

This is because the image is effectively taller than the 16X9 display so you are getting the opposite effect to a 2.35:1 movie where the image is wider than the 16x9 frame.