Just to confuse an otherwise straightforward thread: There is no particular reason why you would be obliged to letterbox 16:9 material, even SD material, unless forced to view it on an SD set and if that set doesn't offer 16:9 scan. My HD delivers a rather spectacular 16:9 SD display of DV material, using the full 480 lines (actually it upconverts to 1080i, so it 'line doubles') ...

The 16:9 recording of DV uses the full 720x480 frame area without wasting any space on black bars -- so although the imaging chips are not fully utilized during shooting in 16:9, there is a real gain in the recording that is then preserved in post ... as long as you can present on a 'proper' 16:9 capable set.

GB

16:9 real world results
 

Ok, I'll bite. What brand hd set do you have that renders these wonderful results? I'd like to know, as I'm considering a purchase in the near future.Thanks.

Mine's a Sony 53" HiScan CRT -- but I don't think that's the key factor, the issue is a set which can display 16:9 without adding letterbox, which I'd think was a function of any HD set that can display widescreen SD material. My DVD player, for example, will output 480p on the component outputs and display as a 16:9 image.

HTH

GB

Yes,thank you.

4:3 is sharper than true 16:9, right?
 

I'm shooting with a Sony PDX10P that can do true widescreen but I have a question:

If widescreen is the same resolution as 4:3, doesn't the image quality suffer slightly from the 'stretching'?

The thing is, we work with a lens adapter and we're cutting the frame to anamorphic anyway. So if we just zoom in on our wide focussing screen until it fits into frame left and right, we won't even have to mind that you still see some black up and above because it'll be cut off and you'll see the whole focussing screen so putting the camera in wide mode won't really make the angle wider. So it seems to me that 4:3 is better because it should be sharper, right?

Because if you shoot widescreen, for as far as I understand, a wider image is squeezed into the normal DV resolution and the image is stretched again afterwards. If you shoot 4:3, none or very little of this occurs.

The PDX10 has 4:3 CCD chips, and when you shoot in the 16:9 mode it uses more of the width of the chips (and so has more wide-angle coverage - much needed on this camera) but sadly cuts down on the height. So you're right, it's at its best in the 4:3 mode but gives very acceptable results in the 16:9 mode too.

But as you're into lens adapters you're after an aesthetic effect, so quibbling over small losses in the camera settings seems academic to me.

tom.

Of course, the problem will be that when shooting 4:3 I will have to do more letterboxing, resulting in the loss of vertical resolution... I guess I'll have to compare that with the loss of horizontal resolution when shooting in wide.

But as you'll be ending up with widescreen, I'd suggest you shoot wide to begin with. The losses that way will be less noticable than the vertical res lost by cropping 4:3.

tom.

This image shows how the PDX10 sensor uses it's sensor area for 4:3 and 16:9 video, and also for still images... looks like it uses more pixels for 16:9.

I agree with Tom... and Tom :-)

The PDX-10 is really at its best when shooting 16:9 IMO. I shot a bunch of comparisons with my PDX-10 and VX-2000. The 4:3 image from the VX looked noticeably better than 4:3 from the PDX, which I attributed to the larger sensor on the VX, plus the fact the the PDX doesn't even use the full width of the chips in 4:3 mode. I think the PDX is kind of a bad choice if you want to shoot 4:3, but it does a pretty good job of 16:9.

Thanks a lot guys, clears things up, I'll be shooting in 16:9 :) .

Shooting 16:9
 

I'm in the preliminary stages of putting together a small business with a few buddies of mine who are in related fields (videography, photography, DJing etc) and have been doing loads of research on various products. One of which is the VX2100, I've been looking at this camera as a possible secondary camera. The reason being it's smaller size than the Canon XL2 and it still shoots in a 16:9 aspect ratio. However, I'm curious if this will be a true 16:9 like the XL2 shoots or will it be "stretched" like my old Optura Xi does? Our primary camera will hopefully be a Canon XH-A1 teamed up with a Brevis35 system. So I was hoping for a good secondary camera that will shoot 16:9 so that shots can flow relatively seemlessly.

Thanks for your help! I may have more questions along the way...

neither the VX series nor the PD series nor the DSR250 shoot a true 16:9-I've tried it on my PDs and DSR and frankly thought it looked pretty bad so when I need it I mask the LCD and leave the headroom and bottom room to crop in post.

Don

Neither. The VX crops a standard 4:3 frame to about 360 lines. It's basically the same effect you'd get by hacking the top and bottom off in editing.

The middle 360 lines look the same as they always would, so letterboxed on a 4:3 regular TV it's not a big deal. But view the video blown up onto a 16:9 HDTV, particularly a big one, and you'll want to cry. It'll be especially noticeable when trying to cut together 360 VX lines with 1080 A1 lines. You'd be better off with an HV20.

Been there.... it's what pushed me to my FX1...

Alright, thanks for the heads up guys I appreciate the info. Glad I discovered this early on.

Thanks again!