Anamorphic Widescreen: Which Standard DVDs Get the Best Picture on My HDTV?

Despite a growing number of high definition televisions (HDTVs) penetrating consumer's homes, standard definition DVDs are still being sold and rented in record numbers. A growing quantity of these DVDs is showing movies and television episodes in the modern widescreen formats. While DVDs are expected to still work on older boxy-screen TVs, they are also expected to look their best on the new widescreen HDTVs. Although many earlier DVDs struggled with this, an "anamorphic widescreen" technique optimizes the data on the DVD for best viewing on an HDTV. Here, I will help explain how this works and why it is important to look for an "anormorphic widescreen" or "enhanced for 16:9 televisions" notation on the back of DVDs.

Despite the advancement in new forms of entertainment media, including high-definition disc players, the traditional DVD saw another record year in 2006. This continued its upward sales trend since the late 1990s. In 2006, consumers spent over $24 billion in DVD sales and rentals (Digital Entertainment Group), a 6% increase over the prior year (sales outpaced rentals 2 to 1). Folks are continuing to accumulate DVDs, despite having a widescreen high definition televisions at home (see 10 Things I Should Know About HDTV). It is important to understand that the anamorphic widescreen DVDs are those optimized for the widescreen televisions. Because high-definition discs such as HD DVDs and Blu-ray disc are already optimized for HDTVs, the use of an anamorphic methods are much less relevant.

The issue at hand arises with the playing of DVD content on 4:3 traditional aspect ratio televisions as well as 16:9 widescreen televisions (see Pain in the Aspect Ratio for a description of aspect ratios and associated black bars). All content burned on the DVD is originally stored in a 4:3 aspect ratio before it is decoded by the DVD player and displayed on the TV. When a program is stored on a DVD in a widescreen format, we have a mismatch between the 4:3 image stored on the DVD and the widescreen image of the program. We'll use a television program shown in 16:9 widescreen for an example. We'll look at how two different types of DVDs handle the delivery of the image: the Letterbox Widescreen DVD vs. Anamorphic Widescreen DVD.

Letterbox Widescreen DVD
The non-anamorphic letterbox DVDs that have a widescreen video will store the image on the DVD with the black bars at the top and bottom - as shown below. The black pixels at the top and bottom are part of the image and take up stored memory on the DVD.
When this image is projected on a traditional 4:3 aspect ratio television, the presentation looks identical to the way it was stored on the DVD. The black bars are part of the image.

When this letterbox image on the DVD is placed on a widescreen TV with the 16:9 aspect ratio, something bad happens. Since the black bars are part of the image, the total height is interpreted to include the black bars at the top and bottom - and this image is placed in the middle of the screen. To maintain an undistorted image, black bars are not added to the left and right - as shown below. Yuck. To make things look a little better, this image may be zoomed to fit the screen. Once this is done, however, the zoomed image is of lesser quality. A lower resolution image is actually blown up to fit the screen. This is not desirable.

Anamorphic Widescreen DVD
With the introduction of anamorphic DVDs, widescreen videos can look better on widescreen televisions. This is not new technology. For years, DVD players have been able to interpret videos using the anamorphic widescreen technology. Here is how it works.

The image stored on the Anamorphic DVD is still in the 4:3 ratio (it has to be - all DVDs are just made that way), but the widescreen image is stretched to the top and bottom. This is what it looks like.


When this image is sent to a television with the 4:3 aspect ratio, the anamorphic status is interpreted and the image height is shrunk to create black bars at the top and bottom. These black bars are not part of the image, but are more like "voids" on the TV. This maintains an undistorted image. Not surprisingly, it looks like this:

The real magic comes in when this video is played on a widescreen television with 16:9 aspect ratio. There is no loss of resolution in the height and the television takes all of the information on the DVD and just stretches it to fit the screen. This maintains the highest quality possible on a DVD. Here is what it looks like:

Conclusion
While the Anamorphic Widescreen DVD is the way to go if you have a widescreen TV, you may not be getting rid of all black bars. The aspect ratio mismatch between the 16:9 screen and the wider theatrical aspect ratios (such as the popular 1.85:1 and 2.35:1) still exists. Without zooming or distorting the image, the HDTV will have to live with black bars (although the black bars will not be as big as on a 4:3 TV). The anamorphic methodology will make sure that you maintain the highest resolution for images you see on your widescreen television. So before you buy your next DVD, take a look at the back of the DVD and watch for the "anamorphic" or "enhanced for 16x9 televisions" label. After all, you don't want the capabilities of your HDTV to go to waste. Give the DVD the best chance of looking good on your widescreen TV.