This video is sponsored by Adam and Eve. Go to AdamandEve.com and use code MIDNIGHT to get 50% 1 item and free shipping in the US and Canada, some exclusions apply.
For the most part, the move to HD TVs has been a positive one, but in this video I make the case that maybe it wasn’t the best for EVERY type of show. In this video I go over live-action sitcoms and how they were hurt by the move.
Music by Epidemic Sound (http://www.epidemicsound.com)
Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/midnightcap
Follow me on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/midnightcap
Special thanks to Andrew Elliott (Stalli111: https://www.youtube.com/user/Stalli111 ) for editing this video!
source
I do think that the HD transfer will almost always be an overall benefit (while I do believe there are drawbacks to even this, like issues with shots having clearly only been put just in focus enough for 480i…) simply because modern televisions make low res video look worse than it really was on an old TV, but I wish more shows would stick to the original 4:3 presentation regardless when it was completely intended as the only way to view the show back then.
Scrubs was really bad when it turned HD.
All the movies I make are in 4:3
Because the old Law and Order was a 1980s/90s prestige drama it was recorded on film. When It came to streaming services in 1080p it was funny to be able to see things that were lost to Standard definition when the show originally aired.
Specifically I remember watching an episode where the criminal they were after was a carrier of the AIDS virus who was intentionally infecting people… and the detectives had to visit a social worker that specialized in helping Gay men.
On the wall, in the background, was a gay porn calendar, with Dick and Balls clearly visible. It must have made it past censors when it was in Standard Def, because you couldn't see it at that resolution, or possibly it was cropped out entirely.
This is exactly how I feel regarding cartoons from the early 2000s and late '90s in HD.
Like, the Powerpuff Girls/Dexter's Lab – hell, even Spongebob just looks plain ugly in HD because they weren't made for that.
Ironically, those shows were also made for laptop watching, unless the upload uses the TV's forced widescreen format.
Heck, when the Fairly Oddparents went HD my brain thought, "Oh boy, I can just feel the remaining funny bones being surgically removed."
If you’ll allow me to share my two cents.
I’m one who is always for seeing a film or tv show in the correct aspect ratio it was originally made in. So when a film is re-released say on Blu-Ray in 1:37:1 Widescreen, but the original ration was one of the ultra widescreen like Cinerama. Then I would want it to be in that aspect ratio and same for tv shows.
However I’ll make an exception if a show started in 4:3 for seasons 1 through 8 and then HD came along and it went to fill the tv for season 9 onward then I would be fine with that because it isn’t altering the image of the earlier seasons to match the new ones.
What you bring up is something Disney did back in the late 80’s when they re-released Snow White and Peter Pan in theaters they had their aspect ratio altered from 4:3 to widescreen to the top and bottom of the images were cut off. Which is something Siskel and Ebert thankfully were against as well as pan and scan.
That was good, thanks.
Zack Snyder's Justice League shows that 4:3 is still 100% viable and even wanted today by people who actually care, every piece of video media deserves to be seen the way it was originally created, if you remaster it, maintain aspect ratio and color grading just increase resolution and sound quality
7:44 just look at Julia and Jason's gesticulations that got cropped. And Rob was so far up his own *ss during that ep of IASIP Podcast, but they were drinking. As someone who has seen or listened to every episode they'd had that "debate" before but it didn't turn into a drunken fight.
I wish this video went into more depth about exactly what qualities of 4:3 are better for sitcoms or how different aspects can be accounted for that aren’t in modern 16:9 sitcoms
Yooo you sponsored by Adam and Eve 😏
I have a nice CRT and dvds of a number of old sitcoms I liked back in the day.
I didn't even know they had newer widescreen HD versions, and honestly I have no interest in them.
They were budget shows on budget sets that knew how to use the aspect ratio for great framing, one of the WORST thing you can do is to make all the small things you were never meant to notice clear as crystal.
The same thing was done to old comic books. Many have been "remastered" and look like garbage. Gene Colan and Tom Palmer's "Tomb of Dracula" is great because these artists understood the printed media of it's day and use it "low" quality aspects to enhance the artwork. Worse is that some young artist might look at those remasters and think they can do better than Colan and Palmer!🤣
I swear, my family was the only one that had CRT sets roughly a cubic metre in size.
10:28 Don't forget Summer Heights High ! That one's a classic. 🙂
As someone who is running a streaming service tied to its own theater company, these are questions I'm trying to find answers to all the time – the only reason I still don't present our streaming content in 4:3 is simply because I want the audience to let the sides of the screen "fall away," and simplify the viewing experience overall. Also going 60fps to match the 30 interlaced of the 70s-90s sitcoms is something I've been trying to make work, but presented in the context of "digital theater." It's a little like building TV from the ground up again, from its roots in radio and theater, and being as un-cinematic as possible. This has got to be a new direction for streaming in general if they want to stop burying themselves in overspending, and, like one of your last videos pointed out, maybe afford to make enough episodes of a sitcom to get into a groove, both on the production side and also on the audience side. Binging 10 half hour episodes does not create the same immersion. Anyway, LOVE these videos because it's literally what I think about all the time.
Stupid argument. You think sitcoms should be 4:3 SD because that's all you've seen for decades. New sitcoms could be made in 16:9. Bigger problem is that broad sitcoms aren't being made. The all need to be "edgy" and "quirky". Showing original 4:3 stuff in 16:9 is generally stupid. Some exceptions, though. The Wire, for example shot in 16:9 but aired in 4:3. So the revamp to 16:9 isn't cutting off part of the frame and David Simon is cool with it.
Why do ppl do this "back in my day" shit. Hop off the boomer vibes
this video is 95% saying "some stuff works better in 4:3 than 16:9" and 5% actually explaining why or showing any specific examples of that. I don't agree with the idea but you're doing very little to explain why or show it.
Multicam sitcoms are SUPER IMPORTANT. I think as they've disappeared, we've been inundated with reaction content on various platforms as a means to recoup such a loss. Multicam sitcoms allowed us to know what was funny, when, why and how. It gave people the cue, nay the courage to laugh, ooh, aah, get rowdy and horny TOGETHER. If someone was evil (a bigot, a crook, a politician) we'd all laugh at them asserting our own power over them in that process.
We have HDTVs everywhere now, but most content on TV is grainy footage from cell phones usually shot vertically!!! 4:3 would obviously be better suited for that.
You lost me at SD being better than HD. I could agree not to touch the aspect ratio, but resolution is not up for debate. Black bars have always been issue, movies have always been wider than TV.
charley day was smoking crack
Ratios are related in the format 4 to 3, and 16 to 9 for example. Four parts compared to Three parts, not Four multiplied by Three. Hope this helps anyone that notices. Great content regardless of this minor discretion.
Seriously, eat my arse. The move to the HDTV standard ended at least fifteen years ago. We have been in Ultra-HD for around a decade now, and here is a little surprise for you. If any show cannot stand up to having its potential resolution unlocked, then it was never that good to begin with. By the way, F(r)iends-lovers, when F(r)iends was made, all shows were shot in 4:3 and you would need to remove material from the top and bottom to make them 16:9. So your "joke […] that is ruined by the 16:9 format" is something you are making up.
Sitcoms have fallen by the wayside because studios and channels have become willing to spend more money making the shows (and they have been getting better returns in the bargain). In Sitcoms like Full (Of Shit) House or Family (Of Assholes) Ties, every episode is a bottle episode. In good comedies like The Good Place, the location can change in order to accommodate a variety of better-made, better-written, better-constructed jokes. The absence of laugh tracks is also a plus. No more need to have the plot element end and begin in the same ten seconds.
The plain truth is that there are things no longer done in television because they were only good ideas at the time. The sitcom as children of the 1980s know it died because The Simpsons showed it was possible to have a deep and meaningful plot that makes you laugh and think at the same time. Suddenly, all of those shows with laugh tracks and ten second jokes looked as crap as they were. The whole reason why we no longer have nearly-square screens is because films and television evolved. The reason we no longer have crap like F(r)iends or Family Matters (Less Than A Complete Bastard) is because television writers and producers evolved.
Deal with it.
Good example of this is the new That 90s Show on Netflix.
A show that quickly pushed it's way to the top of my favourites list, just recently did an episode in SD 4:3. The final season of Atlanta had one episode that focused solely on the relationship of 2.5 of the characters. It basically shows us a raw form of their relationship, focusing on them solely, and also showing a strangely romantic entrapment.
I feel like at least half the problem is that people freak out over seeing 'black bars' on their screen and not understanding why. So media outlets feel like they have to fill up the space, so we end up with funky presentations and pan-and-scan- abominations.
Trailer Park Boys was ruined when they switched to HD it was so jarring, no idea why they did that, it lost all the atomosphere
I had a visceral response to HD Sunny. It made it look like a soap opera 😢
Great observations. Given the wide media landscape today it seems someone will notice and take advantage of this. Shooting a new show in 4:3 standard definition would stand out.
Trying to convert older stuff to 16:9 is a fools errand much of the time since it wasn't directed in that format.
But, I feel like many people are treating 4:3 as some sort of actual stylistic choice on the part of these shows, and not them just using what was the standard of the time. We only have many of these associations because the shows happened to start in an Era before 16:9 was standard, not because it was the "right" choice for the tone of the show.
Regular cameras that shoot in 4:3 aren't even made anymore. The crappiest modern phone shoots in 16:9. I think there are valid arguments, but I think you need to separate those from some things that are just associations with the past and by comparison to modern cameras.
I am a 4:3 convert, firmly by now. Over the last year I’ve learnt so much about old video game consoles and display methods, and frankly, there’s so much genuine artistry and really interesting history behind video games that were made for 4:3 format, the same as TV, that makes the complete switch to widescreen kind of annoying. Things like UI and HUD elements, camera shots, even framing, so many games made this way have had awful widescreen conversions that don’t work in the slightest because for some reason we just have to abandon 4:3 instead of keeping its strengths.
standard def. Some kind of magic was lost with the new shinier HD look. It’s too bright.
The French-Canadian movie "Mommy" has one of the greatest uses of 1×1 aspect ratios ever. If you know, you know
Now– let's talk vertical video.
Pretty soon people are going to be making videos about the glory days of 1080P television.
The best example is "Kevin Can F**k Himself" literally switching around between these tropes of cinematography history
I love classic horror and exploitation. And both work better less clean.
While everybody is embracing 2:1 Univisium lol. (I do love 4:3 too)
I don't know why anyone would think that cutting away a third of a shows image information is a good idea.
I’m not picky about aspect ratio but what I am picky about is when they do reformat it from its original aspect. Composition is done at the time of filming with those hard boundaries considered. Widening 4:3 using what was captured in the bleed wasn’t supposed to be considered. And cropping 4:3 to fit 16:9 loses work that was done by set designers to help set the mood or place you in the environment. And most of the time it’s not even like a smart crop where they shift the content to maintain the right focus. It’s just the center of the shot.
What I do like with the new 16:9 option was the explicit choice in some shows to revert back to 4:3 for retro/flashback/period piece for part of an episode.
Idk I fixate too much on leaving things exactly how the creator intended. I even turn off smart features on my tv (noise reduction, color balance, framerate interpolation). That way I can only blame the show for wasting my time if it sucks 🤣
I wasn’t on board with the premise of this topic but by the end, there were some good points made that made me change my mind!
Most of the images are cut off for stiendfield
Totally agree!
3:17 yes… i'm sorry but you're wrong. watching 4:3 on widescreen tvs is gross and i'm not going to pretend otherwise.
Great episode. Whenever I watch an old sitcom that has since gone HD, especially if it happened during the run of the show, like with Friends, there was always something off that I couldn't quite put in to words, but after watching this I think I know what it was and that's that it really highlighted how cheap everything actually was, the sets, production, etc. Blasting a spotlight on all the little flaws that were obscured by the older format. And there's nothing the show could've really done about those things without significantly changing the feeling of the show itself.
Also, I really want to check out the Sunny podcast now. Podcasts are pretty off my radar in general but Sunny is GOAT as far as I'm concerned so I'm sure I could make an exception for it
I remember watching the Twilight Zone on streaming and you could see the set and little gaps in the paint or string holding up props. You’d never notice it in SD, but it was clear as day in HD.
Changing aspect ratio against what show was shot for is outrageous. What's next – are they gonna colorize "Third Man" and "Maltese Falcon"?
It absolutely did ruin sitcoms lol I'm jk.
Thank you for bringing up the terrible BtVS remaster. I'm a long time fan and I'm so glad I have my early aughts DVD's.