Looking at current TV shows, I see that a lot of them are formatted for phones now, at aspect ratios wider than 16x9. I know the new season may have movies with different aspect ratios and I’m not talking about that, but I hope the show proper (host segments, etc.) will continue to be formatted for TVs at a 16x9 ratio, and not be formatted wider.
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16:9 still seems to be a popular standard. I don’t think we have anything to worry about until Samsung decides to make some ridiculous curved beast the length of a train car.
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Yeah, I don’t know why people want to watch things on a tiny phone screen. No thanks. Give me my nice big screen television, or at the very least, my desktop computer screen.
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The show will continue to be 16x9.
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I’m pretty confident the use of any ratio other than 16:9 for TV will be for artistic reasons, not to adhere to different devices.
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For what it’s worth, formats wider than 16:9 have been around in film for a lot longer than smart phones have been around. They’ve been common in dramatic feature films for a long time. Some TV shows have used it to create more of a dramatic cinematic effect.
That’s not to say nobody has thought of phones when making that decision, but I don’t think that’s the major deciding factor even now.
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For my money I’d say keep to the film’s original form-factor and letterbox if you must. I know there are a few Joel episodes where the movies are cropped and a few that squished 16:9 down to 4:3; neither were great choices.
ETA: If they do choose riff an old made for TV movie in 3:4, that’s a chance for a visual gag where they all have to move in a few seats to be seen…
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Yes, but there’s a difference between using a wider aspect ratio in something that will be shown in a movie theater vs. on TV. if it’s not going to be shown in theaters and is wider than 16x9, the only thing it’s being optimized for is a phone.
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Thanks, Matt.
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I don’t know if I agree with you there. I think for a number of projects, it’s not being done in different ARs for phones. For example Wandavision chose different ARs to represent the TV world and the “real” world of the MCU. The other Marvel Disney+ shows go ultra-widescreen to make it feel more cinematic. It also allows directors to compose their shots differently than they normally would for a 16:9 screen. But I don’t think any of the Marvel directors ever thinks about what it would look like on an iPhone.
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I guess I just don’t see the point of making something “cinematic” that’s not going to be shown in a cinema. All you’re doing is shrinking the viewable area for people.
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But that’s not all you’re doing. You’re also telling the audience subtly that this is an epic experience and you increase the field of view that they can see. So your staging can be even wider than 16:9 and it can affect your choices when it comes to blocking your actors (who now have more space to explore) and what is visible in the shot.
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