Framed picture

[JACKHAWK]

I started watching the Listener on NBC that I had recorded on my HR20. The picture was framed(not pillared) equaly on all sides. I was unable to change it. Two thirds of the show - the frame disappeared & the pictured filled the screen.

Was the the HR20 or the local station fault?

Was there anything that I could have done to get rid of the frame (it was 5 inches on each side)?

[Movieman]

I have had that happen to be but when there has been a local weather advisory from the station. It might be the local station and that is where Directv gets its feed. Also check your display settings and check if you have native, pillar, etc. selected.

[Mertzen]

Someone at the locals station must have forgotten to 'flip' the switch. :lol: It happens sometimes.

[veryoldschool]

I started watching the Listener on NBC that I had recorded on my HR20. The picture was framed(not pillared) equaly on all sides. I was unable to change it. Two thirds of the show - the frame disappeared & the pictured filled the screen.

Was the the HR20 or the local station fault?

Was there anything that I could have done to get rid of the frame (it was 5 inches on each side)?
"Most likely" your local NBC "had a problem" and used the SD feed upconverted to the HD and since the program was shot in 16:9, you got the "window box" effect.
The only option would be to have your TV zoom if it can, but then you wouldn't know when the station reverted back to the correct format.

[NaperDan]

"Most likely" your local NBC "had a problem" and used the SD feed upconverted to the HD and since the program was shot in 16:9, you got the "window box" effect.
The only option would be to have your TV zoom if it can, but then you wouldn't know when the station reverted back to the correct format.

You got it right. The station controls whether they broadcast full HD or not. What you are seeing is a combination of pillarbox with letterboxing. 16 X 9 is letterboxed when broadcast in SD. If you have your receiver set to output SD in pillarbox mode and your brightness is properly set (providing your display is calibrated correctly) you will only see a black frame instead of each set of black bars having different shades of grey. This is perfectly normal when they are preparing to show weather alerts or other emergency broadcasts that cannot be combined as of yet with HD.

If you do zoom your picture you'll know when they resume their normal broadcast by loss of all the outer portion of the frame.

[HoTat2]

You got it right. The station controls whether they broadcast full HD or not. What you are seeing is a combintation of pillarbox with letterboxing. 16 X 9 is letterboxed when broadcast in SD. If you have your receiver set to output SD in pillarbox mode and your brightness is properly set (providing your display is calibrated correctly) you will only see a black frame instead of each set of black bars having different shades of grey. This is perfectly normal when they are preparing to show weather alerts or other emergency broadcasts that cannot be combined as of yet with HD.

If you do zoom your picture you'll know when they resume their normal broadcast by loss of all the outer portion of the frame.

While terminology can be confusingly maddening at times where the context has to be relied upon in many cases to understand what is exactly meant. Just for the sake of accuracy a DTV station which is broadcasting one or more of its sub-channels in an HD format (720P/60 or 1080i/30) has the choice between televising programs in native HD (sometimes called "true HD") or in up-converted 4:3.

The expression "full HD" however usually means a 1080P picture at 60 frames per second.

[denvertrakker]

While terminology can be confusingly maddening at times where the context has to be relied upon in many cases to understand what is exactly meant.

You got THAT right. Care to explain that sentence?:confused:

[HoTat2]

You got THAT right. Care to explain that sentence?:confused:

Sure;

As I pointed out previously the expression "full HD" normally means the 1080P/60 video format. However in the *context* in which NaperDan is using it you can understand that he's referring to a station televising a picture in native HD as opposed to up-converted SD. :)

[TomCat]

You got it right. The station controls whether they broadcast full HD or not. What you are seeing is a combination of pillarbox with letterboxing. 16 X 9 is letterboxed when broadcast in SD...This actually sounds like something else. I have seen 3 or 4 programs that were 16:9 with a black frame around them that were not a combo of LB/PB. The inset image was too large to reflect LB/PB, yet still not big enough to fill the screen. It is a true HD broadcast of a 16:9 program, but the resolution/aspect ratio flag is set improperly so that somewhere in the chain it does not fully resolve the normal format, and the end result is a small border around the picture, rather than the "postage stamp" affect of the combo of LB/PB.

While terminology can be confusingly maddening at times where the context has to be relied upon in many cases to understand what is exactly meant. Just for the sake of accuracy a DTV station which is broadcasting one or more of its sub-channels in an HD format (720P/60 or 1080i/30) has the choice between televising programs in native HD (sometimes called "true HD") or in up-converted 4:3.

The expression "full HD" however usually means a 1080P picture at 60 frames per second.Accuracy, you say? To be accurate, sub channels are never broadcast in HD. There is never enough bits to broadcast both the main channel as well as sub channels in HD. It is technically possible with 720p, but AFAIK never done, as the compression would be intolerable. PBS does a lot of 16:9 SD, but usually not on their sub channels.

TV stations actually really don't have a lot of choice in the matter, other than taking HD back to 4:3 when older legacy graphics equipment is employed for breaking weather crawls, etc. They are usually bound by the limitations of what content they have. HD content it typically broadcast in HD (whenever possible) and SD content is broadcast in SD.

And "full HD" is indeed an "expression", and nothing more. It is not defined technically at all and is probably a made-up marketing term at best, even though there is precious little if any 1080p/60 content available to consumers that is not derived from 1080p/24 or 1030i in the first place, and none whatsoever is available OTA, via DBS, cable, FIOS, or download.

1080p/60 as content delivery format and 1080p/60 as a display format are two very different things, and the advantages of one do not apply to the other. Every 1080p FP TV ever made produces a 1080p picture at 60 (59.94) fps, all of the time (excluding new motion-compensation formats), by definition. So if defining "full HD" as "a 1080p picture at 60 fps", even the upconverted 4:3 480i that most stations broadcast most of the time is "full HD" on a 1080p FP. I would not put a lot of stock in that term, since it really doesn't mean anything at all.