Ultra wide for watching films ?

[jjohnthedon1]

So does a ultrawide monitor get rid of the black bars on the top and bottom 

are they better for films ? 

[UssEnterprise]

They do sometimes if configured right!

And watching a movie on a ultrawide is a treat!

[Cereal5]

Yeah they do. Unless the movie was shot in 16:9 or 17:9 for some reason

[DrM]

if the bars are not embedded into the video itself, then yes an ultrawide will get rid of them

[jjohnthedon1]

Why are films shot like that considering not many people have them 

[mcraftax]

7 minutes ago, jjohnthedon1 said:

Why are films shot like that considering not many people have them 

So you can see a wider scene which is more realistic.

[Squirrel724]

45 minutes ago, jjohnthedon1 said:

Why are films shot like that considering not many people have them 

Because the screens in theaters are 21:9. You can see when the ads end how the screen becomes wider. The ads are 16:9 while the movie is 21:9.

[Scruffy90]

2 hours ago, jjohnthedon1 said:

Why are films shot like that considering not many people have them 

First thing i did when i bought my ultrawide was watch the star wars trilogy. Its a treat to watch 21:9 content on a 21:9 monitor.

[GamerDude]

Watching a 2.35:1 movie and cropping it to fill the screen on a 21:9 monitor is a treat indeed! I'd gotten a 29" 2560x1080 monitor and loved it so much (for movies, WS movies specifically) that I went a got a 34" 3440x1440 monitor, ain't ever going back to 16:9, that's for sure! Below is a pic of of a 2.35:1 WS movie as it would appear on a 16:9 monitor (ignore the black columns on the left and right), the black bars on top and below have always annoyed me.

 

Now, I'd cropped the image to fill the screen and this is what I get...

 

I'm loving my UW monitors, awesome for WS movies and pretty damn good for gaming as well......

[Acquire]

If the source of your video preserves the original aspect ratio (as in the black bars aren't embedded into the video), then yes, the black bars won't be present and it'll fill the screen nicely.  I haven't had much luck with netflix or google play video, but amazon seems to be pretty good at serving up movies in their original aspect ratio.  For the rest you'll have to zoom in to crop out the black bars.

 

If you're doing physical media somehow, from what I remember, blurays do not have the original aspect ratio.  The black bars are embedded into the video, so you'd have to zoom in as well.

 

As to why movies are filmed in such an aspect ratio.  It's because it's simply better.  You get a wider field of view.  For me at least, 2:4:1 seems like the optimal aspect ratio to completely fill my field of view.  Any wider and I'd start to notice the vertical limits of the picture in order to fit the extra horizontal pieces. 16:9 was chosen as a compromise aspect ratio in that 4:3 and 2:4:1 content display about the same area of black bars within it.