Strange 4:3 pillarboxing

5 Star are currently repeating The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air but they're showing it in an odd way. They're displaying it as a 16:9 programme with blurred borders on either side instead of black bars or indeed instead of just transmitting it in 4:3.

This effect is when they play the programme in 4:3, but have another copy playing behind the original 4:3 picture cropped to 16:9 with a blur effect applied. This means when people are near the edge of the screen it can look a bit odd as seen in this capture:



I've seen this effect used for clips on compilation shows or list shows but never for an entire programme being broadcast. When Comedy Central were repeating this recently they just showed it as normal. I'd much rather watch it 4:3 or in a 16:9 frame with black bars, though this is preferable to having people stretch the 4:3 broadcast on their own sets because they don't like a picture not filling the screen.

I've seen this before and presumed it was just stretching out the left and right portions of the picture to fill what would have been the black bars. I don't think its a separate "copy" as such. And personally I don't think its "preferable" to black bars - it just looks horrible. I'd much rather it was just broadcast 4:3 and if moronic people want to stretch it on their 16:9 screen that's up to them - long as I don't have to watch it.

It's great for clip shows but not for whole episodes. The Fresh Prince has fallen victim to many stupid decisions recently in regards to how its broadcast. Why can't they just show it how every other 4:3 programme is broadcast?

I can't decide if this is better or worse than when it was cropped to 14:9 and ended up losing half of the credits.

I know it's not actually a separate copy, I was just trying to explain how it looked in as simple terms as possible since I'm not sure how obvious it works from a screenshot.

Is the C5 group played out with the rest of the Viacom channels?

Isn't it stil played out from Dirty Des's place, or has it moved?

5Star (and its predecessors) have always been played out by Ericsson at White City. The main Channel 5 recently joined it, after having been at Encompass Stephen Street from the start.

It's hideous !!! I suspect whoever thought it was a good idea, is also someone who shoots video on their phone vertically. God help us !

I think there is an argument for pillarboxing 4:3 material in some way these days, given how the combination of certain TVs, Sky HD and HDMI will default to stretch-o-vision when presented with a 4:3 image.

Would rather black bars than this mess.

Sadly then you still get people who whine that their "screen isn't filled"- as if it's still the early 00s.

When it's done properly with a carefully chosen image, it works well. Tales of Television Centre with the mosaic tiles from main reception in the pillar boxes