Comments on: Aspect Ratio Lunacy

By: Adam

Adam — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:06:03 +0000

I emailed CNN tech support about this issue. In my conversation with Kyle, he didn’t even know what I was talking about at first because he had gotten used to seeing it!

I submitted a question to CNN’s tech support asking why my player image is stretched into widescreen. Here is our conversation, starting with Kyle’s reply to my initial inquiry:

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June 23, 2009
Adam,

It should be in widescreen format. Do other sites stretch the aspect ratio as well? Have you removed previous versions of Flash?

Kyle
CNN.com Tech Support

Full View
Re: TTS Helpdesk Ticket: 2495381

Hi Kyle– thanks for writing back. I noticed that for a short while Youtube did the same thing (stretching the 4:3 aspect ration to fit a 16:9 player window) but they fixed the software on their end and it subsequently played correctly on my PC.

I’m very good about keeping my software up to date, so it’s not a flash player issue. Incidentally, this same thing happens both at my home PC and my work PC (which our IT department maintains). I’m at my work PC now… I’ve attached a screenshot for you comparing two similar shots of Dr. Gupta…. the screenshot on the top is how my PC at home plays it as well.

Adam

One more thing, Kyle–

Look at this second image I’ve attached… notice that the CNN logo on the 16:9 player is not stretched and distorted the way Dr Gupta’s image is. The CNN logo in the 16:9 image It is the same size (proportionally) as the 4:3 Youtube video.

This says to me that the image distortion/stretch is coming from CNN.com and is not a user software issue.

Let me know what you find out

Thanks,
Adam

Adam,

Is this happening with all of our video? Can you send a link to the video it is occuring with?

Kyle

Yes, this happens on all the videos. Here is just one example

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/bestoftv/2009/06/24/ac.shot.tues.cnn

Adam

Adam,

I see what you are talking about now. I suppose I just became accustomed to the way it looked after watching it for so long! I don’t think I’ll be able to do anything for you, as this is the ratio the producers are uploading. I wish I had a better fix/solution, but I really can’t do anything. I can put the complaint in.

Kyle

Oh no! When the IT guys have gotten used to viewing distorted images, what hope is there for the rest of us?

I understand it when people stretch images to fit their wide LCD/plasma screens to avoid burn in. I think this is why people aren’t bothered by CNN.com video– they’re used to seeing it at home), but it seems kind of silly when a software based media player without a fixed screen size does the same thing.

However, now I understand that you’re just streaming the content that the producers are providing in an already distorted format. But it is again kind of silly since CNN is already broadcasting in widescreen 16:9 HD, why aren’t they just providing you with 16:9 native footage?? I guess that’s not a question you’ve got the answer to, but it does seem a little absurd, don’t you agree?

Yes, please do register my complaint with the appropriate people (and spread my jpegs around the IT dept so more people see what’s happening . I very much appreciate it.

Thanks Kyle
Adam

Hey Kyle,

Just one more message and then I’ll go back into my distorted viewing corner

I found this article from 2007 (click here) which specifically cites the aspect ratio problem, and cites CNN.com specifically. So it appears that CNN.com has been doing this for quite a long time. The author illustrates precisely my point, but with the same picture. Seen side by side, the difference is pretty staggering. There’s no reason the producers should be distorting digital media like this.

OK, thanks again… I look forward to the day that cnn.com becomes stops stretching their 4:3 square peg into a 16:9 round hole!

Adam Levbarg
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No further response.

It is as the previous poster “Anonymous Coward” said…. if you’re in a sports bar and they’ve got the image distorted, it’s annoying but understandable. When it’s a major multinational media conglomerate, WHAT in the WORLD could they be thinking?

By: Jimmy

Jimmy — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 14:48:47 +0000

I was looking at my girlfriend’s laptop from an extreme angle when she was watching some CNN video and for a brief second I thought they fixed it. NOPE! Come on, CNN. Your video player is out of date and your aspect ratio has been crap for YEARS now… get with the program!

By: Anonymous Coward

Anonymous Coward — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 04:59:54 +0000

It is now two years since this blog post and CNN has still not fixed it. While stretching 4:3 content to fill an entire 16:9 display is to be expected at pubs where the A/V clue is near zero, I am shocked that a media company has let this go on for so long.

By: Andrei State

Andrei State — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 08:59:33 +0000

About those idiotic CNN videos: amusingly enough, the commercials that come with them are shown w/o distortion; the advertising industry obviously couldn’t sell much stuff with fat people. But what is amazing to me is that people like, say, their news anchors do not feel “misrepresented” and complain about it. Surely at least half of them must be vain enough to do so. After all, who wants to look fat? But the fact that this does not happen must mean that most people are indeed clueless. Or at least, that vain people are clueless. Now it all makes sense.

By: Jodi

Jodi — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 06:40:12 +0000

I would be willing to bet money that CNN just takes the original stretched video and drops it on the web site without any thought whatsoever. I’d also bet that there are a handful of people who work there and are really irked by it, but no one else cares, so they won’t do anything. Having worked for a couple of media organizations, I can say without a doubt that any mistake, however egregious, is 9 times out of ten the result of someone not paying attention, not caring, or not knowing how else to do it.

By: suv4x4

suv4x4 — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 18:56:40 +0000

I came to this post by googling for “cnn aspect ratio” since I also couldn’t comprehend the reason CNN’s online video is so badly stretched.

Compensation does happen since we often view our TV-s at odd angles where the ratio is not what we perceive it as.

That said it doesn’t make the choice to plain out stretch the video in this way much less horrible (only a bit less horrible).

Even weirder is this: notice the text and CNN logo are overlayed at square ratio.

It looks like this was a decision at CNN so they can transmit wide screen video on cable, and now all their archives are pre-stretched like that, hence this is how they publish it online.

I pray it’s just an artifact of transitional period as you do, and hope they’ll get it right within 1-2 years.

By: anonymous snowboarder

anonymous snowboarder — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 00:13:09 +0000

great to see some discussion of pixel aspect ratios! Just to toss out another oddity many may not know, most dvds cut out up to 10% of the available picture. This is because of another tie to analog tv – overscan. Because of inconsistencies in quality and differences between manufacturers, the video that was transmitted was bigger than the displayable area (search around for a more detailed explanation). The next time you watch a dvd, grab the controller and play with your zoom button (shrink it).

By: Gareth

Gareth — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 14:27:58 +0000

The only reason I can think of it that at some point in the near future CNN intends to go HD & thus Widescreen – and that they took the decision to hardcode their flash to 16:9 in a future-proofing we can’t quite be bothered why.

As for #29, there’s an awful lot of thought that went into the standards that have driven TV for many years, PAL was especially clever (as a european I have to say that). There’s never been anything stopping you use square pixels with MPEG1 or 2, and indeed non-square pixels on H264. Yes non-square pixels are an oddity, but HDTV was the right time to phase them out, given what MPEG1 and 2 were designed for, it’s not surprising that they supported non-square pixels and aspect ratios. In the UK the main broadcasters are actually very good at making sure their video is signalled correctly.

Don’t act like IT people have all the answers please, because in reality a lot of the failures you get on TV are not about broadcast equipment failing, but the computers that control them failing.

By: rillian

rillian — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 05:55:23 +0000

It’s nice to hear I’m not the only one with this pet peeve.

I assume it’s mostly to do with “getting your money’s worth with that wide screen”. I’ve been in several hotels recently with new 16:9 LCD televisions, but with 4:3 cable feeds. The irony is that the tv has an “autodetect aspect ratio” setting which worked properly, but the power-on default was “stretch to fit”.

Most people are used to watching movies letterboxed now; I wonder if they’ll get used to “barndoors” on older tv shows in another twenty years.

By: Stu Savory

Stu Savory — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 13:58:52 +0000

I think it is even more amazing that by just changing the aspect ratio in your two pictures, the car in the background changed from black to white