2.35:1 vs 2.39:1 are my 2 favorite Aspect Ratios. This is the only video I could find on this topic. Thank you so much for the explanation. Its a subtle difference but it is a difference. All the Indiana Jones films were shot on 2.35:1 except for Raiders of the los Ark which was shot on 2.39:1
Every widescreen movie since about 1970 has been released theatrically as 2.39:1. (How they release them on home video is a different matter.) All 2.39:1 movies shot on film anamorphically can also be said to have been shot "2.35" because the way they achieved the 2.39 aspect ratio was with a slight crop in the projector at the theater, not in camera.
These types of videos are way more important for videographers than any gear video, but yeah this doesn’t push the product sales. Thank you though for giving us actual information!
That presumes that a 4:3 progression is ideal. Plus it only gives you three options. Though you get more if you use an x:3 instead of multiplying ratios by the ratio. But if we're doing that, I'd prefer x:4 or x:5 ratios. x:5 in particular gives you four VERY nice ratios, 7:5 which is extremely close to the square root of 2, 8:5 which is extremely close to the golden ratio, 10:5 which is perfect Univisium, and 11:5 which is Super Panavision 70. All of which are superior to scope and 4:3, IMO. Ironically, this system also gives you 9:5 which is very close to existing 16:9, and 12:5 which would be the equivalent of scope. If we "migrated" to this, I'd propose that 8:5 become the new IMAX ratio, with it and 7:5 generally being the intimate/character-focused ratios, 9 and 10:5 being the balanced ones, and 11 and 12:5 being the pure action/wide vista/set piece ratios. To be fair, you could also do this with x:4 ratios, but you don't get any "perfect" ratios (except 8:4(2:1), and I guess technically 7:4 is close to the square root of 3) like with the x:5 system. Same with x:3, though more people will like that since 4:3 nostalgia and 7:3 being close enough to scope(eugh...) to be acceptable. I guess the x:3 would make things really simple, though. 4:3 for classic/antique look or deep character focus/intimacy, 5:3 for IMAX and a bit more environment/action scope or character-biased "balance" between intimacy and action, 6:3 (2:1) for more action-biased balance, and 7:3 for pure action and huge, broad set pieces. Anyway, that's my overcooked thought for the day that I've been holding onto for the last three or more years. Seeya.
@@Drunken_Hamster you make some interesting points, but its not like there hase to be one set of ratios (x:5 or x:3). It's just that 4:3 was the first ratio in movies. Expressing ratios as x:1 is fairly common, maybe not as neat but its good enough and doesnt lock you in. The native ratio of cinema if i may phrase it that way is 1.90:1 as it is DCI spec and most projectors use it and RED cameras too. Therefore I would suggest imax ratio be 1.90:1 devided by 4:3. The resulting ratio is 1.422:1. Very close to square root of two. In the same spirit I would also propose kind of an ultra panavision replacement. 1.90:1 times 1.5 which is a fairly common anamorphic squeeze factor. The resulting ratio is 2.844:1 which could also be achieved by puting 2X lenses on a theoretical 1.422:1 Imax sensor. And my super panavision alternative would be 2.133:1 (I would also like smartphones to use this ratio. 3072x1440 for example) which can be achieved by cropping or shooting in 1.422:1 plus a 1.5X lens (I am aware that super panavision isnt an anamorphic format). This 2.133:1 ratio would be a companion ratio to Imax. Switching between ratios is super common in Imax movies and a switch to 2.39:1 seems a littile to extreme, but a switch to 1.90:1 isnt all that good because that ratio doesn't look the best in anamorphic and isn't as intimate as 2.39:1 in a sense that you still get that pressence feeling. So 2.133:1 is my middleground. So that is my system for aspect ratios hahahah. Lately I was wondering if 1.422:1 is too tall an have considered 1.6:1. I would love to hear your opinion on all of this, I don't get to talk about this subject often hahaha.
@@davidhrzenjak Yes, I've also considered 1.6:1 as an "even better" Imax style ratio. It also looks fairly good on TVs, quite unlike 1.33 and 2.39. That's one of my big peeves against those two. The only problem with 1.6 is that if you put a 1.5 anamorphic on it, you get 2.4, which I don't like. As far as I can tell, the human eye doesn't see ratios the same horizontally as it does vertically. 1:1 doesn't look 1:1, it looks like a slightly tall rectangle. But if you look at a 1.25:1 (5:4) image, it looks perfectly square. And 4:3 looks just an infinitesimal amount wider than square. Ironically, if you do the math, Scope calculates out to looking almost 2x as wide as it is tall, which is why it feels claustrophobic to me. But if we harken back to the golden ratio, do you know which aspect ratio "looks" (according to my 1.25 equivalency theory) 1.6x as wide as it does tall? Univisium's 2:1 ratio, that's what. And something that looks the square root of 2 (close to 1.4) wider than it does tall, is, again ironically, 1.75, which is close to 16:9. But IMO 16:9 doesn't "work" because it looks like TV, and it's a sort of "right in the middle of definitely wide, and not that wide." 5:3 (1.66) "looks" 1.33 wider than it does tall according to my equivalence theory, so that might be another nice one. Though the math starts to break down after that, TBH. If I were to just list a bunch of good-looking ratios in my opinion without going too square or too wide, while also not having the "TV ratio" effect, they'd be 3:2, 8:5, 5:3, 13:7(1.85 "flat"), 2:1, and 2.2 or 2.25:1. 1.9 just feels like a weird in-between, or even worse, like an in-between OF an in-between. 1.85 "works" because the tiny change isn't enough to notice consciously, but it differentiates subconsciously from the full 16:9 in that it doesn't feel like TV. 1.9 is enough for me to notice that there are bars, and it doesn't look either wide enough nor tall enough to be "right," and I'd rather just see it cropped to either 1.85 or a full 2:1. This... also aligns with my theory that the minimum change between A/Rs to get a different feel is 0.15 to 0.2. With .25 being stark. (The downside is the lower of those three usually gives you some uneven weird numbers for resolutions, hence me liking rounder ratios like the x:5 and x:4 system) This is why, to me, 1.43, 1.375(academy), and 1.33 all feel about the same, but when you look at 1.5(3:2) it actually starts to look a touch wider. Going back to anamorphic for a minute, I theorize that the minimum squeeze factor to be noticeably anamorphic would probably be 1.4x. This is based on observation of 1.33x not being enough and 1.5x being, essentially perfect, with 1.6x also being quite nice and the more traditional 1.8x and 2x anamorphics starting to look "too squeezed" to me. Guess which system scales perfectly with these? It's basically an inverse system pairing. If you do x:4 aspect ratios, they scale with x:5 Anamophics. IE 5:4 sensor crop with a 7:5 anamorphic gives you a 7:4 (1.75) final output. With a wider 8:5 (1.6) anamorphic, a 5:4 (1.25) sensor would give you a "perfect" (imo) 2:1 final output. test
@@Drunken_Hamster it seems that we have quite different preferences. I definately have noticed that aspect ratios look taller then they are. My 5:4 monitor looks almost square, but when i rotate it boy does it get tall. I happen to like the scope aspect ratio and the amount of black bars it has on a tv and 2X lenses, but almost cant stand 2:1. Univisium brides 1.85:1 and 2.39:1, I guess they thought it would be the best of both worlds but to me it looks cheap and neither nor if you know what I mean. I do like 2.20:1 tho.
@@davidhrzenjak Humans do be goofy and opinionated, huh? TBH, I could put up with scope more if it wasn't so overused and more movies did Flat. Very few things NEED to be scope, especially character-driven plots. If we're gonna overuse and abuse a wide ratio for everything, I'd rather it be 2:1, or at least 2.2:1, and even with 2.2, I'd want a taller ratio for intimate character stuff. Like... This might be a bad example because it wasn't a great movie or story, but TWILIGHT didn't need to be cinemascope. I've cropped it on my own with VLC media player to 2:1, and even 1.85:1 and it looks BETTER in both. The only exception is a handful of scenes (across the entire 5-movie saga, mind you) that _actually_ utilize the full-width properly. In which case... They could've just used a different aspect ratio or framed it differently and allowed the extra height to just _exist_ there.
There is movies I want to buy which say their original aspect ratio is 2.39:1 but the Blu Ray's is 2.40:1, how much of the image does this mean I am missing?
You wouldn't be missing any of the image. They're the same aspect ratio. 2.40:1 is 2.39:1 rounded up. Essentially, it is two ways of saying the same thing.
@@CallumVandenberg After making this comment, I checked the specs on IMDb like you said and it says "2.35:1" so now I am back to wondering how much this means I'd be missing again, lol. I have been researching aspect ratio and it just gets more and more confusing, do you have any advice or a good source?
My guess is that the Blu Ray is mislabelled. But it could also be that there is a slight crop on the top and bottom to convert the 2.35:1 image to 2.39:1. DVD/Blu Ray departments are not the best at preserving the director's vision. Criterion Collection excluded.
@@CallumVandenberg That's inaccurate. They're the same for all intents and purposes but some DVDs show the film as 1920 x 804 which is 2.39:1 and some DVDs show 1920 x 800 which is 2.40:1. Basically the same but they're not exactly the same. The film in a movie theater is 2.39:1 coming out of the projector but because of the matting around the screen it ends up more like 2.40:1.
Isn't 2.35:1 still commonly used? I've doubts that 2.39:1 has replaced it as a standard, formally or otherwise. Also, as a side note, I noticed recently that La La Land has an aspect ratio of 2.55:1, so I feel like now I understand why.
Cool. What's weird's that the 21:9 TV I own's 2.37 (to be in between 2.35 & 2.39), not 2.39. Yes, it's only a slight difference, but given that 2.39's way more popular, you'd think that any ultrawide TV'd be 2.39.
@@CallumVandenberg I agree. On my channel I like to make stop motion, and I've used many different ratios like 1.78, 2.35, 2.39, 2.00, and 1.66. If you'd like to check some of them out here's my playlist ruclips.net/p/PLtIG8iyW5PAa_-jleF-UBRZNvaXvO0k7J
1.85:1 is close. The black bars are barely noticeable on a 16:9 screen. I know a few filmmakers have made their films 16:9 when they're intended for streaming. Zack Snyder did this for "Army of the Dead".
Sorry for asking for basics (which should normally be included in any educational video) but when you say 2.35:1 etc what unit exactly are talking about? Are you talking millimeters, centimeters, meters, miles, pounds, kilograms, light years? I know you have a low budget that forces you to use paper and scissors and makes the use of a ruler to draw your rectangles prohibitive but you could have drawn the soundtrack optical or magnetic strips on the sides of the film frames where they belong. Also, when you talk about 2.39:1 having been introduced to hide splice lines, shouldn’t you show that too in your little drawings? Otherwise everything in the video is tip top.
TBH, they're so close it doesn't matter. And I hate "scope" anyway. So much so that I call it cinemaNOPE and will never use it if I can avoid doing so. 2:1 master race. 2.2 or 2.25 (depending on how ou set up the camera vs the lens' squeeze factor) at most.
This deserve WAYYYY more views. I swear, the number of times I've had to explain this to people in film school...!
Thanks! It's definitely a confusing topic.
2.35:1 vs 2.39:1 are my 2 favorite Aspect Ratios. This is the only video I could find on this topic. Thank you so much for the explanation. Its a subtle difference but it is a difference. All the Indiana Jones films were shot on 2.35:1 except for Raiders of the los Ark which was shot on 2.39:1
I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Every widescreen movie since about 1970 has been released theatrically as 2.39:1. (How they release them on home video is a different matter.) All 2.39:1 movies shot on film anamorphically can also be said to have been shot "2.35" because the way they achieved the 2.39 aspect ratio was with a slight crop in the projector at the theater, not in camera.
These types of videos are way more important for videographers than any gear video, but yeah this doesn’t push the product sales. Thank you though for giving us actual information!
You're welcome! I'm definitely more interested in this than gear review videos.
I think 2:35:1/Anamorphic is the most aesthetically pleasing of the aspect ratios.
This is well done and explained using papers and motion time lapse!
2.37:1 is best, I know movies dont use it but you have 4:3, 16:9 (4²:3²) AND 2.37:1 (4³:3³). It just makes sense.
That presumes that a 4:3 progression is ideal. Plus it only gives you three options. Though you get more if you use an x:3 instead of multiplying ratios by the ratio. But if we're doing that, I'd prefer x:4 or x:5 ratios. x:5 in particular gives you four VERY nice ratios, 7:5 which is extremely close to the square root of 2, 8:5 which is extremely close to the golden ratio, 10:5 which is perfect Univisium, and 11:5 which is Super Panavision 70. All of which are superior to scope and 4:3, IMO.
Ironically, this system also gives you 9:5 which is very close to existing 16:9, and 12:5 which would be the equivalent of scope. If we "migrated" to this, I'd propose that 8:5 become the new IMAX ratio, with it and 7:5 generally being the intimate/character-focused ratios, 9 and 10:5 being the balanced ones, and 11 and 12:5 being the pure action/wide vista/set piece ratios.
To be fair, you could also do this with x:4 ratios, but you don't get any "perfect" ratios (except 8:4(2:1), and I guess technically 7:4 is close to the square root of 3) like with the x:5 system. Same with x:3, though more people will like that since 4:3 nostalgia and 7:3 being close enough to scope(eugh...) to be acceptable. I guess the x:3 would make things really simple, though. 4:3 for classic/antique look or deep character focus/intimacy, 5:3 for IMAX and a bit more environment/action scope or character-biased "balance" between intimacy and action, 6:3 (2:1) for more action-biased balance, and 7:3 for pure action and huge, broad set pieces.
Anyway, that's my overcooked thought for the day that I've been holding onto for the last three or more years. Seeya.
@@Drunken_Hamster you make some interesting points, but its not like there hase to be one set of ratios (x:5 or x:3). It's just that 4:3 was the first ratio in movies. Expressing ratios as x:1 is fairly common, maybe not as neat but its good enough and doesnt lock you in. The native ratio of cinema if i may phrase it that way is 1.90:1 as it is DCI spec and most projectors use it and RED cameras too. Therefore I would suggest imax ratio be 1.90:1 devided by 4:3. The resulting ratio is 1.422:1. Very close to square root of two. In the same spirit I would also propose kind of an ultra panavision replacement. 1.90:1 times 1.5 which is a fairly common anamorphic squeeze factor. The resulting ratio is 2.844:1 which could also be achieved by puting 2X lenses on a theoretical 1.422:1 Imax sensor. And my super panavision alternative would be 2.133:1 (I would also like smartphones to use this ratio. 3072x1440 for example) which can be achieved by cropping or shooting in 1.422:1 plus a 1.5X lens (I am aware that super panavision isnt an anamorphic format). This 2.133:1 ratio would be a companion ratio to Imax. Switching between ratios is super common in Imax movies and a switch to 2.39:1 seems a littile to extreme, but a switch to 1.90:1 isnt all that good because that ratio doesn't look the best in anamorphic and isn't as intimate as 2.39:1 in a sense that you still get that pressence feeling. So 2.133:1 is my middleground. So that is my system for aspect ratios hahahah. Lately I was wondering if 1.422:1 is too tall an have considered 1.6:1. I would love to hear your opinion on all of this, I don't get to talk about this subject often hahaha.
@@davidhrzenjak Yes, I've also considered 1.6:1 as an "even better" Imax style ratio. It also looks fairly good on TVs, quite unlike 1.33 and 2.39. That's one of my big peeves against those two. The only problem with 1.6 is that if you put a 1.5 anamorphic on it, you get 2.4, which I don't like.
As far as I can tell, the human eye doesn't see ratios the same horizontally as it does vertically. 1:1 doesn't look 1:1, it looks like a slightly tall rectangle. But if you look at a 1.25:1 (5:4) image, it looks perfectly square. And 4:3 looks just an infinitesimal amount wider than square. Ironically, if you do the math, Scope calculates out to looking almost 2x as wide as it is tall, which is why it feels claustrophobic to me.
But if we harken back to the golden ratio, do you know which aspect ratio "looks" (according to my 1.25 equivalency theory) 1.6x as wide as it does tall? Univisium's 2:1 ratio, that's what. And something that looks the square root of 2 (close to 1.4) wider than it does tall, is, again ironically, 1.75, which is close to 16:9. But IMO 16:9 doesn't "work" because it looks like TV, and it's a sort of "right in the middle of definitely wide, and not that wide."
5:3 (1.66) "looks" 1.33 wider than it does tall according to my equivalence theory, so that might be another nice one. Though the math starts to break down after that, TBH.
If I were to just list a bunch of good-looking ratios in my opinion without going too square or too wide, while also not having the "TV ratio" effect, they'd be 3:2, 8:5, 5:3, 13:7(1.85 "flat"), 2:1, and 2.2 or 2.25:1.
1.9 just feels like a weird in-between, or even worse, like an in-between OF an in-between. 1.85 "works" because the tiny change isn't enough to notice consciously, but it differentiates subconsciously from the full 16:9 in that it doesn't feel like TV. 1.9 is enough for me to notice that there are bars, and it doesn't look either wide enough nor tall enough to be "right," and I'd rather just see it cropped to either 1.85 or a full 2:1.
This... also aligns with my theory that the minimum change between A/Rs to get a different feel is 0.15 to 0.2. With .25 being stark. (The downside is the lower of those three usually gives you some uneven weird numbers for resolutions, hence me liking rounder ratios like the x:5 and x:4 system)
This is why, to me, 1.43, 1.375(academy), and 1.33 all feel about the same, but when you look at 1.5(3:2) it actually starts to look a touch wider.
Going back to anamorphic for a minute, I theorize that the minimum squeeze factor to be noticeably anamorphic would probably be 1.4x. This is based on observation of 1.33x not being enough and 1.5x being, essentially perfect, with 1.6x also being quite nice and the more traditional 1.8x and 2x anamorphics starting to look "too squeezed" to me. Guess which system scales perfectly with these? It's basically an inverse system pairing. If you do x:4 aspect ratios, they scale with x:5 Anamophics. IE 5:4 sensor crop with a 7:5 anamorphic gives you a 7:4 (1.75) final output. With a wider 8:5 (1.6) anamorphic, a 5:4 (1.25) sensor would give you a "perfect" (imo) 2:1 final output.
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@@Drunken_Hamster it seems that we have quite different preferences. I definately have noticed that aspect ratios look taller then they are. My 5:4 monitor looks almost square, but when i rotate it boy does it get tall. I happen to like the scope aspect ratio and the amount of black bars it has on a tv and 2X lenses, but almost cant stand 2:1. Univisium brides 1.85:1 and 2.39:1, I guess they thought it would be the best of both worlds but to me it looks cheap and neither nor if you know what I mean. I do like 2.20:1 tho.
@@davidhrzenjak Humans do be goofy and opinionated, huh? TBH, I could put up with scope more if it wasn't so overused and more movies did Flat. Very few things NEED to be scope, especially character-driven plots.
If we're gonna overuse and abuse a wide ratio for everything, I'd rather it be 2:1, or at least 2.2:1, and even with 2.2, I'd want a taller ratio for intimate character stuff.
Like... This might be a bad example because it wasn't a great movie or story, but TWILIGHT didn't need to be cinemascope. I've cropped it on my own with VLC media player to 2:1, and even 1.85:1 and it looks BETTER in both.
The only exception is a handful of scenes (across the entire 5-movie saga, mind you) that _actually_ utilize the full-width properly. In which case... They could've just used a different aspect ratio or framed it differently and allowed the extra height to just _exist_ there.
I recently view that the 4k star wars Disney releases are 2.39 and the fox are marked as 2.35 and I got confused, so thanks a lot.
You're welcome!
thank you very much for the information, a hug from Portugal
You're most welcome!
Thanks. This easy for understand that I want!
You're welcome.
There is movies I want to buy which say their original aspect ratio is 2.39:1 but the Blu Ray's is 2.40:1, how much of the image does this mean I am missing?
You wouldn't be missing any of the image. They're the same aspect ratio. 2.40:1 is 2.39:1 rounded up. Essentially, it is two ways of saying the same thing.
@@CallumVandenberg After making this comment, I checked the specs on IMDb like you said and it says "2.35:1" so now I am back to wondering how much this means I'd be missing again, lol. I have been researching aspect ratio and it just gets more and more confusing, do you have any advice or a good source?
My guess is that the Blu Ray is mislabelled. But it could also be that there is a slight crop on the top and bottom to convert the 2.35:1 image to 2.39:1. DVD/Blu Ray departments are not the best at preserving the director's vision. Criterion Collection excluded.
@@CallumVandenberg That's inaccurate. They're the same for all intents and purposes but some DVDs show the film as 1920 x 804 which is 2.39:1 and some DVDs show 1920 x 800 which is 2.40:1. Basically the same but they're not exactly the same. The film in a movie theater is 2.39:1 coming out of the projector but because of the matting around the screen it ends up more like 2.40:1.
Informative
tHANKS! is a 2.40 or 2.35 screen best if width is an issue (speakers on both sides)
They're pretty close in size, so the difference wouldn't be that dramatic. But technically 2.40 would be slightly wider than 2.35.
i see. thanks for sharing!
Isn't 2.35:1 still commonly used?
I've doubts that 2.39:1 has replaced it as a standard, formally or otherwise.
Also, as a side note, I noticed recently that La La Land has an aspect ratio of 2.55:1, so I feel like now I understand why.
2.35 is not as commonly used at people think. The majority of the time that a movie is labeled to have “2.35” it really is a mistake
So, 2.35 usually's 2.39?
@@nathanpollard1223 from the research i’ve done that seems to be the case. I believe “2.40:1” is also a mislabeled 2.39:1
Cool. What's weird's that the 21:9 TV I own's 2.37 (to be in between 2.35 & 2.39), not 2.39.
Yes, it's only a slight difference, but given that 2.39's way more popular, you'd think that any ultrawide TV'd be 2.39.
sooo good thank you!!
Awesome video. I love aspect ratios, especially the cinemascope ones.
Thanks! I find aspect ratios to be an incredibly interesting topic. Especially since there are so many that have been used throughout film history.
@@CallumVandenberg I agree. On my channel I like to make stop motion, and I've used many different ratios like 1.78, 2.35, 2.39, 2.00, and 1.66. If you'd like to check some of them out here's my playlist
ruclips.net/p/PLtIG8iyW5PAa_-jleF-UBRZNvaXvO0k7J
What aspect ratio was used for this video?
I think I used a 2.39:1 aspect ratio for this video.
Why cant movies just be made in 16:9 these days as all the home viewer wants is no black bars , how hard can it be.
1.85:1 is close. The black bars are barely noticeable on a 16:9 screen. I know a few filmmakers have made their films 16:9 when they're intended for streaming. Zack Snyder did this for "Army of the Dead".
Which is aspect ratio on this video ?
You know I had actually forgotten and had to go back and check. It's a 2.35:1 aspect ratio.
is it 2:35:1 ??🤔
Are you talking about the aspect ratio of this video? If so, yes it is!
@@CallumVandenberg yes and thnks for that info its helps me a lot😄
How come that 2.39:1 and 2.40:1 is the same but 2.35:1 and 2.39:1 are not the same?
2.39:1 and 2.40:1 are two ways of describing the same aspect ratio. 2.35:1 is a different aspect ratio altogether.
Sorry for asking for basics (which should normally be included in any educational video) but when you say 2.35:1 etc what unit exactly are talking about? Are you talking millimeters, centimeters, meters, miles, pounds, kilograms, light years?
I know you have a low budget that forces you to use paper and scissors and makes the use of a ruler to draw your rectangles prohibitive but you could have drawn the soundtrack optical or magnetic strips on the sides of the film frames where they belong. Also, when you talk about 2.39:1 having been introduced to hide splice lines, shouldn’t you show that too in your little drawings? Otherwise everything in the video is tip top.
TBH, they're so close it doesn't matter. And I hate "scope" anyway. So much so that I call it cinemaNOPE and will never use it if I can avoid doing so. 2:1 master race. 2.2 or 2.25 (depending on how ou set up the camera vs the lens' squeeze factor) at most.
thanks!
Berry ice