BBC News still uses 4:3. Looks amateurish.

I think it depends on the TV, if the TV upscales well yes it looks good but if not no.
Also smaller TVs will show SD better than larger TVs, so a small HD LCD bedroom TV with built in freeview will look ok for SD especially if you aren't too close.
A large HD ready model for your lounge will likely look rubbish at SD. Full HD slightly better especially if its got freeview HD built in.

BBC news isn't 4:3 safe, I tried downscaling, centre cropping then outputting to an old 4:3 TV and it cut off the edges.
Its definitely a generous 14:9 safe, but the ticker on the news channel does at least come in from the very right hand side and on the left the bar goes beyond the BBC news logo right the left hand side.

This is a thing i always look out for. However on some archival programs I watch, there tends to be a mix or current HD 16:9 and 4:3 footage and I notice on some of the older footage the black bars change thickness, sometimes it is a little bigger, sometimes smaller. I think maybe sometimes they stretch the picture but why?


I also like DOGS in the areas to the side when 4:3 footage is shown. I get annoyed on the SD TCM channel because their DOG just hangs over the safe zone yet on older programs like Gunsmoke, i guess it must have been made with black bars at the side, it blends in with their own black bars so the TCM logo is complletely in that area and not hanging over onto the picture.

If I set a box to output in 4:3 mode then it doesn't chop anything off. Granted it's close to the edge and could be a victim of overscan but it still counts as 4:3 safe to me.

When they insert old 4:3 footage into new programs, they will crop as much as they can so that the black bars are less. They never stretch it unless they are a bad broadcaster (very low budget or something).

Regarding DOGs I believe that if the dog moves over to the safe area then its because they are using the same feed.
Either there is two playouts and the HD playout will take a feed from the SD playout to Upscale SD programs (I believe channel5 do this).
Or there is one feed and they use AFDs to create a second downscaled feed for the SD channel (BBC do this I believe).
I assume that in the latter example the AFDs uesd to create the SD channel will also control where the HD DOG goes.

As a side note I presume in the first example with two playouts, that the SD playout will take a feed of the downscaled HD playout.

The TV I used is only about 15 years old so overscan isn't like say early TVs and by my book if the overscan cuts it off on a TV like that its not in 4:3 safe areas!

Time to get a new TV
WS has been out for a long time I had one back in 1999

Probably depends on the TV's internal design. Some of the earlier digital TVs had an ON digital box literally shoved in the back with a SCART cable connecting it internally, so it would make no difference.

A SCART-connected box using RGB and a quality SCART cable is pretty much as good as it gets for SD anyway

Modern TVs would have the tuner and decoding hardware connected digitally to the display processor - so the result isn't really any different from having an HDMI connected set top box.

The point I was really making is that an IDTV would handle aspect ratio switching correctly, guaranteed, whereas a set top box needs to be configured. I don't miss the days of going to a pub or someone's house and watching everything in "stretchyvision" or "slitvision" where the box is on 4:3 and the TV is set to stretch or zoom - and if you made any attempt to correct it they'd say "no, this is how I like it"

BBC News is still 4:3 (Or 12:9)
Its right on the edge but its still 4:3 and there is zero need for that in 2015

Doesn't really matter as that channel looks like to be moved online under the next BBC cuts.

I doubt it if they can help it, BBC 4 and local radio look like the more likely candidates for cuts, along with merging the kids channels perhaps?

Transmission of the News channel as an actual channel can't be that much when they would still need all the production staff and news room ECT for it to be an online stream.

About time this happened.

Why have the rest of us had to put up with broadcasters pandering to the technophobes for so bleeding long?

I'm with you on this. Fortunately the BBC is posting its captions in the 4:3 safe area during their coverage of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships, so when we carry on watching a match in the kitchen while we eat our evening meal, at least we can still keep up with the score!

http://www.a516digital.com/2015/07/a...e-will-be.html

I can certainly see BBC Four going and its time BBC kids channels were merged!
Local radio is going to get hammered and possibly some national services too!

Back to the topic, no, 4:3 shouldn't be in use at all in 2015. Zero need for it!!

Maybe increase overscan or choose Zoom/14:9/4:3 picture modes?

But the captions on Wimbledon aren't 4:3 safe, at least not on the highlights on BBC 2. Even on 14:9, the first letter is chopped off of the players names. For example, Murray read "urray" in 14:9 and proably "ay" in 4:3 :/

Can't see local radio being touched. It's textbook public service broadcasting and a market the commercial sector has mostly abandoned (some parts of the country still have actual local radio, rather than Global's version of "local radio" which comes from London, but often it's only the BBC that does local non-music programming)

BBC Four could be argued to be the same. It is exactly why the BBC gets guaranteed funding. If it wants to become ITV without ads then it shouldn't deserve the licence fee

You're correct it definitely isn't 4:3 safe, at least not 4:3 overscan safe.

This is BBC News in Centre Cut Out on my old 4:3 tv: http://i1147.photobucket.com/albums/...825_162346.jpg

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B56...ew?usp=sharing




This in in 14:9 compromise mode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B56...ew?usp=sharing


https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B56...ew?usp=sharing

As you can see the graphics appear 14:9 safe on my tv not 4:3 safe.


This is in 16:9 letterbox mode: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B56...ew?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B56...ew?usp=sharing


The graphics still look fine in 16:9 with a little blank space to the left and right which is WHY I can't understand why so many of you apparently can't stand 4:3 graphics when I bet the vast majority don't notice any difference or don't care. The average person doesn't care where graphics are on-screen as long as they are visible. The next time you watch a football match at the pub try asking your friends where the scorebar should be or whether the graphics should stretch right to the edge of the screen or be more central. I bet they won't care or won't even understand what you're talking about.

What are you talking about

I see Sky News on a 16:9 tv every day while I'm queuing up for lunch at the Cafeteria. The graphics go pretty much right to the edge and look fine (though in my opinion they'd look fine in 4:3 too). What are you all complaining about???

I went to a friends house for a party the other day and in the Living room they had a 4:3 tv no bigger than 20 inches. I didn't get to watch it as they just played music through it (through CD's through the DVD player).

I felt better when I knew someone near me was still clinging on to a 4:3 tv as their main set.

I guess I'm not the only one who still has a 4:3 tv! I bet there are still many more tucked away than we think!!

Wouldn't you're idea mean that those with 4:3 TV's would get black borders all around the picture when watching a 4:3 broadcast? And that people couldn't stretch or zoom the picture to fill their widescreen sets? Sounds like a breach of viewers freedom to me.

all digital boxes have widescreen so even on old tv the widescreen works and just means black bars top and bottom of screen, does not make viewing worse off.
i hate the logos in top middle of screen it is a totall annoyance, dont mind logos is they far left where they should be

No not true. I used a small 16:9 flatscreen Hanspree tv on holiday and the picture wasn't that great.......