Fighter pilot, Royal Navy 1945, Hydrographer Iraq 1947-52 India 1952-53, Canadian Hydrographic Arctic explorer 1953-1960, Writer-producer Canadian National Film Board 1961-72, Freelance journalist, audio-visual producer 1972-2009, National Press Club of Canada 1961 - 2006

Friday, January 22, 2010

Adjusting to de luxe television technology


Watching movies on my wide screen HDTV


Watching television, if done for relaxation, like reading a book or magazine, surfing the internet or playing solitaire, is best enjoyed as a solitary occupation.

Even among close household members, interests and tastes vary so widely that few family groups can seldom watch the same TV presentation with equal appreciation.

So that makes me wonder. Why are the new HDTV home sets, advertised as ‘Home Entertainment Centres’, getting so monstrously large, with some screens now measuring almost five feet across?

When I watch my 23” television screen I sit about ten feet away from it.

And that’s just fine. I can see the whole screen.

But If I were to have a 60” TV I’d have problems.

I would be unable to watch the entire screen at the same time. So if I were watching a movie I would have to keep my eyes going from side to side as if I was at Wimbledon watching a tennis match. But then I would miss not only the action in the middle but also any action occurring on the opposite side during the moments in which I was looking at the other side.

So if I had such a large TV I would have to watch my movie three times.

During the first run through I would concentrate on the left hand side of the screen. On the second run through I would look exclusively at the right hand 24” of the screen and finally I would have to run the whole caboodle through again and concentrate only on the middle 24" of screen. Then I could marry the three separate viewings together mentally and so get the full gist of the movie as a whole.

But this would call for a drastic time-consuming alteration to my TV viewing procedures.

It would be very confusing.

Unless of course I was watching an actual tennis match being broadcast from centre-court at Wimbledon.

Especially say, a match between Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova. Then it would be just fine. I could let my whole head swivel back and forth. Very naturally.

And exceedingly realistic.




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