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Pan and Scan
- 100 statements
- 18 feature instances
- 16 referencing feature instances
| Pan and Scan | type |
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Modification of a widescreen movie to fit the (now older) TV Aspect Ratio of 4:3, or the (current norm) HDTV aspect ratio of 16:9. This is done by isolating a viewing window within the original frame, then cutting and "panning" said window back and forth to follow the action on the screen; this has the natural side effect of "slicing off" a large portion of the original frame (up to 50 or 60 percent). This practice was common in The '80s and The '90s when movies were released on VHS and Betamax and TVs had smaller screens. As home video became more common in the '80s, film directors would take pan and scan into account when framing shots even in widescreen. Completely CGI productions like those from Pixar could simply be re-framed and re-rendered for the 4:3 home video release. LaserDisc used to be primarily Pan and Scan, too, but starting in the late '80s, it started releasing letterbox versions of every widescreen film available. It was seen as the premium format of movie buffs and A/V geeks. The VHS format would later follow suit, with movies featuring rare widescreen releases on tape oriented for videophiles. LaserDisc remained far more reliable for finding letterbox movies, and most VHS films were Pan and Scan "full screen" releases for the broader public. Pan and Scan is still used today for some films when shown on TV channels, though letterbox movies on TV are more common than they used to be thanks to the advent of High Definition. Since the pan looks entirely unlike a camera move, it can be very jarring for the viewer. Pan and Scan also has minor troubles whenever it encounters a Widescreen Shot in a movie, having to pan across it or picking one little part. With the growing acceptance of the 16:9 (or 'letterbox') ratio, publishers have differentiated the formats with pan and scan being marketed as "full screen" while letterboxed editions are "widescreen" (though as of 2017, you'll only find full screen films to purchase in store discount bins for stock manufactured at least a decade ago and still not sold). For many directors, this was also something of a minor (or major) Berserk Button, since this means a technician has to, according to some, redirect the film, and will frequently lose either important details, or the ambiance of a scene or a whole movie. Turner Classic Movies (TCM) made a quick documentary with several famous directors talking about the downside of pan and scan (it's only 5 minutes, give it a watch). Because of how ubiquitous Pan and Scan was and how much of a problem it was for both videophiles and filmmakers, many directors adopted the practice of shooting movies in "Open Matte" format, in which a film is shot in a full-frame aspect ratio but designed to be cropped to a widescreen format in the theater. Thus, movies could be screened to audiences in an intended widescreen format, but be un-cropped to 4:3 on both TV broadcasts and home media releases without needing to be given the Pan and Scan treatment.note 1In the silent era, the full 35mm film frame was exactly 4:3, assuming you use the standard four perfs per frame. The addition of sound-on-film tracks made the image slightly narrower to 6:5 (1.19:1) Movietone ratio. The film was then matted slightly shorter to Academy Ratio (11:8 or 1.375:1), which is very close to 4:3 (1.333:1), as illustrated here. The difference is so small that it's generally considered inconsequential except by only the most extreme videophiles.note 2In many movies shot this way, VFX shots would have a "hard matte", meaning the widescreen theatrical frame is the most you can get. Showing these in open matte will reveal an Aspect Ratio Switch. These shots had to be pan and scanned for full screen releases.note 3This practice of 35mm with widescreen safe areas is older than home video, as On the Waterfront was shot in the same way so it could look good on older Academy Ratio screens and newer wide screens in The '50s. It could be shown in Academy Ratio, 1.85:1, or anywhere in between. This video essay explains in more detail. The extra image area can cause problems when done carelessly, such as revealing filming equipment that was just outside of the theatrical framing, and can aesthetically mess with a shot's composition. The most notable director to make use of this technique was Stanley Kubrick, who used it for his last three movies (as they were produced when VHS and television broadcasts of films had already become commonplace) and even mandated in his will that open matte transfers be used for posthumous home media releases of all of his movies (which were shot in full-frame and cropped to widescreen in theaters even before he started consciously using the Open Matte technique) just to prevent any horizontal detail from being lost. Later home media releases made after the mass adoption of widescreen at home reverted back to a widescreen-friendly aspect ratio. An alternative compromise that was popular for television in Turn of the Millennium and The New '10s is "shoot and protect", whereby important details are framed within a 4:3 "safe area" in the middle of a 16:9 image. This allows the final product to be watchable when center-cropped to 4:3, with the creative limitation that a shot's focus can't stray too far from the middle of the frame. This is distinct from open matte, because here the "opened up" version uses the intended framing and does not have extraneous details. Before analogue broadcasts were shut down, the BBC would protect its widescreen programs for 14:9 instead, with the 4:3 feed having both minor cropping and thin letterboxes. Pan and Scan started to decline in the 2000s, with DVD credited with killing it off for goodnote Pan and Scan DVDs exist, but were only made in the early days of the format, and typically for movies aimed at younger viewers; studios would often make widescreen versions available alongside pan and scan versions. DVD has an anamorphic widescreen mode, which is the innovation that killed Pan and Scan. The way it works is that a movie can letterboxed to 16:9 instead of 4:3, which provides more pixels to the movie and fewer to the letterbox. It is squeezed into the 720x480 resolution of the DVD, with the player unsqueezing it for playback based on the display width, allowing the picture to maintain image quality regardless of the monitor's aspect ratio As it is with acceptance of 16:9 screensnote 16:9 was chosen as a compromise ratio. 4:3 and Cinemascope, the two most common extremes in aspect ratio, will both take up 75% of the screen when letterboxed. and the fact that both formats are priced the same, pan and scan has seriously declined in popularity, with letterboxing being seen as more "classy"; plus it doesn't lop off the rest of the screen. As 16:9 sets became the dominant aspect ratio, some TV shows that were originally shot in 4:3 have been "remastered" for HD by cropping them to 16:9; this introduces a lot of the same problems of pan and scan, namely losing important parts of the picture. Contrast Letterbox, Open Matte, Visual Compression, and Widescreen Shot. Similar to Screen Crunch in video games. Not to be confused with Stan & Pan, the names under which Laurel and Hardy are known in Hungary. |
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| Pan and Scan | fetched |
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| Pan and Scan | parsed |
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| Pan and Scan | processingComment |
Dropped link to Letterbox: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
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Dropped link to SexStartsStoryStops: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
| Pan and Scan | processingComment |
Dropped link to VisibleBoomMic: Not an Item - FEATURE | |
| Pan and Scan | isPartOf |
DBTropes | |
| Pan and Scan / int_13652756 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_13652756 | comment |
Another obvious example is a moment in Finding Nemo during the Aquascum scene. When a female patient with a skirt enters the dentist office, her legs are visible in the fullscreen version, but not in widescreen. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_13652756 | featureApplicability |
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| Finding Nemo | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_14cb9f30 | type |
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| Pan and Scan / int_14cb9f30 | comment |
One of the most obvious examples of this is a particular scene from A Bug's Life where they show two young ants climbing up a leaf: in the original widescreen version, you couldn't see the second ant at all, but in the fullscreen version, you actually do. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_14cb9f30 | featureApplicability |
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| A Bug's Life | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_25124728 | type |
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| Pan and Scan / int_25124728 | comment |
Played straight with most Disney animated films, but inverted in Brother Bear where the film actually starts out in fullscreen, but switches to widescreen just right after Kenai turns into a bear. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_25124728 | featureApplicability |
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| Brother Bear | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_261c8d3f | type |
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| Pan and Scan / int_261c8d3f | comment |
When every episode of The Simpsons was marathoned on FXX, the pre-season 20 episodes were cropped like this, rather than being pillarboxed as they were on prior airings and streaming platforms. This led to a lot of visual gags being completely cut out of the frame, and when these versions began streaming on Disney+, there was enough public outcry that Disney+ added a 4:3 option five months later. | |
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| The Simpsons | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_3aeb1c75 | type |
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| Pan and Scan / int_3aeb1c75 | comment |
For the Dragon Ball franchise, this trait is one of the biggest points of contention against Funimation's "remasters" of Dragon Ball Z for DVD and Blu-Ray, mainly stemming from the perception that it is both unnecessary and awkward compared to the original 4:3 footage (the releases of Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball GT weren't cropped). Sadly, Toei Animation themselves followed this approach when making Dragon Ball Z Kai: The Final Chapters to adhere to Japanese broadcast standards, as it was cheaper to do that than to also make a separate uncropped version for the home release. Inverted regarding widescreen releases of the classic Dragon Ball films: while they were originally animated in 4:3 for TV broadcasts, they were composed to still work when cropped to a widescreen aspect ratio, which is how they were screened in cinemas. Toei did the same for The Transformers: The Movie and the Sailor Moon R and Sailor Moon S movies. |
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| Pan and Scan / int_3aeb1c75 | featureApplicability |
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| Dragon Ball (Franchise) | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_4c4e08ca | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_4c4e08ca | comment |
Parodied in a sketch of The Benny Hill Show in which a technician attempting to pan and scan a movie in real time manages to miss all of the important details. Same kind of thing, but not a parody. The operator apparently forgot the "pan" part and simply took the center of the scene. |
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| Pan and Scan / int_4c4e08ca | featureApplicability |
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| The Benny Hill Show | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_5db577ba | type |
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| Pan and Scan / int_5db577ba | comment |
The Full-Screen DVD of The Dark Knight shows the IMAX scenes in Open Matte, while the scenes filmed in Panavision (anamorphic) 35mm are pan and scan. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_5db577ba | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_5db577ba | featureConfidence |
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| The Dark Knight | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_6e17a0d1 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_6e17a0d1 | comment |
The Die Hard DVD contains a featurette giving a very good illustration of the differences between letterbox, "centre-scan" and pan-and-scan. | |
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| Die Hard | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_73cdb697 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_73cdb697 | comment |
The HD remasters of Resident Evil Remake and Resident Evil 0 use vertical cropping and tilt & scan that follows the player in their widescreen modes, which can obscure important objects. Luckily, the original 4:3 display is still available as an option via Letterboxing. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_73cdb697 | featureApplicability |
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| ResidentEvil | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_7a8e5c7e | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_7a8e5c7e | comment |
Inverted regarding widescreen releases of the classic Dragon Ball films: while they were originally animated in 4:3 for TV broadcasts, they were composed to still work when cropped to a widescreen aspect ratio, which is how they were screened in cinemas. Toei did the same for The Transformers: The Movie and the Sailor Moon R and Sailor Moon S movies. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_7a8e5c7e | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
| Pan and Scan / int_7a8e5c7e | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
| The Transformers: The Movie | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_98a0a468 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_98a0a468 | comment |
The initial home video release of The Black Hole was pan-and-scanned to anamorphic 1.78:1 as opposed to 1.33:1, resulting in a full picture if you unsqueezed it on a widescreen tv. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_98a0a468 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_98a0a468 | featureConfidence |
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| The Black Hole | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_a660fd96 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_a660fd96 | comment |
While Avengers: Endgame was largely filmed in an open matte 1.90:1 aspect ratio for IMAX, and cropped vertically to 2.39:1 for general exhibition, repurposed footage from Thor: The Dark World was cropped horizontally in the IMAX release (though retaining its original aspect ratio in the general release), as the latter film was shot in Panavision. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_a660fd96 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_a660fd96 | featureConfidence |
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| Avengers: Endgame | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_adb73758 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_adb73758 | comment |
The Spanish Blu-Ray of Highlander: The Source proves that this trope lives on in the HD era, cropping the 2.39:1 image to 1.78:1, on top of heavy compression that would be unforgivable for a single-layer DVD. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_adb73758 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_adb73758 | featureConfidence |
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| Highlander: The Source | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_d14c3aa1 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_d14c3aa1 | comment |
In the commentary for Ghostbusters (1984), during the lobby scene at the Sedgwick Hotel, Harold Ramis laments that he's frequently chopped out of the picture entirely in pan-and-scan presentations due to his not having many lines in that shot. This actually cuts out the main joke of the scene, that he's silently feeding Bill Murray's character the numbers. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_d14c3aa1 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_d14c3aa1 | featureConfidence |
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| Ghostbusters (1984) | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_d66ef045 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_d66ef045 | comment |
Atlantis: The Lost Empire has a particularly annoying case of this in its DVD release (Especially the European release), especially because it touted its letterbox format and beautiful, sweeping panorama-esque sets as something of a selling point...Only for it to be presented with a tiny aspect ratio of 1.33:1. The worst case of this is a couple of dialogue scenes, for example the discussion between Rourke and Helga discuss the difference to the plan to sell the Heart of Atlantis, where the camera has to very awkwardly cut back-and-forth between two people standing right next to each other. Luckily the Cinescope aspect ratio was fully restored in the Blu-Ray version. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_d66ef045 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_d66ef045 | featureConfidence |
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| Atlantis: The Lost Empire | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_e214a513 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_e214a513 | comment |
The pan-and-scan VHS and DVD releases of Anastasia (1997), have one of the most unusual cases of this trope, in that the picture is actually slightly wider than 4:3 (the DVD specifications list the aspect ratio of this version as 1.48:1 as opposed to the common 1.33:1). As such, it is one of the few pan-and-scan versions of a film where you can see black bars at the top and bottom of the frame throughout the entire movie (as opposed to just the opening and end credits).note Yes, this statement does also apply to 16:9 TV owners: except for the elusive, CinemaScope-only Family Fun Edition, all Anastasia DVDs lack anamorphic enhancement. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_e214a513 | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_e214a513 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
| Anastasia | hasFeature |
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| Pan and Scan / int_e885c808 | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_e885c808 | comment |
The DVD release of Spaceballs is a "flipper" disc with the original widescreen version on one side and the pan-and-scanned 4:3 version on the other. It includes a paper insert that educates the viewer on the difference and implores them to watch the widescreen version, using a screenshot of the characters skipping four abreast in a visual Shout-Out to The Wizard of Oz as an example of the sort of gag that's ruined when the two characters on either side are cropped out of the picture. However, the 4:3 version can play out to the Droste effect in the "We're in 'now' now" joke as Dark Helmet and Col. Sandurz were watching the movie in 4:3. All widescreen DVDs released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer during this time have similar inserts, but are often inaccurate depending upon the nature of how the movie was shot. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_e885c808 | featureApplicability |
1.0 | |
| Pan and Scan / int_e885c808 | featureConfidence |
1.0 | |
| Spaceballs | hasFeature |
Pan and Scan / int_e885c808 | |
| Pan and Scan / int_ff9ab17f | type |
Pan and Scan | |
| Pan and Scan / int_ff9ab17f | comment |
Some scenes in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine were filmed in anamorphic widescreen and intentionally panned and scanned for their TV presentations. They include shots in which special effects couldn't be rendered on a moving camera shot, and one scene in If Wishes Were Horses in which Dax interacts with her Doppelgänger, to make it look more convincing. | |
| Pan and Scan / int_ff9ab17f | featureApplicability |
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| Pan and Scan / int_ff9ab17f | featureConfidence |
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| Star Trek: The Next Generation | hasFeature |
Pan and Scan / int_ff9ab17f |
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