WEBVTT - Reflecting on Resolutions 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:12.440 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there, 0:00:12.480 --> 0:00:15.640 and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:19.120 I'm an executive producer with iHeartRadio. And how the tech 0:00:19.360 --> 0:00:22.440 are you today? I thought we would talk a bit 0:00:22.480 --> 0:00:25.880 about resolutions. Not like I'm gonna lose weight this year, 0:00:26.280 --> 0:00:29.280 I promise, but more like, yeah, I got a five 0:00:29.400 --> 0:00:33.200 K ultra wide display, so you know, I'm pretty cool. 0:00:34.040 --> 0:00:38.639 Resolution is one of the factors that determines the quality 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:42.800 of image you can have on a display, whether that's 0:00:42.800 --> 0:00:46.800 a television or a computer display. We're largely going to 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:49.880 talk about TVs in this episode. And remember I said 0:00:50.040 --> 0:00:54.040 one of the factors, because there's actually a ton of 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:56.960 different factors that come into play when it's all about 0:00:56.960 --> 0:01:02.160 your image quality. I think that's important because often, I 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:04.480 guess less often than it used to be. But you know, 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:06.920 it used to be a thing where people would use 0:01:06.959 --> 0:01:11.240 resolution as a as shorthand for quality, right, Like they 0:01:11.280 --> 0:01:14.640 would talk about resolution as if that automatically made one 0:01:14.959 --> 0:01:20.840 display or television better than another. And there's this implication 0:01:21.360 --> 0:01:25.400 that the larger the number, the better the experience. It 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.600 is kind of like how Nigel Toughnel of a spinal 0:01:28.720 --> 0:01:32.720 tap insisted that his amp was superior to all other 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:36.399 amps on the market because his goes to eleven and 0:01:37.200 --> 0:01:41.119 eleven is one louder than ten. As it turns out, 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:45.039 there are lots of elements that determine whether or not 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:48.520 the image you get on screen is fantastic or if 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:50.760 it's not, And we'll talk a bit about that at 0:01:50.800 --> 0:01:54.440 the end, but for now, let's just focus on resolution, 0:01:55.000 --> 0:02:00.600 no pun intended. Typically we describe resolution as think of 0:02:00.640 --> 0:02:03.120 it as the number of pixels that are used to 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:06.320 make up an image, so pixels in this case would 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:09.200 be individual points of light. This is a lot easier 0:02:09.240 --> 0:02:12.040 to talk about with digital displays. When you get to 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:14.920 analog it's a very different story. We'll touch on that. 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:19.200 So there have been a lot of different display technologies 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:23.040 over the years, and they work in different ways, but 0:02:23.320 --> 0:02:27.720 we frequently will still talk about resolution in terms of pixels. 0:02:27.760 --> 0:02:31.240 It's just a useful kind of shorthand. Now it's undeniably 0:02:31.320 --> 0:02:35.280 true that if you only have a few pixels, any 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:39.160 image you create is going to be crude and blocky. Really, 0:02:39.200 --> 0:02:41.200 you'll be able to pick out the shapes of the 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:44.920 individual pixels. So a lot of the discussion we're going 0:02:44.960 --> 0:02:47.440 to have today is going to be about square pixels. 0:02:47.919 --> 0:02:50.480 And thus, if you make an image with just a 0:02:50.480 --> 0:02:52.919 few pixels and they're all square pixels, it's going to 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:55.519 look like a bunch of blocks. If you've ever played 0:02:55.800 --> 0:02:59.000 old home video games, like the stuff you would get 0:02:59.000 --> 0:03:02.320 on say an Atari twenty six hundred or the old 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:06.520 Nintendo Entertainment System, you probably noticed that stuff on screen 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:11.040 typically is made up of squares. Some of the squares 0:03:11.160 --> 0:03:14.600 could be pretty small, but they're still squares, and they 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:16.760 have defined edges. If you get a good enough look, 0:03:16.800 --> 0:03:18.840 you can see, oh, these are a bunch of blocks. 0:03:19.040 --> 0:03:22.760 Even rounded characters like the Goombas in the original Super 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:25.680 Mario Brothers game on the nes, they're made up of 0:03:25.680 --> 0:03:29.880 these tiny little blocks, and pixels are essentially the same 0:03:30.000 --> 0:03:33.839 basic idea, although pixels are really the elements that are 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:37.360 allowing us to see those blocks. So if I gave 0:03:37.440 --> 0:03:41.080 you a bunch of actual physical wooden blocks, and the 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:43.880 blocks were of all different colors, like you know, you've 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:45.880 got like a ton of red, and you've got lots 0:03:45.920 --> 0:03:47.520 of different shades of red, and a ton of blue 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:49.360 and a ton of green, and all those kind of things. 0:03:49.800 --> 0:03:53.200 But each block measured one inch to a side, So 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:55.880 these are these are cubes. And I give you a 0:03:55.920 --> 0:03:59.120 frame that's I don't know, like twenty one inches wide 0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:05.920 and twelve inches tall. That's roughly a four x three relationship. 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:10.000 Not quite, but it's close enough. And I told you 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:14.120 create a picture of a house using these blocks, Like 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:19.000 you have to make a house using these blocks within 0:04:19.080 --> 0:04:23.200 that frame. So you're doing what is essentially a two 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:26.560 dimensional image, Like, yeah, the blocks are cubes, but we're 0:04:26.560 --> 0:04:29.159 just gonna be looking at it from the top down. Well, 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:33.840 your picture is gonna look pretty primitive because you're using 0:04:33.880 --> 0:04:35.640 these one inch by one inch blocks, and you know 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:39.839 you're not gonna have any smooth curves or or things 0:04:39.880 --> 0:04:41.800 like that, like anything that's at an angle. You're gonna 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:45.760 get this blocky texture. But let's say that instead I 0:04:45.839 --> 0:04:48.560 give you the same size frame, but now I'm giving 0:04:48.600 --> 0:04:51.880 you blocks that are half an inch to a side, 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:55.279 not a full inch. Now you can fit more blocks 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:59.400 inside that same frame. The house you create will look 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:05.080 slightly less jagged, it'll look less primitive. Now let's say 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:07.479 I keep doing that, and eventually you have blocks that 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:10.200 are just one one hundredth of an inch to a side, 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:14.480 and you're able to manipulate these somehow well, you could 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:16.720 create an image that, from at least a certain distance 0:05:16.839 --> 0:05:18.760 might not look like it's jagged at all. It might 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:21.080 look like it's made up of smooth lines no matter 0:05:21.120 --> 0:05:24.840 what the angle is, maybe even curved lines. Well, that's 0:05:24.880 --> 0:05:29.560 the basic idea behind resolution. It's a combination of pixel density, 0:05:29.960 --> 0:05:34.520 as in how many pixels are within that frame, and 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:38.520 then the display size how big is the frame. So, 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:40.640 going back to our example where we were starting with 0:05:40.680 --> 0:05:43.400 a frame that's twenty one inches wide and twelve inches tall, 0:05:44.000 --> 0:05:47.960 let's say we increase the frame size by a factor 0:05:48.000 --> 0:05:51.480 of ten. We might get ten times larger. But instead 0:05:51.520 --> 0:05:55.000 of adding more blocks, I also just increase the size 0:05:55.040 --> 0:05:57.600 of the blocks as well, So the pixels in this 0:05:57.680 --> 0:06:01.359 case also get to be ten times long. The resolution 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:05.200 would be the same. Even though the image is bigger, 0:06:05.640 --> 0:06:09.360 The resolution is the same because it's the exact same 0:06:09.480 --> 0:06:12.279 number of pixels that make of that image. It doesn't 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:15.360 matter how big I make that frame. If the pixels 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:19.000 expand along with the frame expanding, we get the same 0:06:19.040 --> 0:06:22.360 blocky image. Now, granted, if you get further and further 0:06:22.440 --> 0:06:25.400 away from the picture, it starts to look better because 0:06:25.520 --> 0:06:29.560 we lose the fidelity with our vision. Human vision has limitations. 0:06:30.000 --> 0:06:32.799 But if I really want to make a higher resolution image, 0:06:33.240 --> 0:06:37.320 I have to change the size of the pixels. That's 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:40.160 what's important, so I can put more pixels within that 0:06:40.240 --> 0:06:43.840 frame now, at least to a certain point. The higher 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:48.080 the pixel density, the smoother and image will appear on 0:06:48.160 --> 0:06:52.400 a display. I say to a certain point because as 0:06:52.400 --> 0:06:55.440 I mentioned earlier, human vision has its own limits, and 0:06:55.480 --> 0:06:58.719 beyond those limits, you are not likely to notice a difference. 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:02.240 It's not like there's a hard cutoff for all people. 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:06.080 Obviously everybody's different, But if you were to look at 0:07:06.120 --> 0:07:10.360 a typical person, you would say that beyond a certain resolution, 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:14.200 if you're considering a certain size display and a certain 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:17.080 distance from it, you're not really going to notice a 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:20.760 difference in increase resolution. It just comes a point where 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:23.200 a curve line is going to look perfectly curved. Now, 0:07:23.200 --> 0:07:26.160 if you were to zoom way way in, you would 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:28.440 see that actually that curve line is made up of 0:07:28.480 --> 0:07:32.160 these little individual points, and if you go in far 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:35.640 enough you might see, oh, these edges, there's edges to 0:07:35.680 --> 0:07:38.240 this curve. It's not perfectly curved, but only if you're 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:41.840 zoomed way in. For our normal vision, it looks smooth, 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:44.520 and that's that. Now, you might technically be able to 0:07:44.600 --> 0:07:49.320 cram even more pixels into that frame, but it wouldn't 0:07:49.360 --> 0:07:53.160 really make a difference in the experience. So this kind 0:07:53.160 --> 0:07:55.040 of becomes one of those if a tree falls in 0:07:55.080 --> 0:07:57.680 the woods and no one is around to hear it, 0:07:58.280 --> 0:08:02.120 does it make a sound of situations? If a manufacturer 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:05.320 boosts resolution in a display but you're not able to 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:10.320 perceive any difference, does it matter. I would argue that 0:08:10.680 --> 0:08:16.080 from a consumer standpoint it doesn't really matter, but the 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:21.640 resolution tends to get tied into sales pitches and marketing 0:08:21.680 --> 0:08:24.920 and pr and from that side, it really does matter 0:08:25.000 --> 0:08:28.440 because it's a way for you to set your product 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:33.040 apart from your competitors, because again, big numbers sound really impressive, 0:08:33.160 --> 0:08:35.520 and certain types of people just naturally want to think 0:08:35.559 --> 0:08:38.280 they're buying the best thing that's out there, even if 0:08:38.280 --> 0:08:41.320 they can't actually tell the difference between that and say, 0:08:41.640 --> 0:08:46.520 earlier or competitor models. I'm reminded of a time where 0:08:46.559 --> 0:08:50.400 I attended cees. This was years ago, and I went 0:08:50.440 --> 0:08:54.800 to a certain company's booth. I'm not going to name them, 0:08:54.920 --> 0:08:58.000 mostly because I can't really remember which booth it was, 0:08:58.040 --> 0:09:01.280 but it was one of the big ones that does television, 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:06.360 so probably probably something like Phillips or Samsung. The company 0:09:06.400 --> 0:09:10.439 had several televisions and displays, and they had all different 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:13.240 ranges of resolution, from some that were still in the 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.120 high definition range, which we'll talk about a little bit, 0:09:16.559 --> 0:09:18.839 up to what I think was eight K. I think 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:21.400 they had an eight K TV on there, and this 0:09:21.520 --> 0:09:25.520 was in the earliest days of eight K technology. It 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:28.840 was kind of a prototype device, so this was before 0:09:28.920 --> 0:09:32.000 you could buy an eight K television as a consumer, 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:35.719 and it was really just a demonstration of that technology. 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:40.200 And the representatives in the booth had magnifying glasses and 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:42.480 they would hand one to you and encourage you to 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:46.120 step right on up to that screen and hold up 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:49.439 the magnifying glass and look for pixels. And even when 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:51.600 you did that, they were still really really hard to see, 0:09:51.640 --> 0:09:53.720 and they were saying, see, look how small our pixels are, 0:09:53.720 --> 0:09:56.880 and therefore the resolution is incredible, And yes, it was impressive, 0:09:57.440 --> 0:10:00.439 but to my eyes, when I stepped back and I 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:03.320 just looked at the display and I compared it to 0:10:04.160 --> 0:10:06.959 lower resolution displays that were, you know, just a few 0:10:06.960 --> 0:10:12.080 feet away, some of that was virtually indistinguishable. You know, 0:10:12.160 --> 0:10:14.600 ones that were at a lower resolution didn't look that 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:17.120 much different from the eight K display. Yes, if I 0:10:17.160 --> 0:10:19.920 got right on up to them, if I got to 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:22.400 the point where my nose is almost touching the glass 0:10:22.400 --> 0:10:25.280 of the display, and especially if I use the magnifying glass, 0:10:25.800 --> 0:10:28.480 yes I would see pixels more clearly on the lower 0:10:28.480 --> 0:10:31.800 resolution screens than I did with the eight K. But hey, y'all, 0:10:32.000 --> 0:10:35.160 I don't watch TV that way. I'm usually quite a 0:10:35.160 --> 0:10:38.840 few feet back from the screen, and I rarely ever 0:10:38.920 --> 0:10:41.560 whip out my magnifying glass while I'm watching, you know, 0:10:41.840 --> 0:10:46.199 shmigadoon or whatever that being said. As I mentioned earlier, 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:49.839 if you are a manufacturer and you decide, hey, I'm 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:52.959 going to create the largest consumer television that's been introduced 0:10:53.000 --> 0:10:56.360 so far, resolution is going to matter in that case 0:10:56.400 --> 0:10:59.080 because the bigger the display you go with, the higher 0:10:59.120 --> 0:11:01.640 resolution you're going to need in order to get that 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:06.120 smooth experience with your image quality unless people are just 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:09.600 looking at the display from really far away. Because you know, 0:11:09.679 --> 0:11:11.840 if you look at a huge television but you're really 0:11:11.880 --> 0:11:13.640 far away. It's kind of the same thing as looking 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:17.679 at a medium sized television, but you're closer. I know 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:20.560 that i'm saying the obvious, but it's important for things 0:11:20.559 --> 0:11:23.520 like resolution. So if I'm shopping for a new television 0:11:23.720 --> 0:11:26.160 and I'm looking for something that's in the forty three 0:11:26.240 --> 0:11:29.600 inch range, right, like, that's the size TV I'm looking for, 0:11:30.160 --> 0:11:32.320 I probably don't need to go up to an eight 0:11:32.440 --> 0:11:35.000 K television. I'm probably not going to be able to 0:11:35.120 --> 0:11:40.720 tell the difference. But let's say I'm crazy wealthy and 0:11:40.760 --> 0:11:44.080 I want to get the equivalent of Samsung's the Wall, 0:11:44.280 --> 0:11:46.400 which I think can go up to like one hundred 0:11:46.480 --> 0:11:49.880 forty six inches. I mean, it's crazy huge. That's more 0:11:49.920 --> 0:11:53.520 than one hundred inches larger than a forty three inch 0:11:53.640 --> 0:11:59.040 TV right on the diagonal, So that's truly huge. Well, 0:11:59.120 --> 0:12:02.200 if I'm getting something that big, well I probably want 0:12:02.200 --> 0:12:04.640 the best resolution I can get because it will be 0:12:04.760 --> 0:12:08.680 noticeable if you're sitting a little close. I mean, you 0:12:08.679 --> 0:12:10.559 probably don't want to sit too close to something like 0:12:10.559 --> 0:12:12.520 that because you wouldn't be able to see everything anyway. 0:12:12.520 --> 0:12:15.000 But you get what I'm saying. So I want to 0:12:15.120 --> 0:12:18.520 higre a resolution display if it's really huge. That way, 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:21.920 I'm not distracted by blockie images. By the way, the 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.560 same thing is true for the displays on our phones. 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:28.600 Resolution does matter on smartphones, but again, once you get 0:12:28.640 --> 0:12:33.280 to a certain pixel density, the differences become harder to spot, 0:12:33.400 --> 0:12:37.679 at least with resolution. Smartphones vary in size, but they 0:12:37.720 --> 0:12:43.280 don't get to gargantuan proportions like some televisions do. And also, 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:47.160 the distance from which we view our smartphones tends to 0:12:47.240 --> 0:12:52.040 fall in a fairly narrow range. So I looked it up. 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:55.640 I found the National Institute of Health actually has stats 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:58.600 on this and says that on average, people hold their 0:12:58.679 --> 0:13:02.480 phone between teen point three centimeters to thirty two point 0:13:02.559 --> 0:13:05.640 nine centimeters or about five point two inches to just 0:13:05.720 --> 0:13:10.440 under thirteen inches away from them if they are sitting down. 0:13:11.120 --> 0:13:13.600 If you're laying down, it's different. You get the phone 0:13:13.640 --> 0:13:15.840 closer to you, probably because you don't want to be 0:13:15.880 --> 0:13:18.720 holding the phone at arm's length above you in bed 0:13:18.800 --> 0:13:21.920 or something. So if you're laying down, it tends to 0:13:21.920 --> 0:13:25.040 be between nine point nine centimeters away to twenty one 0:13:25.120 --> 0:13:28.640 point three centimeters. That's about well just under four inches 0:13:28.760 --> 0:13:31.439 to a little more than eight inches away from your face. 0:13:31.720 --> 0:13:35.040 So My point is, while companies might boast about increasing 0:13:35.040 --> 0:13:38.320 image resolution at a certain point, it just doesn't make 0:13:38.480 --> 0:13:42.800 a noticeable difference in the image quality. All Right, we're 0:13:42.800 --> 0:13:44.480 gonna take a quick break. When we come back, we'll 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:56.760 have more to talk about with resolutions. All right, let's 0:13:56.760 --> 0:14:00.280 talk about some of the different resolutions that are out there. 0:14:00.320 --> 0:14:03.320 And also we should note that there there's another factor 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:05.880 that's going to come into play in this discussion when 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:10.079 we talk about televisions also computer displays, and that factor 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:14.240 is called aspect ratio. This is the relationship between how 0:14:14.400 --> 0:14:19.480 tall a display is versus how wide it is. So 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:24.120 before the nineteen nineties, with televisions, it was pretty standard 0:14:24.280 --> 0:14:28.080 for those to come in a four to three aspect ratio, 0:14:28.760 --> 0:14:32.840 meaning the display was slightly wider than it was tall, 0:14:33.800 --> 0:14:37.520 but it was, you know, fairly boxy. So it means 0:14:37.520 --> 0:14:38.680 that you would take, you. 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:45.120 Know, let's say you have the width of this this television. Uh, 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:49.080 if you divided the width however wide the TV was 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.400 by four, whatever that number was, if you multiplied it 0:14:52.440 --> 0:14:55.760 by three, that's how tall the television was. 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.240 That's the four to three, so a little wider than 0:14:59.280 --> 0:15:02.040 it is tall. Beginning in the nineteen nineties, we started 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:04.480 to see the introduction of what was then called wide 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:07.880 screen television. We just call them TVs today because it's 0:15:07.920 --> 0:15:11.680 the standard format, but they had a different aspect ratio. 0:15:11.800 --> 0:15:15.920 Their aspect ratio was sixteen to nine. That means there's 0:15:15.920 --> 0:15:19.240 a bigger difference between height and width, right, The width 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:23.240 is wider now than it changed more than the height did. 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:26.600 And you could think about that, like if you multiplied 0:15:26.720 --> 0:15:30.080 four to three by three, it would be twelve to nine. 0:15:30.560 --> 0:15:33.239 But we're not talking twelve to nine. We're talking sixteen 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:37.400 to nine. So the width changed more than the height did. 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:40.320 That's when we get the wide screens. That's also going 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:44.200 to affect how we talk about resolution. The introduction of 0:15:44.240 --> 0:15:49.480 computer displays complicated matters considerably because televisions followed a fairly 0:15:49.480 --> 0:15:53.160 standardized path. They had to. It was a necessity because 0:15:53.160 --> 0:15:57.920 they needed to be able to show broadcast television and 0:15:58.000 --> 0:16:01.920 cable television and these followed. So the televisions that we 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:04.800 bought needed to be able to display those standards and 0:16:04.840 --> 0:16:08.560 make it a good experience. So, while there was nothing 0:16:08.680 --> 0:16:13.320 inherently requiring televisions to all follow the exact same you know, 0:16:14.440 --> 0:16:20.000 measurements and everything or aspect ratios. It was important that 0:16:20.040 --> 0:16:22.800 they did so, otherwise you would end up with like 0:16:23.040 --> 0:16:27.320 weird bars along the sides or top and bottom of 0:16:28.240 --> 0:16:31.440 images so that they would fit your screen, and people 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:35.760 typically don't like those so much. So we're again, we're 0:16:35.800 --> 0:16:38.200 going to focus primarily on televisions. But you know, computer 0:16:38.320 --> 0:16:42.720 displays didn't have those restrictions, so computer displays have come 0:16:42.760 --> 0:16:46.560 in all sorts of different shapes and aspect ratios and 0:16:46.640 --> 0:16:50.400 thus also resolutions. So the reason we're going to focus 0:16:50.440 --> 0:16:52.880 on televisions is because if we tried to do it 0:16:52.960 --> 0:16:57.240 with computer displays, it would we'd be here for weeks, 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:02.160 and some of them reference like a display that was 0:17:02.280 --> 0:17:05.720 used for a couple of years and hasn't been used since, 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:08.840 and it would make no sense to even really spend 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:13.200 time on it. So with televisions, we typically start discussions 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:17.359 by talking about standard definition TV. You technically could go 0:17:17.440 --> 0:17:20.280 back further than that, but there's no real point in 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:22.920 doing it, so don't ask me to do it. Besides, 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:25.200 I've already done episodes where I talk about the history 0:17:25.240 --> 0:17:28.120 of TV and kind of talked about this. Also, I'm 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:30.800 out of coffee, so I'm a little cranky today, so 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:34.520 you know, it's just getting grouchy, Jonathan, I'm sorry. So 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:39.680 standard definition really came in two formats, and they followed 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:45.159 two different technologies. They were different enough to be incompatible, 0:17:45.760 --> 0:17:48.399 and what you got depended upon where you lived. So 0:17:48.600 --> 0:17:51.080 for folks who lived in places like the United States, 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:55.359 we had standard Definition TV that was at four eighty I. 0:17:56.240 --> 0:17:58.920 The I in this case stands for interlaced. That gets 0:17:59.080 --> 0:18:03.960 into a related but arguably tangential territory. So I'm just 0:18:04.000 --> 0:18:06.040 going to stick with the resolution. But if you were 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:09.240 in England, then you had the PAL format and that 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:13.480 had five seventy six I resolution, So for eighty in 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:17.480 the US five seventy six in the UK. Technically PAL 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:21.679 crammed more pixels onto the screen. It also had a 0:18:21.680 --> 0:18:27.720 different frame rate from US or in TSC based tv U. 0:18:27.960 --> 0:18:31.440 These formats are largely obsolete today. Obviously, if you watch 0:18:31.440 --> 0:18:33.720 older content made for television, you're going to see that 0:18:33.760 --> 0:18:38.560 reflected in both image quality and aspect ratio. The numbers 0:18:38.720 --> 0:18:43.520 there indicate the number of lines that made up images 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:46.160 on the screen, and we're talking lines from the top 0:18:46.160 --> 0:18:48.320 of the screen to the bottom or from the bottom 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:50.959 to the top if you prefer. So, we're talking about 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:55.800 the height of the display, So four eighty means there's 0:18:55.840 --> 0:18:58.760 four hundred eighty lines. Five seventy six means there's five 0:18:58.840 --> 0:19:02.840 hundred seventy six line. Uh, And thus the five to 0:19:02.840 --> 0:19:06.680 seventy six format is putting more image into a displays, 0:19:06.760 --> 0:19:10.679 cramming more lines of image. So if we were talking 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:15.480 about digital, we would say by taking a four to 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:20.000 three aspect ratio television and old style TV showing standard 0:19:20.040 --> 0:19:23.000 definition TV, if we were thinking of it as digital, 0:19:23.520 --> 0:19:25.919 we would say it was four eighty by six forty. 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:29.359 That's what you get. Would you take the four eighty 0:19:29.640 --> 0:19:32.439 height and you put it through that four to three ratio. 0:19:32.520 --> 0:19:36.160 Remember the three in the four to three is the height, 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:40.200 So it's four eighty tall and six forty wide five 0:19:40.320 --> 0:19:42.479 seventy six. If we did the same thing, would be 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:46.040 five seventy six tall and seventy seven hundred and sixty 0:19:46.160 --> 0:19:50.919 eight wide. Again, assuming that you're using square pixels, that 0:19:51.000 --> 0:19:53.919 also would change things. But we're trying to keep this 0:19:53.960 --> 0:19:58.000 as symbol as possible. Now, that's if we were talking 0:19:58.040 --> 0:20:02.160 digital information with the standard definition, we wouldn't be Typically 0:20:02.200 --> 0:20:05.400 we'd be talking about analog television, that's a very different thing. 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:08.639 We would still be talking about lines, but we wouldn't 0:20:08.640 --> 0:20:12.680 be talking about pixels so much. It's a different way 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:17.439 of going about creating an image. So pixels gets a 0:20:17.440 --> 0:20:20.359 little muddled in that context, not that it really matters 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:24.280 for our discussion because we're talking about largely obsolete technologies. 0:20:25.240 --> 0:20:28.240 But when you get up to enhanced definition television, the 0:20:28.240 --> 0:20:32.280 resolutions actually become four eighty by seven twenty and five 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:35.880 seventy six by seven to twenty. So you might say, well, 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:39.320 why why seven twenty Why is the width standard but 0:20:39.359 --> 0:20:41.879 the height different. Well, the answer to that is a 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:44.800 little complicated and also largely moot, and so I'm not 0:20:44.840 --> 0:20:47.480 going to go into it because it doesn't really matter. 0:20:48.000 --> 0:20:52.080 It's not something that you would commonly encounter today. That 0:20:52.320 --> 0:20:55.320 again was standard definition that was in the before times, 0:20:55.920 --> 0:21:00.119 and then high definition would bring new resolutions into the picture, 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:03.400 so to speak, and also a change to the sixteen 0:21:03.520 --> 0:21:07.320 to nine aspect ratio that would have a large impact 0:21:07.359 --> 0:21:11.880 as well. So once we got to HDTV, the lowest 0:21:12.040 --> 0:21:17.560 resolution for HDTV was seven twenty P. So the P 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:22.080 in this case stands for progressive scan. That's the alternative 0:21:22.160 --> 0:21:25.199 to interlace. Right, we talked about four eighty I and 0:21:25.280 --> 0:21:29.600 five seventy six I seven twenty P progressive scan progressive 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:33.000 versus interlace. We're still talking about the height of the 0:21:33.040 --> 0:21:35.760 screen when we use that number seven to twenty P. 0:21:36.320 --> 0:21:41.080 So a seven to twenty P HDTV has seven hundred 0:21:41.119 --> 0:21:44.320 and twenty vertical pixels. If we were to measure the 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:48.280 width of the screen in pixels, we would count one thousand, 0:21:48.600 --> 0:21:52.880 two hundred eighty pixels across. You got to multiply both 0:21:52.920 --> 0:21:55.960 of those to get the full number of pixels that 0:21:56.000 --> 0:21:58.520 are on the display. Right, the height times the width, 0:21:58.840 --> 0:22:01.000 that'll give us nine hundred two twenty one thousand, six 0:22:01.080 --> 0:22:04.440 hundred pixels. That's how many pixels make up a seven 0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:09.200 to twenty P HDTV image. Now, a step up from 0:22:09.240 --> 0:22:13.520 seven to twenty P was ten eighty P. We also 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:17.159 had ten eighty I, which was arguably a step up 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:19.880 because it was a higher resolution, and I say arguably 0:22:19.920 --> 0:22:22.760 because of the differences between interlaced and progressive scan. But 0:22:23.119 --> 0:22:26.400 again that gets into a different technology. So a ten 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:30.080 eighty screen shows images that are one thousand and eighty 0:22:30.240 --> 0:22:33.160 pixels tall. So we're still talking about the vertical here, 0:22:33.880 --> 0:22:37.240 and then for with we're talking one thousand, nine hundred 0:22:37.280 --> 0:22:41.320 and twenty pixels wide, So you multiply those two together 0:22:41.359 --> 0:22:44.120 and you get more than two million pixels on display, 0:22:44.160 --> 0:22:46.760 so more than twice as many of a seven to 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:50.440 twenty p display. So you're really cramming those pixels in there. 0:22:50.600 --> 0:22:54.359 Of course, we're only just getting started. Also, this is 0:22:54.359 --> 0:22:58.080 at the point where the television industry did something silly. 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:02.160 So again, up to this point, when we're talking numbers, 0:23:02.640 --> 0:23:06.200 what we're describing is the number of vertical pixels in 0:23:06.240 --> 0:23:10.160 a column, right, how tall the image is in pixels. 0:23:10.720 --> 0:23:13.520 That's what we've been talking about with standard definition and 0:23:13.680 --> 0:23:16.720 high definition. But then we get into the ultra high 0:23:16.800 --> 0:23:22.200 definition territories and we suddenly stop looking at the vertical 0:23:22.760 --> 0:23:25.920 side of the equation and we look at the horizontal 0:23:26.080 --> 0:23:31.000 the width. So ten eighty would mean one thousand and 0:23:31.080 --> 0:23:34.240 eighty vertical pixels. But when we hit UHD, we do 0:23:34.359 --> 0:23:36.680 the flippy floppy, and we talk about the pixels that 0:23:36.720 --> 0:23:39.359 are across rather than the ones that go up and down. 0:23:39.720 --> 0:23:42.080 So let's say that you were talking about a two 0:23:42.359 --> 0:23:48.400 K display. Technically two K really references resolutions that are 0:23:48.920 --> 0:23:53.040 somewhere in the neighborhood of two thousand pixels wide. That 0:23:53.160 --> 0:23:56.679 means you could actually call a ten eighty P television 0:23:57.119 --> 0:24:00.840 a two K television because yes, it's one thousand eighty 0:24:00.880 --> 0:24:04.560 pixels tall, but it is one thousand, nine hundred twenty 0:24:04.560 --> 0:24:08.280 pixels wide. One nine hundred and twenty is practically two thousand, 0:24:08.359 --> 0:24:11.680 So a ten adp TV is technically also a two 0:24:11.760 --> 0:24:14.919