For a few months now, MTV has been showing AMTV, morning music videos with a range of old and new. Let's ignore the repetitive nature for a second. The biggest flaw is that MTV HD shows the videos in the same quality as its non-HD entity, leaving those annoying black side bars. Why aren't any of the music videos on MTV or VH1 in HD?In a weaker economy where even television programs get budget cuts, music videos are a great alternative to showing programming since the station doesn't pay for them. It's shameless advertising for the musician and a cheap way to put things in HD.
MTV has been finicky with their HD programs before. I've had many instances where MTV forgot to switch to full HD when airing HD programs, leaving the show in a really small box on my television. The biggest example was when MTV continuously forgot to air the Brooklyn season of The Real World in HD. You knew someone forgot to press the HD button because once in a while after the first commercial, the button was pressed and the show was in HD again.
MTV sister station Palladia HD shows full HD videos; many of which aren't new. Sure, Palladia plays Carrie Underwood's "Before He Cheats" at any time they can squeeze her in, but it shows that any old widescreen music video can fit. I don't even care about the audio quality, as long as those black bars go away.
Older television programs like Family Guy are adjusted for HD when it's on TBS. Commercials that aren't HD have the TBS logo in the black bars. Why can't MTV quickly stretch a music video? Fuse does that already. There are several artists out there that make amazing visual music videos and get ignored, but even some of the mainstream artists, like Kanye West, make music videos in widescreen that can stretch without distortion. The lack of care for the music videos basically shows that MTV has no interest in the "M" in MTV.
Here's another suggestion: look at cable news or The Weather Channel. They manage to plop a lot of crap on my television and it's interesting to see a channel attempt to create HD effects with flashy graphics. For maps with green and yellow blotches, The Weather Channel is beautiful with it's frames and glass-like flips. MTV shouldn't have a problem getting a college graphic artist to make something. Then they can scroll music related news on the bottom and plop Billboard/Amazon/iTunes charts on the side. How about crappy shameless photos of the artist at an MTV party or plopping random facts about the artist on the side? What about crappy text message shout outs? An hour of that has to cost less than two episodes of Room Raiders.
MTV has only embraced HD programming for their reality shows and award shows when many current music videos are already HD friendly. I understand that AMTV is cheap early morning programming, but Palladia shows music videos in HD in the morning as well. MTV is wasting a golden opportunity.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
6-23-2009 @ 7:24PM
Adam said...
The only thing I've seen in HD on MTV/VH1HD is "I Love Money 2", and seeing those chicks in HD was a truly frightening experience.
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6-24-2009 @ 1:41AM
steve said...
This guy seems to be confusing HD for widescreen. Just because something is widescreen does not make it HD and just because something is HD, does not make it widescreen. Those Family Guy episodes on TBS HD are distorted. Who wants to watch a distorted show? I would rather see it in the original aspect ratio without distortion. I would ask him to do a little research before writing about something but the fact that he is obssessed with MTV may be asking too much.
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6-24-2009 @ 8:05AM
Galley said...
HD, by it's very definition is widescreen (16:9 or greater).
6-24-2009 @ 8:05AM
royce said...
Those Family Guy episodes on TBS are just 4:3 aspect episodes stretched into 16:9. Family Guy looks ok like that because it's drawn. Try watching Home Improvement in this format, it looks awful, and TBS does this all the time. The only exceptions are newer stuff like My Name Is Earl, and Seinfeld which has been remastered for 16:9.
6-24-2009 @ 8:05AM
Shaun said...
Galley, I'd love for you to state that on Engadget HD....
HD has to do with the RESOLUTION (normally 720 lines of resolution or greater), not the aspect ratio (the wide screen you are referring to...). Please do a simple check on wikipedia before spreading these misnomers.
As for the author, it's because of people like you that we are forced to watch movies on HBO in 16:9 ratio regardless of the original aspect ratio. Everyone is so concerned for the black bars, which I can understand, but don't ruin it for everyone, just use the 'stretch' option on your tv, and don't force us to watch everything in stretch-o-vision
6-24-2009 @ 10:11AM
Galley said...
Sorry, I was referring to HDTV, which only comes in two resolutions: 1280 x 720, and 1920 x 1080, both of which are 16:9.
6-24-2009 @ 8:46AM
Lance said...
MTV plays music videos??
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6-24-2009 @ 10:10AM
Han Solo said...
Wait......you think MTV plays videos!
HAHAHA!
The hell you say!
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6-24-2009 @ 10:12AM
Michael Pascua said...
Yeah, apparently they do. Sometime between 3AM and 9AM when no one is awake. Apparently it makes up one day (24 hours) of music videos in a week.
6-24-2009 @ 10:11AM
Jim said...
Wha? MTV plays videos!!??
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6-28-2009 @ 11:00PM
ES_Trader said...
My nieces and nephews are all part of the MTV core demographic and they could care less if something they want to watch is in HD... That demographic couldn't tell the difference anyway... so... as much as I would love to see the Real World in HD; why would MTV waste money making sure it happens on their simulcast channel.
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6-29-2009 @ 10:35AM
Kyle said...
ES_Trader, the correct term is "could NOT care less."
6-29-2009 @ 10:16AM
Matt said...
Because MTV/CMT/VH1 (or Viacom in general) is sucking retards?
And yeah, this author is a "black bar hater" who helps contribute to non-OAR broadcasting! Stretching 4:3 and P&S/cropping of "super widescreen" stuff... So-called premiums like HBO/Max claim "uncut," except half the picture has been CUT with 2.35 movies... Well, the A/V quality would be inferior to BD anyway.
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6-29-2009 @ 9:46AM
Matt said...
Because MTV/CMT/VH1 (or Viacom in general) is sucking retards?
And yeah, this author is a "black bar hater" who helps contribute to non-OAR broadcasting! Stretching 4:3 and P&S/cropping of "super widescreen" stuff... So-called premiums like HBO/Max claim "uncut," except half the picture has been CUT with 2.35 movies... Well, the A/V quality would be inferior to BD anyway.
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6-29-2009 @ 11:55AM
john said...
Just say NO to stretchy-vision!
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6-29-2009 @ 2:23PM
David said...
I agree. Stretchy vision is BS. And the only Seinfeld episodes that I have seen in HD actually don't stretch to fit, but increase the size of the pic, CROPPING off the top and bottom of the picture - so you go to 16*9 and see LESS than the original 4*3. It's ridiculous. They're not remastered... they're butchered!
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7-01-2009 @ 3:51PM
Praveen said...
First of all, while I agree that MTV doesn't care about HD, the writer is offbase in taking the higher ground when he is just as guilty as dumbing HD down by wishing for stretch-o-vision and saying that audio doesn't matter for a music channel.
Now if the program or music video is a 16x9 or 2.35:1 image letterboxed in a 4:3 shape embedded in a 16x9 HD signal, I understand the frustration and the HD channel should have the presence of mind to ZOOM proportionally the image to fit widthwise the entire TV while keeping the OAR intact. This solution gives a full screen or a near full screen on an hD tv without the horrible stretchy image.
But if you are advocating stretching everything 4x3 image blindly to a 16x9 full screen, this is idiotic.
You want to make use of the screen? Why not put in pop up video like jokes or straight facts in the side bars?
ANything, but stretchovision.
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