People seem to be increasingly concerned about the cropping of their films on Netflix; so much in fact that a new single-serving Tumblr has popped up devoted solely to bringing attention to the popular movie streaming service’s common practice of adapting movies using the “pan and scan” method. This simple formatting technique adjusts what would be a widescreen film image into the proportions of a standard definition television screen. As a result of this type of cropping, viewers will not experience the “big picture” due to the chopped-off the sides of the original widescreen image.
The aptly titled ‘What Netflix Does‘ goes on to show exactly what you may be missing from some of your favorite films and television shows and is noted by its creator as his “biggest complaint about the service.”
Here’s an example of how a film was:
…and here’s what Netflix did
and here’s another
..and this one too
(Images: WhatNetflixDoes/Tumblr)
