Aspect Ratio

What is aspect ratio?

• Aspect ratio specifies the ratio of width to the height. Video, still pictures and the devices used to display this have the aspect ratio like 3:2, 4:3, 16:9....
• The number before the colon represents the width and the number after the colon represents height.

Aspect Ratio		Uses	TVs
4:3	1.33:1	Standard Channels	Old TVs
16:9	1.77:1	HD Channels	The majority of HDTVs
21:9	2.35:1	Most movies	Most theaters

Types:

Original Aspect Ratio:

• It is the aspect ratio in which the video/image is produced.
• The cameras has some common presets of the aspect ratio to match with the display devices.

Modified Aspect Ratio:

• It is the aspect ratio which is assigned to the video/image in order to fit the screen and it is different from the original aspect ratio dimensions.
• Various photo/video editors provide the option to change the aspect ratio of the image/video.

What happens if the aspect ratio of content does not match that of the display screen?

• If the aspect ratios do not match we observe black bars either above and below or left and right as shown below.

• While printing the paper aspect ratio must match the content's aspect ratio. If not matched the content will be cropped and printed effecting the actual content.

4x6 or 3:2 Aspect Ratio Here's the original image taken by a camera with a 3:2 sensor. In this case, a 4x6 print will not get cropped in any way since the dimensions of the sensor match the dimensions of the print.

5x7 or 7:5 aspect ratio Here's what happens to this same image when I want to print it at 5x7. Since the 5x7 ratio is not the same as 3:2 parts of the left and right of the image are going to get cut off in the final print.

8x10 or 5:4 aspect ratio The 8x10 size. In this case you can see the extreme cropping that happens when you try to print a 3:2 image 8x10. Sometimes content may be lost.