What do you guys think of 9:16 aspect ratios or the similar? Are they now inevitable and worthy of standing alongside the classic horizontal formats?
Youtube now has a service for these videos called "Shorts"; I imagine others have the same service as well.
I think they are only for viewing on smartphones; in case of horizontal displays they work wrong.
Personally I don't see the point of them. They lose so much detail, don't look good on a normal monitor or TV, where we see more and more of them, all too often showing part of the action of an accident or similar and, frankly, they annoy the hell out of me!
I hate vertical 9:16... on PC it looks horrible, but on phone it's addictive.
3:4 likes on phone and PC.
The loss of details is normal but it has a great focus on the objective of the video.
I got used to vertical... Video is less corrupted when re-encoded. especially on Youtube.
A friend says that when he shoots his children skiing, he prefers vertical because he focuses on them. Why would he use his smartphone horizontally to frame a lot of unnecessary snow on either side of his son?
I have read in other discussions that the human mind is adapted to horizontal vision because it has horizontal eyes. So watching a vertical video in a smartphone is still more tiring and less natural than watching a horizontal video.
I am not sure about this last statement; one should see the studies on the psychology of vision...
I prefer horizontal vision even for vertical subjects: so much space on the sides of people is important for both aesthetics and visual storytelling (editing), plus having little space (room) above and below the person is even more important. These are among the most important basics of cinematography.
Returning to the example of the skiing son: a vertical photo of him is best because it captures the subject in the best possible way. But a video centered only on him is not good to watch, because it lacks the environment and thus visual fluidity (and narrative: a video is always narrative even if it does not tell a story, because it develops over time).
Why would he use his smartphone horizontally to frame a lot of unnecessary snow on either side of his son?
Surely, if he shows it to anyone else, they will want to see where he is skiing as well as the fact that he is? Strangely, I thought snow was necessary for skiing 😜.
