DVD Menus - what's the commercial standard, 4:3 or 16:9?

[MarkyBoy666]

I've recently started creating some DVDs containing 16:9 footage, and HAD been creating 16:9 menus too. However, when set to Pan / Scan for 4:3 playback, these aren't as crystal clear as straightforward 4:3 menus I've done in the past.

I was just wondering if anyone knew what the commercial industry standard was for DVD menus - i.e. is it always 4:3 menus, even if the movie/feature itself is 16:9?

[Awatef]

No, I've got many DVDs w/ 16:9 content that have 16:9 menus.

[manono]

And I have quite a few DVDs with 16:9 menus and 4:3 movies.

You might consider setting them for Automatic Letterbox, rather than Auto P&S.

[MarkyBoy666]

Cheers guys. I had read somewhere that most commercial DVD's just used 4:3 menus, but that didn't sound right to me either to be honest.

[techreactor]

Cheers guys. I had read somewhere that most commercial DVD's just used 4:3 menus, but that didn't sound right to me either to be honest.

but its the fact

[setarip_old]

That certainly is the case with most, if not all, that I own...

[MarkyBoy666]

So 4:3 is the standard...what normally happens when those menus are viewed on a Widescreen TV, are they usually stretched or do black bars appear to either side?

It really seems to be a bit of a grey area this, I've struggled to find any real info online about which is normally used and why.

[setarip_old]

Hard to provide a "standard" answer your question, as most standalone players and widescreen TVs have multiple display format capabilities, so the appearance of the menu can be altered in many ways...

[manono]

So 4:3 is the standard.
Hardly.
I've struggled to find any real info online about which is normally used and why

Why don't you look at a few in PGCEdit? Open the DVD->right-click the menu->domain streams attributes, and it'll tell you. If you have a 4:3 menu, then ordinarily you'll get pillarbars when viewed on a 16:9 TV set. If you have a 16:9 menu, then ordinarily they're letterboxed when viewed on a 4:3 TV set. Which was my suggestion to you in my first response in this thread.

Edit: After checking a bunch of 16:9 menus, I am finding a good mix of Pan&Scan along with the Letterboxed for 4:3 TV sets. But since you said that your P&S menus are slightly blurry, you might get better results with Automatic Letterbox, since they won't be zoomed in that way.

[MarkyBoy666]

Hmmm, using PGCEdit I see that most US DVD's in my collection have 16:9 menus set to automatic Pan & Scan, whereas most UK ones are 16:9 set to automatic letterbox. I suppose the answer is that there's no right answer...