If you don’t have HD TV by now, you must really be trying hard to hang on to the ‘good ole days’. The days before rap music, video games and colour vision came along to ruin perfectly good Friday nights spent at the Old American Barn Dance:
Oh man….when that old guy came on, I just had to stop watching. The mentally deranged roamed free in those days. At any rate, HD TV.
I’m not going to kid myself, the jump from standard definition to high definition probably doesn’t even come close to the change from black and white to colour broadcasts, but the change is still a significant one. With HD you get a more aesthetically pleasing aspect ratio, an elongated rectangle instead of a square or artificially stretched image. If you disagree, please be my guest and find me a ‘beautiful’ Polaroid picture. You also get a wider range of colours, which really make artistic cinematographic efforts breathtaking to witness; the planet earth series for example. If you want a rather startling demonstration of HD vs. SD, then check out Jon in the video below:
I don’t think that anyone will actually put up an argument that SD is better or the same as HD, we’re past that. However, there are still a large group of people that refuse to treat themselves to this extra viewing pleasure because of the price. Let me break it down.
For around $10-$20 dollars more a month (at least in Canada), you can watch movies in anamorphic widescreen, instead of a grainy square box. You will actually see what happens in sports and put and end to those embarrassing moments when you accidentally cheer for the other team, because not enough photons are hitting your retina to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys. Finally, you can start entertaining guests at your house again and people will actually show up!
For those that are still not on board, I have a suggestion. Just cancel your cable and subscribe to your favourite shows for online transcripts after the broadcast. That way you can read your shows and not be bothered with any bills at all! Some examples follow:
Sports:
Announcer: The guys got the ball. He’s gonna try to score it…and he does!
Fans appear to enjoy this
Announcer: You had to see it to believe it! You gotta love sports!
Multiple men in uniforms celebrate, while the men in the other uniforms appear to be upset
Nature channel:
Animals abound
A man is speaking but he is not on camera
The Forest flourishes
The Biggest Loser:
A big man is doing pushups
A bigger woman is running on a treadmill
A man that is the size of the big man plus the bigger woman is watching them and reconsidering if cannibalism can truly be abhorent in EVERY situation
Come on…make the change. You deserve it.
Entertainment Maven 