High definition ads
By Richard Lawler 
posted Oct 24th 2005 10:17PM
posted Oct 24th 2005 10:17PM
I was watching Monday Night Football a moment ago when I noticed something odd about the advertisements.It took me a minute, but then I realized the ad was taking up the entire screen, instead of being in 4x3 like most ads. Around 9:20 or so, the Coors Light NFL "Love train" ad featuring the Patriots and the IBM helpdesk ad that followed (the "vault" one), were in 16x9. The Coors Light ad was definitely in high definition, it was crystal clear while the IBM ad appeared to just be upconverted as it was a bit grainy, but not stretched.
Well, I guess that answers that question. Football is your favorite sport to watch in high definition and I'm not surprised to see networks and ad agencies responding to that, I may use my DVR to fast forward through other ads but I will watch anything in high def.
I haven't seen full high definition ads since Sony's ads during the Olympics, have any of you noticed advertisers sneaking in high definition advertisements?
Maff, actually although some ads in the US are in widescreen, watching thme on high def channels usually means seeing a 16:9 widescreen ad shown in a 4:3 winodw inside of a 16:9 frame.
Yeah, ass-tastic is the word i'm looking for there.
The mastercard commercial with Kate Winslet, and some soap commercial. All I've seen so far.
I'd really like to know why more commercials for movies aren't in HD, cause it's such a waste of space having black bars all around, and it's not like the source material isn't that hard to convert in the first place...
Actually, it's the American Express commercial with Kate Winslet. ;)
Target has had a few during How I met your Mother on CBS...about two weeks ago, I believe.
So aren't most adverts in the US in widescreen?
Our government has forced all advertisments to be in widescreen and it's been like that for a few years now (most have done it themselves since Digital TV started in 99)
We just want Hi-def now but that's not launching til next year and it's not likely to take off that well to start with
I'm in the UK by the way
i think all circuitcity commericals on discovery hd are in widescreen
During Sunday's NFL games, I noticed that the Sharp Aquos ads were HD. Pretty good strategy when you're selling HDTV's...
This has been going on since the start of the football season, actually. Possibly earlier, but that is when I noticed it.
Ya but Josh, admit it, they have been FEW and FAR between to even hardly notice them.
Actually when I have watched like a Hockey game on HD Net it is almost funny when they have a 4:3 SD commercial on, it looks so bad. But when the broadcast channels do an HD commercial, I almost don't notice unless I look hard enough at them, Man you have to love that DVR to skip them all together.
Not being a football fan has robbed me of those oh-so-wonderful HD commercials. *SOB* But seriously, I find the 4:3 commercials annoying too, and still haven't seen any HD ones on the HD programming I watch. (Which is getting less and less, now that I can't get Smallville in HD in Ottawa.)
The Masters golf tournament started running true HD ads 2 years ago on CBS.
Woe is me. The Bears game on CBS was in SD this week, not HD.
Even my wife could tell that it wasn't HD, that's how bad it looked! Almost unwatchable (especially when you combine it with the fact that it was Da Bears playing. They're not very good).
Selest:
actually, 2 years ago the masters was broadcast commercial free, so i'm guessing they didn't have HD commercials that year.
There was a high def Target ad on Grey's Anatomy last week.