Does it bug anyone else when photographers letterbox their images?

[Rajah Sulayman]

I'm seeing it a lot on Flickr lately--photographers who add black letterboxes to their 16:9 photos--and I don't know why but it really annoys me. It feels like they're trying to add some sort of cinematic feel or otherwise legitimize their photos. It just feels unnecessary and superfluous and--I'll be honest--a little bit pretentious. All it does is for me detract from the image and make me like it less. Am I alone in this, or does manual letterboxing of photos bother anyone else?

[OsmosisStudios]

Originally Posted by Rajah Sulayman

. It feels like they're trying to add some sort of cinematic feel or otherwise legitimize their photos. It just feels unnecessary and superfluous and--I'll be honest--a little bit pretentious.

Why? What does having black stripes on the top and bottom make you SO angry? What is so vile about it?

[essvee]

I think it falls under the category of what someone chooses to do with *their* photograph.

Sometimes I think it's OK, others I find it detracts from the image. It's a case by case thing for me. Also, I think some use it to make sure there is definition of the subject from the background. A high key image, for example, can get lost against a white or light background and might benefit from a border of some kind to insure the viewer knows where the image begins and ends.

[Rajah Sulayman]

Originally Posted by OsmosisStudios

Why? What does having black stripes on the top and bottom make you SO angry? What is so vile about it?

How did you manage to read one short paragraph and infer so much that wasn't said yet simultaneously ignore what was said? I never said it made me angry, I said it annoyed me. It's a pet peeve. That's what pet peeves do. They bother us for reasons not readily apparent to us. Which is what I said in the OP when I said "and I don't know why but..."

I was simply asking if I was alone in this, and I guess I was.

[slc_shutterbug]

Doesn't bother me in the slightest. And I would not let something like this influence my feeling of an image overall. "Oh, I would have liked this had you not done that...." that just doesn't make sense to me.

[Rajah Sulayman]

Originally Posted by essvee

I think some use it to make sure there is definition of the subject from the background. A high key image, for example, can get lost against a white or light background and might benefit from a border of some kind to insure the viewer knows where the image begins and ends.

I definitely see the merit to bordering or framing an image, your example of High or Low Key images being perfect cases. Likewise, for some reason an image with a thick white border around it seems "classier," I suppose because the thick white border subconsciously reminds me of mat board.

With letterboxing, though, I don't know. It just bugs me. Maybe it's because it feels like they're trying to make their shots seem cinematic. Maybe it's because it's almost entirely unnecessary, especially in the shots I see it used on. I find it just distracts me from the image, drawing my attention away from it, rather than to it. These are all just guesses, though. I don't really know why it annoys me, only that it does.

[Rajah Sulayman]

Originally Posted by slc_shutterbug

And I would not let something like this influence my feeling of an image overall. "Oh, I would have liked this had you not done that...." that just doesn't make sense to me.

It isn't so much that it affects my judgment of an image as it affects my ability to view the image, if that makes sense. Kind of like if someone had matted their shot in big, hot pink board (imagine, 6" borders all around). I'm so distracted by the presentation it distracts me from the image.

[Nicole]

Just out of curiosity, is it just the ones that are cut down to 16:9 with black borders or do the ones that are left at regular aspect ratios and use the black letterbox sort of things to go to 1:1 also bother you? I seem to be seeing the latter more than the former (unless it's just a generalisation and it's the same thing to you ). My opinion is it's kind of like everything: I've seen it used well, I've seen it used not so well. I can take it or leave it.

[Rajah Sulayman]

Originally Posted by Nicole

Just out of curiosity, is it just the ones that are cut down to 16:9 with black borders or do the ones that are left at regular aspect ratios and use the black letterbox sort of things to go to 1:1

I actually haven't seen the latter at all, curiously enough. Do you know of some examples off hand? I'd be interested in seeing them.

It's mostly just 16:9s that are letterboxed to 4:3. If used judiciously, I suppose it wouldn't be as annoying, but upon checking the photostreams for some of the offenders I've come across in the past, it looked as though they did it for all their photos across the board. Like they just slapped an export action on them. If it were someone doing it sparingly here and there when it was merited and actually added to the photo, that'd be one thing. But to add it to every photo you produce just seems to smack of trying-hard.

[RLucas]

Letterbox anything is a pet peeve of mine. If a movie is in letterbox format, I really have a hard time watching it. I feel like I am squinting to watch it. That being said, I have done one letterbox image, and I actually kind of liked it. It's not something I would otherwise do much of. I think it really needs to fit the context, just not arbitrarily done.