What If The Original Star Trek Series Had Been Shot In Ultra-Widescreen?

Back in the 1960s, when Star Trek was filmed, everything on TV was shot using the 4:3 aspect ratio (like above).

Today, when you look at a TV series of that vintage on your giant flat-screen TV, you get those black bars on either side of the image.

To some, they're so annoying that they can't watch. Others who don't understand aspect ratios think part of the picture is missing.

Those of us around in the 4:3 era are perfectly able to watch this aspect ratio on modern TVs. The younger generation have a tougher time of it.

There is one widescreen version of the Original Star Trek series floating around. Right now, it's airing on the Horror Channel - a Freesat satellite TV channel in the UK, though it's not broadcast in high definition.

The series has been reframed for widescreen broadcast and some effort was put into how headshots and visuals are framed, rather than the picture simply being zoomed in so it fills the width of the screen.

This widescreen version has never been released commercially on DVD or Blu-Ray.

So what would original Star Trek look like if it had been given the cinematic treatment, with aspect ratios even wider than today's 16:9 format?

Nick Acosta asked that very question a couple of years ago. He took screengrabs of scenes as the camera panned over them and then stitched them together. Here's what he came up with...

 

 

 

 

You can see his full collection of images here: http://cargocollective.com/nickacosta/Star-Trek-in-Cinerama