Widescreen becomes Default to YouTube – The Change Begins Now

[UPDATE 12/4/08: YouTube has now enabled Widescreen embeds.]

YouTube has officially switched from the default 4:3 ratio to a 16:9 ratio for videos playing on their website. This is definitely great for future web video content. Now there’s a reason to upload videos in 16:9 ratio. Obviously there’s a difference between 16:9 and true high definition, but YouTube is taking it one step at a time.

In the past, YouTube’s user generated videos and professionally produced videos looked practically identical. We’re finally getting to the point where we may see a rift occur between these user generated content and professional content. When YouTube began, it didn’t matter what quality you uploaded the video at because it looked like crap. Earlier in the year, YouTube enabled high quality video streams and now that it has defaulted to a widescreen display, there is a reason for content producers to actually care about the visual quality of their footage!

This will only help the internet web video industry as a whole. If there has been one reason why advertisers have been hesitant to step into the web video market, it has been because a lot of web video shows don’t look and feel like a traditional TV show. By having YouTube, the king website for web videos, shift their focus from low resolution videos to high resolution videos, the web video industry will grow and evolve.

This is a big day for not only web video content producers, but consumers as well. We’re finally getting to the point where quality matters.

Eva Longoria in The Avengers?!

And you’d think it’s still too early to talk about a movie coming out in 2011. But it’s never too early for Marvel comic book adaptations, especially after their masterstroke, Iron Man. So we do have a good idea now about what movies we can expect from Marvel, but isn’t cast speculation a little too early?

And if it’s too early for cast speculation, shouldn’t it be a little unthinkable that they’ve already started casting? Hell, Favreau only gave us fuzzy details of Iron Man 2, it would be shocking if they’ve already started putting stars as The Avengers.

Rumour is, Eva Longoria may be cast in it. Yes, that Eva Longoria from Desperate Housewives (like you were thinking of another, pfft). How does this rumour crop up? Look at the image above. Yes, Longoria was seen at the Marvel Studios offices and went out carrying a bunch of those Avengers issues. Coincidence? Sudden fandom?

Seemingly, she wasn’t too careful on hiding those, so it could either mean that it’s supposed to be a misleading hype-event or a direct declaration. Hmm.

“Eli Stone”: Legal Drama, with a Twist of Fantasy

Eli Stone: The Complete First Season
ABC Studios
Starring Jonny Lee Miller, Natasha Henstridge, Matt Letscher, and Victor Garber
Rated TV-PG
559 minutes (13 episodes on four discs)
Release Date: September 02, 2008

For the past four years, Lost has delivered elements of fantasy, the supernatural, and science-fiction to audiences willing to go along for the journey. Viewers have been witness to mysterious island-dwellers, polar bears, and an organization known as the Dharma Initiative. With these types of fantastical elements, Lost has become a success and continues to attract viewers. I would go so far as to say we keep watching because nothing is ever explained and we want to know the answers. In the case of the new series, Eli Stone, Continue reading ““Eli Stone”: Legal Drama, with a Twist of Fantasy”

Holy Lego Cartoon Series, Batman!

Lego Batman

Batman will be hitting the TV again, and I’m not talking about The Batman here. Instead, Traveller’s Tales, developers of all those great Lego games will be handling this. Yes, that’s right, we’re talking about a Lego Batman cartoon series by a video game developer! Awesome!

“We’re looking to do… a Lego Batman series. I think they’re looking at doing a one-off initially,” Rich Earl, producer at TT said. The series will use the game’s engine itself, and the characters will animated fresh from Maya.

Earl claims that this will be quite different, and that’s totally fine by me. Traveller’s Tales earlier announced that they had their minds on a TV cartoon series, but did not mention any specifics. This news confirms that a 20-minute Batman cartoon will be on, and hopefully make its way to its own series!

I hope LucasArts looks at this and decides that a Lego Star Wars TV series will be worth its salt. Hell, from what I can tell, that might even end up better than that battlefest kid’s show The Clone Wars. Well, it’s not that bad, but a Lego Star Wars TV series might end up somewhere. Or not.