What's HD Format

HD Format

Apparently, High-Definition is the "new" way to watch videos. But how much do you know about HD format? When talking about HD video, it usually refers to the videos with a higher resolution compared with common videos. Based on the resolution and how many pixels high the video footage is, HD video can be divided into two categories: 1280×720 pixels or 1920×1080 pixels, which are considered to be the standard high-definition resolutions. Both resolutions are within the 16:9 aspect ratio and can be abbreviated as 1080i or 720p.

Overall speaking, HD video can be classified as common HD video and extra HD video.

Common HD Video: 1280×720 pixels(720p),1920×1080 pixels(1080i), 1920×1080 pixels(1080p).

Extra HD Video: 2048×1536 pixels(2K), 3840×2160 pixels(2160p), 4096×3072 pixels(4K), 4520×2540 pixels(2540p)and 7680×4320 pixels(4320p). More and more camcorders are able to produce recordings in extra HD resolution, for example, Sony FDR-AX1 2K camcorder, Sony PMW-F5/F55, GoPro Hero3, GY-HMQ10U 4K HD camcorder, etc.

So far, the technology of high definition video has gained a wide used in various aspects, such as video recording formats ( D5 HD, HDCAM, HDCAM-SR, XDCAM HD, HDV,DVCPRO HD,AVC-Intra, AVCHD, etc), television broadcast (HDTV), gaming industry, website field, the optical disc delivery system Blu-ray Disc, video tape format D-VHS and so on. Currently, there are a few online video streaming websites offering HD videos, such as YouTube, Vimeo, Hulu, Amazon Video On Demand, Netflix Watch Instantly and so forth. However, the video quality produced is usually inferior to that of broadcast HD due to heavy compression issue. On the other hand, the PlayStation 3 game console and Xbox 360 systems are able to output native 1080p through HDMI or component cables, but with few 1080p games provided since most of them can run natively at 720p or less, but can be upscaled to 1080p. However, the image produced by native 1080p is much sharper and clearer than that of the upscaled 1080p. Users are allowed to download high-definition videos/movies from the PlayStation Network or Xbox Video services and then stream them to the game consoles for playback freely. Notes: if you would like to play the local HD videos downloaded from elsewhere, say, play 1080p MKV on Xbox 360, you'd better get help from an external converter to break the format limitation first.

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