Wide Screen LCD panals and subtitles - Question

[fredfred]

Using a 800x600 projector I can display Japanese subtitles off screen (16x9 movie) in the black bars at the bottom of the screen when I select 4:3 mode on my DVD player. This has two advantages 1) Subtitle free picture 2) The subtitle are easier to read with the black background.

My question is: Is there any adjustment on wide screen LCD projectors that allows you do the same thing without reverting to the 4:3 mode, which would defeat the purpose of buying a wide screen LCD in the first place. I have see it done on a 16x9 TV, my friend used the remote to select full Widescreen anamorphic - 2.35:1 (many of my Japanese DVD's have both 16x9 and Wide Screen 2.35:1) which creates the black bars for the subtitles. Can you do the same with the Panasonic TH-AE100? or any other projector while still mantaining a correct aspect ratio?

 

[richard plumb]

Good question!

the panasonic AE100 will allow you to use a 'wide' mode, which behaves the same as a widescreen TV. Set your DVD player up as 16:9 and it'll output properly.

But I don't know where subtitles go. Can anyone help here? On a 2.35:1 movie, are the subtitles in the black bars? I suppose then you couldn't mask off the screen.

On 1.85:1 movies, I suppose the subtitles would be overlaid on the picture.