Nathan Snyder of owyheesound has an interesting writeup on using old anamorphic projector lenses to squeeze true widescreen images out of a cheap DV camera without losing valuable vertical resolution by cropping/letterboxing.

“Put simply an anamorphic lens can squeeze a wide image to fit onto a typical format like 4:3 mini-DV cameras…A cheap and easy way to get experience using an anamorphic lens is to use readily available anamorphic projector lenses. Though these lenses were not designed to be used for cameras they can none the less be easily modified to be used with a camera. These projector lenses have the same basic abilities as the original Cinemascope lenses.”

A very do-it-yourself solution that might help eke a little extra filmmaking mileage out of great 4:3 SD cameras like the DVX100.