In the world of standard-definition video, which traditionally has been using interlaced scanning, it is also known as quasi-interlace,[1] progressive recording[2] or movie mode.
Charles Poynton, an authority in digital television, made the following remark in his book: "Proponents of [PsF] scheme claim compatibility with interlaced processing and recording equipment, a dubious objective in my view.
"[1] William F. Schreiber, former Director of the Advanced Television Research Program at MIT, suspected that the continued advocacy of interlaced equipment originated from consumer electronics companies that were trying to get back the substantial investments they had made in obsolete technology.
One of the documented examples of PsF usage is the 2003 transfer of the film "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" to DVD, performed by Artisan Entertainment and THX.
[7] PsF has been recognized by Recommendation ITU-R BT.709 as a legitimate way to transport progressive frames within an interlaced system.
The 2:2 pulldown scheme had originally been designed for interlaced displays, so fine vertical details are usually filtered out to minimize interline twitter.
This is how Sony described the progressive recording mode in the operating guide for a 60 Hz ("NTSC") Sony DCR-HC96 camcorder: Note on the progressive recording modeIn a normal TV broadcast, the screen is divided into 2 finer fields and these are displayed in turn, every 1/60 of a second.
This enables compatibility with current editing and monitoring equipment that only accept interlaced signals, while maintaining the quality of the 25p image.
To ensure compatibility with interlaced-based systems, chroma information in PsF video is sometimes recorded in interlaced format, despite that the content is progressive.