The VideoLAN Forums

Clicking the full screen button in the upper left of the player only opens to fit the screen. The shortcut Ctrl-Cmd-F fills the background with black. The player however remains in the Finder space. On every Mac application full screen, whether with the button or the shortcut, fills the screen with the application and puts it in its own space. The VLC Player should do this as well.

You should have the following preferences enabled:

Preferences/Video/Fullscreen settings

Start in fullscreen (box checked)
Use the native fullscreen mode (box checked)

Try simply using command-f for fullscreen mode, not control-command-f

Thanks Lornadoo. I set those preferences and closed the application. I launched a file into VLC but it didn’t open to full screen only to actual size. I tried Cmd-f and the full screen button, but both leave the application in the Finder space. If I’m in VLC and use the App Switcher go to the Finder I still see the player, either just the player or a Finder window if there’s one open.

Hmm... that is an odd problem. What version of VLC are you using?

Have you tried trashing your VLC preferences and starting over?

Quit VLC
Go to your user library folder and delete the two files below:
~Library/Preferences/org.videolan.vlc
~Library/Preferences/org.videolan.vlc.plist

Restart VLC and set the fullscreen preferences I mentioned in my first reply above.

It should work... fingers crossed...

Yes. Thank you. It works correctly.

I can confirm that as of ver. 308 the full-screen view is not a native one no matter what troubleshooting is done. Trashed those files, restarted – no difference: still just fits the screen. I went to advanced prefs, ticked/unticked "Use Standard" – no difference.
Mac OS X Lion.