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Safe and title safe for dual use (online and broadcast)
I run an online video service and 99.9% of our videos are only ever seen in an online player which has left me with the following options, none of which I like.
- Ignore title safe and pretend that the online player is the only player. Unfortunately, when we do play on videos on TV (our reception TV loop, at tradeshows, etc.) the titles get cropped
- Plan for both and stay within the broadcast safe title space. Unfortunately that leaves the vast majority of the time our videos are viewed with L3s and “rundown” graphics a lot farther from the edge than looks normal online.
- Export two versions of the video where we crop out the “extra” space around the edges to make the online version look better. Unfortunately that’s an extra step in an already busy workflow (might be some automation option there) but it ALSO means I’m creating an odd resolution for web usage which means it will be stretched and scaled to meet many sizes (i.e. 1920×1080 now becomes 1900×1010 or something and thus gets stretched to fit 1080)
- Export two versions where I scale the normal 1920×1080 video to approx 110% so that the online version is still in a 1080 resolution but doesn’t have the extra space around the edges. Unfortunately that starts me off with a soft source file before the encoding/transcoding to different sizes and bitrates even begins.
What have others done for this scenarios?
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7 Replies
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Hmmmm….
I understand your dilemma. But your ratio says a lot.
you’re trying to account for homogenizing a workflow for the .1% of videos that will go to broadcast. In my mind, that’s sacrificing a lot for the fraction of work that will be viewed on TV…
But I understand that things can get really busy, and splintering formats do complicate things.
So…
When you say “titlesafe for broadcast”
are you referring to a standard HD aspect frame
or
are you referring to 4:3 center cut within an HD frame?
knowing that might help me to help you.
thanks!
Alex Udell
Editing, Motion Graphics, and Visual FX
Let’s Connect on Linkedin
Examples: Retail Automotive Motion Graphics Spots
Example: Customer Facing Explainer Video
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Thanks for your interest in helping!I am referring to the typical HD safe/title space.
the embedded image is an example of how by using what you would consider normal spacing between the edges of the frame for online delivery would cause you trouble on a typical TV (when this is shown on the TV in our reception area, the first letter or two on the left is over-scanned and the text on the bottom is much too close to the bottom of the TV – the ligatures below the baseline of the text get cut off), but it looks normal online.
I think your point is well taken that whatever the extra time is needed to make our content more suitable for typical TV delivery is just he cost of doing business when the vast majority of our audience is online.
Guess that’s the best answer at this point.
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[Tia Now] ”
Plan for both and stay within the broadcast safe title space. Unfortunately that leaves the vast majority of the time our videos are viewed with L3s and “rundown” graphics a lot farther from the edge than looks normal online.
“I wouldn’t worry too much about that. A lot of TV content is getting streamed so viewers used to seeing TV title safe on streaming content.
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Also there’s a bunch of TV’s that have overscan on by default so you might be still losing something. If this a concern to you make all your stuff with the safe areas in mind.
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Probably best handled in AE because it can be batched and there are tools our there to help automate this once you have it set up.
A cheat that is used often, is design for the web size,
then in a comp at at the Broadcast RES,
scale to fit within safe,
layer the file over itself, then scale up the background proportionally to fill the frame…
and then blur it a bit.
In AE you can essentially open the project, replace the footage in the project panel, edit the comp duration as necessary, or if you get fancier there are ways to batch out comps from a setup…
so it’s separate masters, but it takes minimal effort to make the versions.
hth,
Alex Udell
Editing, Motion Graphics, and Visual FX
Let’s Connect on Linkedin
Examples: Retail Automotive Motion Graphics Spots
Example: Customer Facing Explainer Video
Example: Infotainment & Package editorial -
Oh yeah, essentially the cell phone in portrait mode treatment. Very interesting idea.
If I can automate the process within AE that might be what I’m looking for… an automated way to make my online-only content work “well” on TVs.
Thanks all for the comments!
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Hi Tia…
Here’s a couple of the automators:
https://aescripts.com/compsfromspreadsheet/
https://aescripts.com/templater/
🙂
Alex Udell
Editing, Motion Graphics, and Visual FX
Let’s Connect on Linkedin
Examples: Retail Automotive Motion Graphics Spots
Example: Customer Facing Explainer Video
Example: Infotainment & Package editorial
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