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editing with multiple frame sizes in timeline problem
Have a huge problem-
My sequence and most of my footage is 720×480 DV/DVCPRO-NTSC.
However some other footage that was given to me for this project are in varying aspect ratios: 480×360, 360×244, etc.Over night I let compressor turn these varying formats into DV/DVCPRO, and a SPECIFICALLY told compressor to make sure it conformed the aspect ratios to 720×480.
However when I tried working with the footage today…turns out all the footage just kept its unique aspect ratios. Great..
So when I try to import a 360×244 DV/DVCPRO clip into my 720×480 DVCPRO sequence, FCP cuts off huge portions of the video, and no matter what I try (conform to video, distort feature), the video is cut off. The source footage looks fine, but put it into the sequence…basically unusable and all squeezed. (Not my 720×480 footage though, which looks fine).
Does anyone have any idea how to just….have FCP conform differing aspect ratios to 720×480? Surely it can be done…I hope…or else I’m not meeting my deadline for tomorrow and I have to re-compress everything to 720×480 🙁
Thanks for the help-
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6 Replies
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Thanks for the reply. While the manual shows me how to turn off FCP automatically setting scaling…it still isn’t solving the fact that FCP is literally CUTTING my image off…quite randomly actually.
It’s as if when I drag a clip into the sequence, FCP has decided to just remove 45% of my video, and no parameter adjustment will get it back (only mess around with the remaining video).
Any thought to why FCP is being so…tyrannical with this?
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Wilson,
You are literally trying to squeeze a square peg into a round hole.
Something has to give. Either you crop or you stretch, but it’s physically impossible NOT to alter the image to match the new size.
It seems to me that you’re looking for an “Easy Button” to deal with your lack of preproduction preparation. Next time, spend a few minutes thinking about these fundamental issues BEFORE you shoot. You’ll save yourself hours of grief.
Mark
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Hi Mark, thanks for the response.
I get that, you’re going to be loosing image size. But what I’m trying to do…is manually choose which part of the image I’m loosing. Right now, for whatever reason, FCP is choosing the top left corner of the image automatically when I drag the video into the sequence, making the image absolutely unusable.
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Nothing happens when you right click the offending clip and select “Remove Attributes?” That should reduce the file back to its original size.
FCP cannot just “cut off” video from a frame that you cannot retrieve. You might have to distort the image, but you can bring it back.
As for Compressor, sounds like you had it set to 100% of Source when you tried to make your conversion. Therefore all of the videos retained their original frame sizes.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Editor, Colorist, Director, Writer, Consultant, Author, Chef.
HD Post and Production
Biscardi Creative Media“Foul Water, Fiery Serpent” Winner, Best Documentary, LA Reel Film Festival.
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I’m having a similar dilemma, but for different reasons (I’m attempting to transcode cell-phone 3GP video to a QuickTime movie and thus avoid the need to render once in FCE).
The transcoding works fine, and produces a 720×480 (DV-NTSC) video from the 480×352 original. I bring it into FCE and the clip looks fine in the viewer, but once in the timeline the canvas shows only a cropped-in portion. Scaling doesn’t do anything but make the same cropped-in area appear smaller in the canvas, with black around it.
I _think_ part of the problem is that FCE sees the frame size still as 480×352 (the Mac OS Finder displays these same dimensions), whereas the QuickTime Player insists its a 720×480 size (pillarboxed; it shows a 640×480 actual size). My theory is that FCE is behaving as if the video is smaller than it really is; it essentially stops “reading” once it has read 480×352.
I do not, unfortunately, have a theory of what to do about it.
-Kevin
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