16:9 playback squashed

[Picxsee]

Thanks for that 🙂 so… other render formats such as WMVs play at correct 16:9 size in those players becuase they are encoded? (ie not uncompressed??) Just trying to get this all clear as have to explain to client. Thanks agian x

[Michael Duff]

no, its not to do with the how it’s encoded it’s that the pixels are actually rectangular … when you look at it on your NLE, or television it will look correct.
maybe read up on:

https://www.creativecow.net/articles/gerard_rick/pixel_madness/

what is the final format for this project? is it going to TV? or staying on the computer or web? if it’s only ever going to be seen on a computer then you shouldn’t be working in rectangular pixels to begin with …

or if you just want to do a render that looks correct on a computer, in the render queue go to output module, then select stretch, then set the dimensions to 720×405. This will squish it back down to look correct on the PC, but don’t use this to publish to broadcast.

If none of this makes any sense at all, spend a bit of time googling around and searching the COW. Once you get your head around square and non-square pixels it will all become clear.. good luck!

[Picxsee]

Ahh thanks – i dont think you understand my question. I totally understand the pixel aspect ratio deal. This is a job to be shown on widescreen tv – we’re supplying a looping dvd and the client also wants the animations as uncompressed avi’s, to be spliced into other sequences. Obviously when they viewed the avi’s on their computer (which is not how they are going to be used! they looked squashed.) I’m simply wondering why windows media player will play a wmv at the correct ratio but play an avi squashed. ta

[Michael Duff]

so a wmv rendered out of exactly the same comp doesn’t play squished? if that’s the case then maybe be a piece of data is written into the file that tells it the pixel aspect ration – then windows media player maybe adjusts to suit…. that’s just a guess though.

for us wmv files always display squished, but we are on macs using flip4mac.

I’d stick to the AVI files that display squished and just explain it to the client.

[Picxsee]

Thanks for that guys – yeh no big drama – have given them the AVIs but was sending nice compressed WMVs for review purposes – hence the confusion when they got the AVIs and they didnt look the same. Was wondering if there might be a setting or something in Windows Media Player to make it play correctly, but guess its just one of those things.

That would be a good idea to pop it into a 1024×576 comp if i had to give an avi for review, but wmvs seem to be working for me in that department.

Cheers!