A question about DV-PAL DVD resolution

[Alexander Kallas]

The difference is the ratio between non square and square pixels.
However this conversion will cause any images or videos with square pixels to look “squashed”. Therefore one should use 768×576 images in PAL projects.

Cheers
Alexander

[Damien Molineaux]

Hi,
If my try to explain more precisely. SD digital standards, in both PAL and NTSC use non square pixels.
– For PAL 4:3 it’s 720×576 and upon screening the image is stretched to 768×720, pixel aspect ratio 1.06
– For PAL 16:9 it’s 720×576 and upon screening the image is stretched to 1024×576, pixel aspect ratio 1.42
– For NTSC 4:3 it’s 720×480 and upon screening the image is squeezed to 648×480, pixel aspect ratio 0.9
– For NTSC 16:9 it’s 720×480 and upon screening the image is stretched to 864×480, pixel aspect ratio 1.2

To add still images to video, you start off with the square pixel resolution, in the case of PAL 4:3 that would be 768×576, and you squeeze the image to 720×576 so that it matches the video pixel aspect ratio.

Cheers

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