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Anamorphic Blues
Hi folks, I really appreciate any feedback you may have.
I posed some similar questions to the folks at the FCP board, but here’s the more AVID sided part of my question:
I just finished editing a DV film on FCP 4.5, shot and edited within the anamorphic aspect ratio. The producers of the film would now like to online it on an AVID, I’m assuming so that they can output it on Dbeta. I’ve searched this forum and it seems like there isn’t a tried and true method of converting the stretched footage to letterboxed 1.85. Would it be best to output a tape of the anamorphic film and convert it at a tape transfer house? Or is there a way to import a quicktime from FCP?
Or should we be keeping this whole project in anamorphic, even on the AVID to eliminate any image quality loss? There is a possibility that we’re going to uprez this footage to HD…so wouldn’t it be best to leave it anamorphic on our output Dbeta tape and then run it through a conversion box at a tape transfer house to go from anamorphic Dbeta to correct aspect HDcam?
Thanks!
Tim -
1 Reply
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There is a method of converting anamorphic to letterbox: change the vertical size of the footage to 75%. That gives you 1.78:1 (16×9) letterbox. If desired, put the 1.85 film mask effect on top.
Part of on-line editing is knowing what needs to be made to fulfill the deliverables. If you plan on doing an upconversion, I would make an anamorphic master. Then you can go to hi-def or Ntsc letterbox as necessary.
Bill Stephan
Senior Editor/DVD Author
USA Studios
New York City
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