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Aspect Ratio and importing photos
Hi Everyone, and a HUGE congrats to Media 100 for releasing Producer!
I’m on my Powerbook G4 17″ using DV 16×9.
2 questions:
Question 1:
When importing media into After Effects, how should I set the media? When I Aquire with M100 Producer from DV using 16×9 set to SD 720×486, and view the media it’s ok. But, when I see the footage in the finder, or in After Effects the file opens as 720×486 and the image is squished. Does anyone know the frame size I should use to reset the image? What pixel size should I set the media to? Is there a better or different way to Aquire?Quetion 2:
I shoot my stills with a Canon Digital Rebel, and store them all in iPhoto. Then, when I import them into Media 100, it looks like it is close but no cigar. I’m using SD 720×486 16×9 in M100. Ok so I think I need to first CROP the image in iPhoto. Does anyone know the exact numbers for the crop to keep the perfect aspect ratio? I’m a bit rusty, and appreciate the help.Thanks!
Ethan- -
4 Replies
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Hey Ethan,
QuickTime does handle Widescreen (anamorphic) material not too well, so there is no good way to get the QuickTime files to look “correct” in the Finder. If you are going to AE it depends on the way you use. If you have a 16:9 timeline in Media 100 (Producer), and you do an “Export to AfterEffects” and an Import into AE with the included AE importer plugin all your asect rate settings will be handled automatically.
If you want to import files “manually” by creating a new AE project and importing single Media 100 QuickTimes you should use AEs “Interpret Footage” setting to tell it that your clips are PAL or NTSC WideScreen. If you then create a PAL or NTSC Widescreen composition AE will handle all aspect rate conversions for you, including mixing with 4:3 clips or e.g. Square Pixel Photos or Graphics files.
One additional hint: at the bottom of AEs Composition window is a little button that switches between square pixel view (which is usually sharper since each video pixel gets mapped to one computer display pixel) and aspect rate corrected pixel mode. There WideScreen footage and comps may look a little bit pixelated (AE does stretch each pixel to a WideScreen Mode which is not ideal for Computer displays), but you are looking at your correct aspect ratio. And as soon as you will see your footage on a video screen everything will be fine. -
Hi Floh,
Thanks for the help! First, when I export out of Media 100 Producer to After Effects, it creates an XML file that can not be imported into AE 7.0.
So, I tried to bring the footage in by itself. I set the comp size to 1152 X 648 and also resized the footage to be the same pixel count. It looks pretty good. I think I got it.
Anyone have an idea on the field dominance for de-interlacing? I’m rendering to DV for re-import back to M100.
Thanks!
Ethan- -
[Ethan Becker] “Thanks for the help! First, when I export out of Media 100 Producer to After Effects, it creates an XML file that can not be imported into AE 7.0.”
You need to copy the Media 100 AE importer Component which is in your Media 100 Producer folder into YourAEFolder->Plugins->Standard->Formats to read the XML files.
[Ethan Becker] “I set the comp size to 1152 X 648 and also resized the footage to be the same pixel count. It looks pretty good. I think I got it. “
If it looks good it does not mean it is “correct”. 1152 x 648 is definitely not a “video” size, so you won
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Hi Floh,
Thanks again. Yes, yes, yes, the AE importer. I remember when we shipped it. I totaly forgot all about it! Thank you so much. And thanks for the advice on the file size. I found 1152×648 on a google search of 16×9 frame size. For the most part, I’m not doing mission critical production, mostly music videos for online distribution.
I’d like to learn a cool and or regular system for going back and forth to and from AE in the 16×9 format.
Thanks again for replying to my post. I appreciate it.
Best,
Ethan-
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