converting ntsc .mov to halfsize .flv for the web

[Bret Williams]

[Harvola] “greetings. i’m an old school motion graphics designer trying to keep up.

i want to use AFX to prep my show reel files for the web.

my web builder is going to convert whatever i give him to .flv
he says just make them the pixel size i want with lossless compression,
and he’ll convert them.

my originals are NTSC DV 720×480 .mov – with stereo audio at 41.100

a friend recommended shrinking them to iPod video size 320×240,
but that is a mathematic reduction of a DV Square Pixel size 720×540.

(i’ve read the CC tutorial on square pixels but it didn’t really tell me
what i should do in this case)

should i render my new smaller size comps in SQUARE PIXELS ?
should i just reduce to half size (360×240) or should i force-fit to 320×240
or should i crop slightly to 320×240 ?

should i consider field or non-field render ?
should i reduce the audio to mono to save bandwidth ?

another friend recommends Sorenson Squeeze but i am comfortable in AFX.”

Your friend is right. Render your comp to 320×240. Which if you know your math is the same as 4:3, which IS the same as non-square 720×480, or square 720×534. 720×480 is NON-SQUARE pixels, which can only be shown properly by a television, not computers. Computers only deal with square pixels. So yes, force fit your 720×480 to 320×240. Do not field render as computers don’t play back fields and it will look like mush. I personally think the best way to save bandwidth is to reduce to 15fps AND make it mono. Keep it 16 bit but you can reduce to 22khz or 32khz.

320×240 is actually 1/4 the size, not half.

[Chris Harvey]

thanks! – but i’m still confused about this:

should i select SQUARE PIXELS in my comp set-up ?
(this AFX comp is strictly for generating these files for the website.)

also: i’m no math whiz, but 320 x 2.25 = 720 and 240 x 2.25 = 540
…doesn’t that make 320 x 240 the equivalent of 720 x 540 ?

sorry to be so rudimentary! – this puzzles my very analog mind.

[Bret Williams]

No need to make a comp a particular size. Do it all in the render que.

Drop your DV file into a DV comp just as normal. On output, simply output at 320×240. Non-field rendered. 15fps. 22khz mono, 16bit, etc.