FCP footage (16×9) into After effects – can’t figure;-(

[David Jolosky]

Hi there,
Vertically stretched, that’s a bit odd. The short answer is this but I’m not sure it’ll help your VERTICAL challenge.

InAfter Effects, DVCPRO HD shows up as 1280×720

Only in FCP HD does it show up as 960×720. Elsewhere, it shows up as 1280×720. AND when you add an uncompressed 1280×720 codec piece of media to a 960×720 DVCPRO HD timeline, it PROPERLY handles aspect ratio.

I’m doing a post project right now with DVCPROHD and using DVCPROHD settings in AE, exporting out and they render just great back to Final Cut.

Hope this info is a bit helpful.

dj

[Todd Gillespie]

Hi Keenast,
I’ve been trying to answer your post for 2 days! Short story is it takes a while to get my laptop up and running.

I was reminded of the same situation a couple months back. I don’t have AE install on my laptop yet, so I can’t double check, but (I believe) you need to go to the ‘interpret footage’ under file and choose the 16×9 option. You also need to have a ‘widescreen’ comp under the settings. It took me a couple of times before I got the correct combo, but it’s there.

Good Luck,

Todd at UCSB
Television Production

[Tom Carter]

Vertical stretching sounds like a problem with pixel aspect ratio to me. Take a look at the Dr. Strangepixel tutorial – it’s to do with how computer monitors have square rather than rectangular pixels and so the footage looks distorted when they display it on screen.

Provided you have your comp settings correct, click the little arrow at the top right of the comp window and click ‘view options’, then check the box that says ‘pixel aspect correction’. This will simulate how the footage will look on a tv rather than a monitor.

If you search the COW there’s lots of threads about this,
Tom