-
FCP X 4:3 to 16:9 Pillarbox effect
Hoping someone in the community can help me.
I’m trying to create a pretty simple pillarbox fill effect. My project is a 16:9 1080p canvas and I have some 4:3 content. Rather than just have standard black pillarboxes, I would like to fill them with the 4:3 content. In FCP 7 what I would do was duplicate the layer. On the lower layer I would zoom in to around 180% and add a gaussian blur. On the upper layer I would add a 2px crop on the left and right, zoom in to 101% and add a soft drop shadow with a 0 distance to give a bit of seperation between the top and bottom. The effect worked really well.
Problem is, I can’t seem to replicate it in FCP X. I thought maybe I could be all fancy and create a motion effect template that does all of this in one layer (and holy cow would that be awesome). But it appears as though the effect can’t go above and beyond the size of the original video. That means any distortion I did was confided to a 4:3 window.
So then I tried to replicate the effect in FCP X. I can get most of the way there with a blurred lower layer and a top layer that is sized right. But once again I run in to a problem with the drop shadow. It seems that any drop shadow I try and add is also confined to the original 4:3 video size and can drop outside of that as it could in FCP 7.
I’m hoping there is just an uber simple solution I’m not thinking of. Seems to me this is a pretty common effect and a great way to get 4:3 content to look better in a 16:9 canvas. Any thoughts from the community?
Benjamin Higginbotham
Spacevidcast.com
be******@**********st.com -
10 Replies
-
The drop shadow is there but you don’t see it because the 4×3 video has to shrink within it’s 4×3 frame in order for you to see the drop shadow. In shorter words, the drop shadow is being applied to the video and not to its container. Without shrinking the video, the container is limiting your view.
RippleTraining has some free effects to accomplish this but you can create your own in a couple of minutes.
Create a new effect (doing this off the top of my head) and publish the scale control so you can shrink the video inside the placeholder and thus reveal any drop shadow you apply to it. You’ll also have to publish the drop shadow controls for the video as well. I’m sure I’m leaving out a detail or two trying to convey this without Motion in front of me, but you seem savvy enough to fill in those details.
NewsVideo.com
-
I also meant to mention above that you scale down your video within the placeholder but then scale up the placeholder itself so that you can see a drop shadow but still scale the whole thing to 101%.
NewsVideo.com
-
Though it’s not impossible to create this as an effect, it’s pretty easy to do outside of motion. In fact, it’s done the same way that you do it in FCP 7.
Duplicate the clip. Scale the lower clip to whatever you need to in order to make it fit in the 16:9 frame without pillaring. Apply a blur effect to the footage.
Crop the top layer, scale it if you like, and add the drop shadow.
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
-
The problem is the drop shadow; there isn’t for video clips in FCP. A guess you could fake one with a generator of matching size.
All the best,
Tom
Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Coming in 2011 “Complete Training for FCPX” from Class on Demand
“Final Cut Pro X for iMovie and Final Cut Express Users” from Focal Press -
You know, I’ve got to stop posting when I don’t have my X beside me. I don’t know why I thought there was a drop shadow. Perhaps because it’s so similar in UI to Motion now. Ok. I take it back, the easiest thing would be to create a pillarbox effect in Motion. Just clone the placeholder then scale and blur the lower one.
Andy
https://www.timesavertutorials.com
-
Quick solution for you. Just precompose the 4×3 shot in a 16×9 compound clip.
Then it is easy to do the rest in Motion. Here is an effect to get you started.
——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque -
I have tried using this effect but I must be doing something wrong because the effect works great on-screen in FCPX, but when you export out the file, the background (enlarged, blurred, faded) is missing and instead you are left with just black borders on either side of the 4×3 footage.
So here is what I am doing!
Go into project bowser, click on project properties; the spanner, change to amorphic 720×576
1 Place 4×3 footage on timeline
2 Place duplicate footage above as a connected clip
3 Click on bottom clip -click spatial conform and Fill
4 drop on fake 16×9 blur footage effect on bottom clip
5 Adjust to make it look required
6 Share / Export MediaCheers
Wayne
New Zealand -
I just tried this and I see that the exported version is darker that what is seen in FCP X. Perhaps that is what is happening. See here: The one of the left is the QT export, on the right the FCP X interface:
I made that effect pretty quickly, it was more of a proof of concept. Perhaps it is something I did wrong. But the quick fix seems to be to bump up the opacity.
——
T. Payton
OneCreative, Albuquerque -
Thanks
I’ll give it a goSince tried raising the transparency from 8% to 25% and it is now about the same after exporting as the 8% before export. Great, at least I know it now works and I can allow for the difference
Cheers
Wayne
New Zealand -
x
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up