-
hdv and dv, 16:9 and 4:3 all mixed up in same sequence. Advice would be lovely please.
Hi
I’ve arrived half way through someone else’s problem and really could do with advice please.
I have premiere pro cs5 with 4:3 DV and 16:9 HDV footage in the same project.
I have it all rendering as i type in a 16:9 DV sequence with the obvious black bars on the sides of the 4:3 DV footage.
I understand there will be loss in the down grading from hdv to dv in the sequence. The final output will be to encore and a dvd. Is this an (acceptable) route to be taking/ will i get a watchable result. I know it is a bit of a cop out but it is not an important job and time is critical.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I didn’t want to waffle on so ……. -
3 Replies
-
If your end product is SD-DVD and Web then edit in an SD 4×3 sequence.
Scaling the HD will still look good and can fill the screen on some shots and be letterboxed on others.
JMOChris Tompkins
Video Atlanta LLC -
Believe it or not my first instinct was to put it in a 4:3 sequence but someone had me believe that the mix of ratio would not play well on widescreen tv.
Thanks very much though.
I’ll let this render finish then set it of in 4:3 aswell. -
If a lot of the footage is HDV, then I would edit as widescreen 16:9. Here’s the reason – if you letterbox the 16:9 as 4:3, when viewers watch the final 4:3 video on a 16:9 screen, it will be BOTH letterboxed AND pillarboxed, with a small video in the center of their screen! You’re just “dumbing down” the whole production quality.
Assuming the majority of viewers now own flat panels (16:9 native), then create the video for those viewers, unless the great MAJORITY of footage is 4:3.
For the 4:3 footage in the 16:9 project, you have a couple of options. One would be to scale the 4:3 footage up to fill the 16:9 frame, and adjust the vertical positioning as needed for proper image cropping. Now it matches the 16:9 footage, full screen.
On 4:3 clips that you do not wish to crop, rather than have black pillar bars on the side, pick a nice background graphic of some sort. Or better yet – put a copy of the clip for the background, stretch to fill 16:9 frame, and add BLUR effect. I often see this on documentary shows and it works nicely because the colors of the background then of course match what is happening in the foreground video, looks good.
If exporting a copy of the 16:9 DV video for the web, don’t use 720×480 or the video will be squished, as players don’t recognize anamorphic widescreen. Export as 854×480, using square pixels (1.0 pixel aspect).
Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up