Layered Photoshop Changing Size in FCP

[Alan]

I don’t know if this helps but I’ve had similar problems with changed Photoshop files not updating correctly in FCP. To correct this, I simply deleted the old file from the browser which made it go off-line, then reimported the new revised file and replaced it on the timeline and everything was hunky dory.

[Bryce Whiteside]

This may not be your issue but the trick to bring in Photoshop layers in registration is as follows:

1. In Photoshop create a new layer at the top of your layers and name it Ref or Reference and make sure it is selected.

2. Create a one pixel selection in the upper left hand corner. Hint-zoom all the way in and try and make the small Marquee Tool selection.

3. Go to the Navigator and move your view window all the way to the lower right and hold the Shift key while making the Marquee Tool in the lower right hand corner-you are adding to your first selection that is still in the upper left hand corner.

4. Fill the selection, the two points in the upper left and lower right hand with Black. Hint-Opt+Delete to fill with the foreground color or Cmd+Delete to fill with the background color.

5. Type 0, 1 to make the layer 99% transperant or 01% opaque.

6. In the layer menu hold the Opt key down and select Merge Down from the upper right hand pull down menu (the little arrowhead pointing to right you see at the very top of the Layers Window) over your layer of rasterize text. Then for each layer of rasterized text place your Ref layer just above it and repeat holding the Opt key down and selecting Merge Down from the upper right hand pull down menu making sure you Ref layer is the one selected. What this does is make each layer of rasterized text have the same canvas size and registering the position of your text or any layer element in the photoshop document. Holding the Opt key while selecting Merge Down prevents the Ref frame from destroying itself when Merging Down. It in essences merges a copy of itself down.

7. As a rule of thumb I then place the Ref layer at the top of the document, select it and type 100 to make my two pixel dots in the upper left hand corner and lower right hand corner visible so I can see them if I zoom in to make sure they are there.

If you work in SD ITU-601 you could alway have a template .PSD file with a canvas size of 720 x 540 with your Ref or Reference frame already in there along with a SafeTitle layer. If you work in DV you want a canvas size of 720 x 534. If you use these numbers, FCP will automatically recognize number and resize to 720 x 486 or 720 x 480 respectively. If you use a larger canvas size make sure it is in the TV 4 x 3 square pixel aspect ratio. Let’s say your .PSD canvas is 1440 x 1080 and FCP doesn’t recognize that aspect ratio, go to Motion>Distort>Aspect Ratio and type in -12.5 to achieve the video pixel aspect ratio of .9. Don’t ask me why the Aspect Ratio of -12.5 works in FCP, but I do know that is the number FCP automatically calculates when you import a 720 x 540 .PSD canvas into FCP.

HTH,
Bryce

PS Apple’s knowledge base has some slightly different canvas sizes for Photoshop: Final Cut Pro: Using square or non-square pixels when creating graphics

Don’t worry Mr. B. I have a cunning plan…

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