Letterboxing my work

[Eoin Ryan]

Sorry, I’ve been tyring to upload those images and can’t. I hit browse, select the image and upload. However, the images aren’t in my post.

[David Roth weiss]

[Eoin Ryan] “I’ve been letterboxing my wedding DVDs for years and have had nothing but great feedback.”

Sure, the public don’t have a clue how you shot it or a clue what they should be seeing on their screens. As long as your stuff looks good and sounds good and makes them feel good about taking the plunge, they are happy, at least until they see their neighbor’s video at full-screen or possibly in HD.

[Eoin Ryan] “So based on advice above I’ve edited a clip in anamorphic (no black bars) and dropped it in iDVD, with the intention of playing it on my 16:9 plasma screen. When I did this, the video image filled the whole screen alright, but looked a bit distorted.”

Why are you using iDVD and not DVDSP?

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles

POST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™

A forum host of Creative COW’s Apple Final Cut Pro, Business & Marketing, and Indie Film & Documentary forums.

[Eoin Ryan]

The template menus in iDVD are nicer, according to the people who matter: the couples.

If I was using DVDSP, could I not ask someone “Why are you using DVDSP and not iDVD?”

Why is DVDSP better?

[David Roth weiss]

[Eoin Ryan] “Why is DVDSP better?”

iMovie and iDVD are consumer apps. DVDSP is a professional application. Yes, iDVD is a simple, nearly one button solution, built for convenience, and it’s great for what it is. But, like most things in this world, what you gain in ease of use, you lose in terms of control. The issues you’re having with aspect ratio are one example, others often mention quality issues such as pixelation the DVDs they create with iDVD.

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles

POST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™

A forum host of Creative COW’s Apple Final Cut Pro, Business & Marketing, and Indie Film & Documentary forums.

[Eoin Ryan]

Pixelation was a problem with an earlier version of iDVD. Not now with ‘professional encode’. I hear what you’re saying about control and settings etc. Obviously DVD Studio Pro is ideal for that. But when you don’t need to do that so much, you can use iDVD.

Do you know if there’s much of a difference between the quality of an image I’d get with iDVD and DVD Studio Pro? Different types of encoders I believe? But what are they doing differently?

[David Roth weiss]

It’s possible that Apple has fixed iDVD by replacing its formerly inferior encoding engine with the same one in DVDSP. If that is in fact the the case, and I honestly don’t really know much about it, then at least that obstacle has been removed.

In any case, over the long haul, I think you’ll find that learning DVDSP will ulimately empower you, and it will allow you to make DVDs with more original menus that aren’t the cookie cutter menus that every other wedding videographer is using.

David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles

POST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™

A forum host of Creative COW’s Apple Final Cut Pro, Business & Marketing, and Indie Film & Documentary forums.

[Ben Holmes]

Last time I checked, the iDVD templates were available in DVDSP.

Honestly, for your requirements, if the quality is OK, use whichever software you are comfortable with. Until DVDSP supports Blu-Ray, I’d stay where you are (and I have NO idea how iDVD works…)

As far as the widescreen/letterbox debate goes, I understand your concerns. I have a very different perspective on it as a broadcast pro (as does Walter). For broadcast, what you are doing is plain wrong, as you have reduced the vertical resolution of the video by letterboxing it in FCP. If someone watches this on a widescreen TV, they will see letterboxing and pillarboxing, and may be tempted to hit the ‘zoom’ button on the TV, filling the whole screen. This zoomed picture would be lower quality.

Now, in a world full of widescreen, HD TV’s you may be disappointing as many people as you please with this method.

If you use DVDSP (and again – I have no idea if this is possible in iDVD) you can specify HOW a DVD player treats an anamorphic (ie. true SD widescreen) DVD. If the disc is set to display as letterbox in the DVDSP disc setup, if the DVD player is set to 4:3, your video will display in your arty letterboxed look. If the DVD player is set to play 16:9 to a widescreen TV, it will display full frame. Either way, it’s being shown in the shape intended.

As someone said earlier, giving someone a stretched/always letterboxed view on a widescreen TV won’t please some people, and the other option, zooming, will lose a lot of quality.

Ben

Edit Out Ltd
—————————-
FCP Editor/Trainer/System Consultant
EVS/VT Supervisor for live broadcast
RED camera transfer/post
Independent Director/Producer

[Eoin Ryan]

I use DVDSP for other things. I use iDVD when I want/need to. All this “professional application” talk is redundant, depending on what you’re doing. iDVD also saves time and I’m not compromising image quality with encoding (I’ve tried encoding with both and there’s no difference). As regards cookie-cutter menus: they’re better menus that I could probably ever create myself, nor would I want to create my own menus. I’m not interested in that. DVDSP takes way too long, when all you need to do is use a really nice menu time and time again.

[Eoin Ryan]

Thanks to everyone for the comments.

As my main worry these days is people seeing pillarboxing, I have edited and exported as anamorphic and tested it on various players/TVs.

If the TV is set to 16:9, then I get the black bars that I like. Aspect ratio correct.

If it’s not, at least the full frame is displayed on the TV, without black bars. Aspect ratio correct and no pillarboxing.

So I get the best of both worlds: sometimes black bars, and if not, full frame widescreen with no pillarboxing.

FADE OUT.

[Dan Doskey]

I have somewhat the same issue as Mr. Ryan here, but I don’t care about having a letterboxed look, only about my end users seeing the entire image in the best resolution possible without adjusting settings. My work is legal, so my clients can sometimes be even more obtuse about technology than the average bear, and crankier when there are unexpected surprises.

Typically, they are taking a DVD to an unknown DVD player & TV, dropping it in and pressing play, so I want to make it as universal as I can. I am newly shooting HD (usually 1080/30p) with the new JVC HM100, editing in FCP 6, and typically do use iDVD for the same reasons he describes above. Additionally, there are those on my staff that don’t necessarily have the same technical knowledge I do, and the iDVD interface is very easy to master quickly and get the video out the door and into court. That said, I am not opposed to using DVDSP and training them how to use it. My main goal is to have our projects look their best on as many tv/dvd combos as possible without the end user having to make adjustments.

So, is editing and exporting Anamorphic all there is to it, or do I need to re-think my whole workflow? Many thanks to any who may be able to help.

Dan Doskey
Production Manager
Visual Evidence, Inc.
West Palm Beach, FL