Preparing graphics in Photoshop for FCP… again

[Alec Gitelman]

i believe if you look at the clip motion properties after you drop it in the timeline you’ll see that the distort value is not equal to 0. that’s what fcp will do, i guess it is smart enough.

however, you don’t have to jump through hoops to make your graphics. latest photoshop versions, 7 and up i believe, can work with non-square pixels. just choose the video preset for pal SD and you will get a 720×576 file that will be 4×3 on screen.

[Tom Wolsky]

Do the way you’re doing it. Resize the image. Photoshop will do a better job of scaling and aspect ratio adjustment than FCP. Don’t save to JPEG. It’s a recompression format. Save to PNG or TIFF or Photoshop, anything but JPEG.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Alec Gitelman]

Tom,

i’m confused. i guess i need a pointer now..

so what’s wrong with creating your graphics in a preset photoshop document, such as PAL 720×576 aspect ratio 1.07 or NTSC preset, or whatever preset you need. when you draw a circle in that – it’s a circle, etc… no resizing needed. am i wrong?

Alec.

[Tom Wolsky]

It will work, but it’s not recommended, basically because Apple uses its own math for calculating the pixel aspect ratio, which is different from Adobe’s.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Bret Williams]

I’d beg to differ. In his method PS is creating the graphics the right way, the first time. In exactly the same way AE creates nonsquare animations the right way. In exactly the same way your camcorder records them the right way. Using a pixel for pixel match that requires no alteration by FCP. Creating them as square, and then resizing has the same result, but requires another step and is no longer required since PS started utilizing non square aspects 4 years ago. In fact, one could argue the resizing in PS leads to a minor amount of softening and degredation. The image does have to be resalpled after all.

[Helge Krabye]

I am currently using Photoshop Elements 4.0 on my Mac, and it doesn’t seem like it is supporting rectangular pixels (can’t find any meny to choose the pixel aspect ratio – so I guess Elements always use square pixels, then?)

Helge

MacPro 2×2,8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
FinalCutPro6
MetaSynth, ArtMaticPro, ArtMaticVoyager
My music: https://homelessballoon.com

[Helge Krabye]

Now, this is getting quite confusing. If FCP is altering the aspect ratio automatically, what is the purpose of creating the image with non-square pixels in Photoshop? Even if I do create the correct aspect ratio in Photoshop, FCP may interpret it wrong and distort the ratio, right? Or is the clue here that when FCP understand that the file has non-square pixels, it will leave it as it is (correctly)? I presume that when FCP imports an image with square pixels, it will “distort” the aspect ratio in order to display the image correctly?

MacPro 2×2,8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
FinalCutPro6
MetaSynth, ArtMaticPro, ArtMaticVoyager
My music: https://homelessballoon.com

[Tom Wolsky]

Either way will work. I prefer to do it in Photoshop. This from the FCP manual:

“Note: There is no accepted standard for the exact aspect ratio of non-square SD video
pixels. Different manufacturers may assume different pixel aspect ratios when designing
their software. Fortunately, these differences tend to be very small, so in many cases you
may not notice a difference between pixel aspect ratios of, say, 0.9 and 0.89.
Since every non-square video frame size has an equivalent square frame size that will
look correct in SD video, it’s easy to create your graphics with a usable frame size. The
steps below tell you how.

Graphics for projects that will be output to HD video, or for video that will be played
only on computers and doesn’t use any captured SD video footage, simply need a
frame size that matches the sequence frame size. No alterations are needed.
To create graphics that look correct when output to video:
1 In your graphics application, create a frame size that’s the square-pixel equivalent of
the video frame size of your sequence.
To select the correct frame size for your video format, see “Frame Size Chart for
Creating Graphics” on page 373.
2 Create your graphic.
3 Do one of the following:
 Save your image from the graphics program to your media folder on disk.
 In your graphics program, first save your image at the original dimensions with a
name such as MyGraphic_original (this is a working copy that you can always use to
make further changes). Then, rescale the graphic from the square-pixel frame size
you created it with to the non-square equivalent shown in “Frame Size Chart for
Creating Graphics” on page 373. This makes the image look distorted in your
graphics application, but it will look right when you output it to video. Save this
resized graphic to the folder in which you store your media.
4 Import your image file into Final Cut Pro.”

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Helge Krabye]

I can’t find any menus to set the pixels to non-square in Photoshop Elements, so I guess it will always create square pixels? Most our video editors are only allowed to use Photoshop Elements, so this is important to know. Anybody knows?

MacPro 2×2,8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
FinalCutPro6
MetaSynth, ArtMaticPro, ArtMaticVoyager
My music: https://homelessballoon.com

[Alec Gitelman]

I don’t know about photoshop elements.

also, i don’t think fcp cares whether your photoshop file was square or rectangular pixels, i don’t believe it can read that information.

bottom line is, if you import a graphic file with native codec dimensions, such as 720×576, it will match the video size and won’t have to rescale it. if you import a 4×3 image, fcp will have to rescale it. it is generally recommended to pre-scale the graphic files before import (someone please correct me if i’m wrong). whether you work with non-square or square pixels in photoshop seems to be a moot point. the question is, which resizes better, photoshop or fcp? frankly, i’ve never quite noticed, or cared to notice the difference.