Sound Drop-Out in Letterbox

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Maria Luisa Gambale] “I had decided to make a 4:3 DVD”

First of all, why do this? DVD players can handle the letterbox from anamorphic footage.

[Maria Luisa Gambale] “But when I export to Quicktime Movie, I get sound drop-outs in certain places every time. “

Trash your audio render files and re-render, then reexport.

[Maria Luisa Gambale] “I’m making my DVD with iDVD”

That could be part of it DVDSP is a much more capable program.

Jeremy

[Maria]

Thank you, Jeremy. All of that is good info – problem is I don’t have DVD=SP at home right now.

But it’s not a problem with the making of the DVD. It’s the Quicktime Movie export.

I got a version working by exporting to DV-NTSC with QT Conversion instead. There actually is still a small sound glitch in one location – but this is showing up in the 4:3 timeline version also. (The other massive sound glitches were just appearing once I exported.)

One follow-up question (though I am still curious why the QT export wouldn’t work). I didn’t have time to experiment with exporting directly from my anamorphic timeline and making a DVD from that file. iDVD says it can handle anamorphic and HD files, but I wasn’t sure. I did get as far as exporting the file in anamorphic, but when I played it in Quicktime directly, it wasn’t appearing anamorphic (it was squeezed). So, I stopped and went back to the tried and true, being short on time. Would it look okay in the final DVD?

Maria Luisa Gambale
DP/Producer
Brooklyn, NY

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Maria Luisa Gambale] “I did get as far as exporting the file in anamorphic, but when I played it in Quicktime directly, it wasn’t appearing anamorphic (it was squeezed)”

Anamorphic is squeezed. That’s what it means. If you export your anamorphic timeline, it will appear as 4×3 squeezed. I’d stick with that as long as you tell iDVD that your movie is 16×9 (or anamorphic however they name it).

You should export QT Export and not QT conversion as your movie will get recompressed using conversion.

So, my advice:

1) Trash your audio render files and re-render

2) don’t render a letterbox timeline

3) Export your original anamorphic timeline as it is (and it will look 4×3 squeezed as it’s supposed to)

4) Make sure to tell iDVD your footage is anamorphic (or they might call it 16×9, I don’t know iDVD).

Jeremy

[Maria]

Thanks – that all makes sense now. Appreciate it.

Maria Luisa Gambale
DP/Producer
Brooklyn, NY

[Maria]

Ah, actually, one quick follow-up question. I know that if you have a 4:3 project letterboxed that it will be letterboxed on an SD TV and will be 16:9 but not full-screen on an HD TV.

If you make your DVD from your anamorphic timeline, I’m supposing it’s going to be full-screen widescreen on an HD TV – what’s it going to look like on a Standard Def TV?

By the way, FYI, iDVD does call it 16:9.

Thank you!

Maria Luisa Gambale
DP/Producer
Brooklyn, NY

[Jeremy Garchow]

That’s the beauty of keeping it anamorphic and not letterbox.

If you pre letterbox, it’s going to look letterbox on whatever TV you play it. On an HD TV the user will have to ‘zoom’ the picture to fill the screen, losing a lot of resolution.

WIth anamorphic, the DVD player will automatically letterbox the footage on a 4:3 tv and on an HD tv, the footage won’t have to be zoomed, but rather it will be stretched back out to 16:9 preserving vertical resolution.

Working anamorphic is the best of both worlds for 16:9 material.

Jeremy

[Maria]

Awesome! And it only took me three years to figure that out.

Thanks, Jeremy – you’ve been a huge help.

Maria Luisa Gambale
DP/Producer
Brooklyn, NY

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Maria Luisa Gambale] “Awesome! And it only took me three years to figure that ou”

🙂

No worries.

Jeremy

[Maria]

Just a follow-up in case people are curious:

iDVD doesn’t seem to have anything where you select a widescreen project mode.

I output from my anamorphic sequence and dumped it in iDVD.

Plays great on an HD TV – just the way it should.

Does not switch to letterbox on a Standard Def TV or on DVD Player on my Mac.

I’ve read some iDVD forums and they seem to say that 5.0 and 6.0 don’t truly suport anamorphic – you have to trick these workarounds – which I’ll try tomorrow.

I really just should get DVD Studio Pro, but until then, I think it’s back to letterboxing.

If anyone has had a different experience with this, or I am missing something, I’d be happy to know it.

Maria Luisa Gambale
DP/Producer
Brooklyn, NY

[Jeremy Garchow]

What version do you have? I am pretty sure iLife 08 will do this, but I don’t know for sure.