square pixel and 4:3

[Pau Perez]

Yes, I’m sure I’m not capturing 16:9 footage. In the after effects forum someone is telling me that PAL in square pixel looks in fact 720×576, that is 5:4. This is what he tells me:

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It’s the same encoded aspect ratio, for native PAL devices the resolution is always 720×576.

Only in the cases where you want to see what those 720×576 encoded pixels will look like when displayed would you need to scale the image (yes scale it, stretch it) out to 768×576.

However, this is not the way I would recommend to work, instead I would recommend placing your non-square footage into a matching non-square comp and enabling pixel aspect ratio correction preview (it looks like a small screen with a double sided arrow running horizontally through it, it’s along the bottom of the comp preview pane). That way you are maintaining the same correct 720×576 encoded frame throughout the workflow.

To reiterate: unless you know what you’re doing, it’s best to always maintain the 720×576 resolution of the footage.

Whether the image is being displayed on a square pixel or non-square pixel device will determine whether those 720×576 pixels will appear to be 5:4 (square pixel device) or 4:3 (PAL device). We do not use different aspect ratios whether working on a square or non-square device, we just have to account for the different ways in which the same pixels are treated.