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Working with HDV clips in a DV 4:3 project
Hello,
We have just shot some 1080i HDV footage with a Sony FX1 camcorder and this footage has been captured as HDV clips using Sony Vegas. But the final video must be PAL D1/DV 4:3 so I have made a new PAL D1/DV 4:3 project and I would like to bring to the timeline my HDV footage. So far so good.
The point is that when I bring the HDV clips to the timeline and go to Pan&Crop and select 4:3 std aspect ratio TV the program simply gets rid of the right and left parts of the frame so that I have now a 4:3 picture. But, what if I want to zoom in the frame?? The HDV clip is no bigger than a PAL frame. In fact, the HDV clip seems like a PAL widescreen clip. If I zoom to a specific part of the frame (that’s the advantage of shotting HDV for a SD project) I’m loosing quality, am I ?!
Am I missing something?
Moreover, HDV is upper field first and PAL DV is lower field first. If I’m in a PAL DV project and I work with HDV clips on the timeline, will I have any problem with the fields when rendering the final PAL 4:3 video ?
Thanks in advance.
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2 Replies
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you can still pan/crop the events. The starting resolution is there no matter what. Depending on your preview mode, you may or may not see it.
If you’re working with HDV, it’s always larger than PAL. Only the HVX200 (not HDV) has smaller frame/imager than PAL in HD-land. JVC frame is 720, Sony or Canon frame is 1080.
ANY time you pan/Crop, you lose quality. No matter what the end game is. But….HD in SD project does let you get away with zooms up to about 40% without losing too much, and it remains (mostly) unnoticable.
Don’t worry about the fields. Force a resample, Vegas will manage this properly for you.Douglas Spotted Eagle
VASSTCertified Sony Vegas Trainer
Aerial Camera/Instructor -
“The starting resolution is there no matter what”. Really? If I zoom-in to the HDV clip using Pan&Crop and monitor the output looking at the monitor window (good>auto) I think I’m loosing quality. Theorically I would be able to zoom-in 40% without noticing any pixelation, but…
To sum up, what I would expect from importing a HDV clip to a PAL 720×576 project is to have a huge HD 1440×1080 frame and I would need to zoom-out in order to match the PAL 720×576 frame. At least, that’s what I do when working with After Effects. But there is no “zoom-out step” in my workflow when aplying Pan&Crop effect. The HDV frame is “aparently” PAL resolution.
Furthermore, If I hit 4:3 std aspect ratio preset I get correct aspect ratio but with two tiny black borders on each side of the frame. Right-clicking and selecting “Match output aspect” fixes it. The point is that I think it is better not to select this option so that Vegas would not stretch the footage at all but rather crop to size, thus preserving any loose of picture quality. Any comment about this?
Thanks again for your help.
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