Wrong aspect ratio

[Roli Rivelino]

What are your full FCP sequence settings and full compressor settings?

https://www.rolirivelino.com/

System
Mac Pro 2.8Gb quad core
8Gb RAM
1x 320Gb 7200 hardrive
1x 1Tb 7200 hardrive
Nvidia Geforce 8800 512mb Graphics card
1x 1Tb external WD ‘My Book’ eSata

Equipment
Panasonic AG-HVX 200
Firestore FS-100

[Carl Eltervaag]

Hope you can help 🙂

FCP sequence settings are:

Pixel aspect ratio: PAL – CCIR 601 (720×576) anamorphic
Field dominance: Upper (odd)
Compressor: mpeg imx 625/50

Compressor settings:

Description: DV/DVCam PAL Anamorphic with 48kHz stereo audio
File Extension: mov
Estimated size: 22.71 GB/hour of source
Audio Encoder
16-bit Integer (Big Endian), Stereo (L R), 48,000 kHz
Video Encoder
Format: QT
Width: 720
Height: 576
Pixel aspect ratio: PAL CCIR 601 (16:9)
Crop: None
Padding: None
Frame rate: (100% of source)
Selected: 25
Frame Controls: Automatically selected: Off
Codec Type: MPEG IMX 625/50 (50 Mb/s)
Multi-pass: Off, frame reorder: Off
Pixel depth: 24
Spatial quality: 50
Min. Spatial quality: 0
Temporal quality: 0
Min. temporal quality: 0

[Roli Rivelino]

Strange, try adding a 16:9 crop instead of none and see what that gives you

https://www.rolirivelino.com/

System
Mac Pro 2.8Gb quad core
8Gb RAM
1x 320Gb 7200 hardrive
1x 1Tb 7200 hardrive
Nvidia Geforce 8800 512mb Graphics card
1x 1Tb external WD ‘My Book’ eSata

Equipment
Panasonic AG-HVX 200
Firestore FS-100

[Colin Mcquillan]

Could be FCP misinterpreting the footage. This happens sometimes.
Does the footage look squished? (as in it is squeezed 4×3 but would look normal stretched out to 16×9)

In your FCP browser scroll right until you see the column “Anamorphic” If there is no checkmark click in the column, add one. Now edit the clip into your sequence and see if it goes in properly.

Colin McQuillan
Vancouver, B.C.

“Live, love, laugh and be happy.”

[Michael Gissing]

SD anamorphic is 4:3. On replay the TV or computer should stretch the image back to 16:9. You could make a file that was 1024 x 576 which is true 16:9 square pixel.

What is the file for? The choice of DV codec seems a little strange as it is a lossy codec and not a lot smaller than IMX

[Carl Eltervaag]

SD anamorphic is 4:3. On replay the TV or computer should stretch the image back to 16:9. You could make a file that was 1024 x 576 which is true 16:9 square pixel.

What is the file for? The choice of DV codec seems a little strange as it is a lossy codec and not a lot smaller than IMX

Thanks for feedback.

The footage didn’t look squashed in FCP, but when I opened the exported file in quictime, it was 4:3, with a squashed look, giving the impression it was 16:9 put in the wrong frame.

The footage is going to be broadcast on a norwegian kids tv channel, and the standard format is IMX50.

I solved my problem in this case, by taking my portable harddrive with footage onto a computer at the tv station, and lifted the footage from the time line to one of their publishing sequences in FCP.

However, I still don’t know exactly the right settings in Compressor to use for footage shot 720×576 anamorphic in IMX50. If I make it 1024×576 like you say, wouldn’t it make the quality of the picture lossy?

What codec would you recommend instead of the one I used?

[Michael Gissing]

SD broadcast is 720 x 576 in PAL countries. A 16:9 sequence is actually anamorphic squeezed into a 4:3 frame. This is normal. If you want to create a file for the web that displays true 16:9, the pixel aspect is 1024 x 576.

So editing for SD PAL you chose the 720 x 576 anamorphic sequence settings. The best codec for broadcast would be ProRes 422. IMX and DV are compressed formats and you will experience quality loss, particularly with graphics and text in DV.

So in future capture as ProRes422 720 x 576 anamorphic and edit with a matching sequence.