[Chris Asta]

Ah, I see. That makes a lot of sense. Thanks for clearing that up. Unfortunately, the client insists on NEEDING 720 x 480, so I guess they’ll just have to get a slightly squeezed image (they probably won’t be able to tell anyway).

For future reference, do you have any thoughts on the square vs. CCIR 601 pixel aspect ratio? Let’s say I stayed in 8-bit uncompressed and set a frame size of 720 x 486. What would be the most correct pixel aspect ratio? What if I went to a DV/DVCPRO codec and set a frame size of 720 x 480? Or does it just not matter? It seems when I bring them into FCP, they all just show up as CCIR 601 anyway.

Thanks again for all the help.

[Chris Asta]

Thanks for the help David. I did see that post, but found that when I used the 4:3 crop setting in Compressor, I was still getting a slightly squeezed image (but enough to notice it). That’s when I started trying to plug in custom settings for how much to crop left and right and could never find the right setting.

I also found that things would look right in Quicktime Player and then I would bring them into Final Cut and they would look wrong and vice versa. I thought this might have something to do with the difference between a square pixel aspect ratio and a 601 CCIR, which is why I was wondering which pixel aspect ratio I should be using. Any idea what I might be doing wrong? Thanks again.