[Jeff Pulera]

So glad you finally have success! Regarding VLC, I had mentioned to check exports back in Premiere, that is the only way to truly know what you have.

If after exporting using Scale to Fill, you still have any black (I think I saw the same hairline) try using Motion Effect to manually scale image up a few percent in timeline before exporting.

Found this at Film Freeway:

FilmFreeway accepts all major video formats in full quality HD up to 10 GB. We transcode videos for playback compatibility and performance and recommend that you use settings close to our output settings:

Maximum video bitrate: 2200 Kbps, H.264, mp4
Audio: 128 Kbps, AAC, 2 channel stereo
Aspect ratio preserved; maximum video height of 720 pixels

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Sorry for the typo, SCALE TO FILL is desired if output preview shows any black edges

“nothing worked” doesn’t give me anything with which to help you. HOW didn’t it work, what was the result?

No offense, but this has to be user error of some sort that we are overlooking. What EXACTLY did you do this time around, and what was the outcome?

And for starters, please do NOT work with that 1344×1080 abomination of footage, please begin with the 720×576 clips and ALL HD output attempts should be 1.0 PAR

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Hi Robert,

Thanks for the images, now I am more confused as to why the suggestions I have put forth have not worked for you.

I imported the “car” image into Premiere and it came in as DV PAL (4:3), which is to be expected since a still since image does not respect PAR. So I right-clicked image in Project Bin, and used Modify > Interpret to set Pixel Aspect to DV PAL Widescreen. I then did New Sequence from Clip and got a proper widescreen image from timeline.

From that timeline, I then did Export and set to H.264 > YouTube 720p HD

NOTE – you will need to set Scale to Fit in output settings to remove very narrow black edges which come from slight math differences in converting DV wide to HD wide.

Please see attached the Output Settings, which also shows source (sequence) settings, for how I arrived at a good 720p HD output, and also added a final still image pulled from the 720p .mp4 I created.

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

“Can I really crop it to a perfect 16/9?”

Absolutely!! Since you want to submit this to festivals, you will need to use a proper video format. Going to suggest 720p for that since you are close already with the dimensions you have in the upscale version. When you provide a proper sample of the upscale footage you are working with, I can then decide how to best get it to 1280×720 as 16:9 with no bars in the image. Hopefully, without cropping or stretching width or height, to be determined when I see what you are working with. I think the lack of resolution to the issue so far is due to not knowing precisely what you are working with there, not having a sample of the actual material. Should have been resolved many posts ago ????

Thank you

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Let’s make this really easy. Import the footage you have into Premiere, is that the 1344×1080 upscale version?

Right-click and New Sequence from Clip. Put the playhead on a desired frame in timeline, and then export a still image using the camera icon. This will save a still from the timeline in the exact resolution of what’s there (black bars and all, if those bars are part of the actual video source clip). So I don’t need VIDEO to work with, a proper STILL will do. But then also provide a screen shot of the Sequence Settings from that same setup. That will verify resolution, frame rate, pixel aspect that is being worked with so I can duplicate here. Having that information, and the still image, is all I should need to get this fixed finally.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

I pulled your lady pic into Photoshop and it comes up as 1050×576, which is close to the 1024×576 I had suggested for a widescreen image. I’m confused about comments of YouTube adding black bars – if the content you upload is HD widescreen, no bars are getting added to anything. But that is dependent on the upload being an acceptable video format sizing and not some odd dimensions.

This would be infinitely easier to resolve if I could see or have a sample of the footage you are working with, since it is apparently not the original DV footage. Can you possibly put a short sample of a few seconds into DropBox or similar so that I (and/or others) could actually run it through Premiere and refine the proper workflow to get the desired results?

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Re-reading your original post, you wanted help in re-exporting the 1344×1080 clip. Just want to make sure you know that all of my suggestions are based on using the original 720×576 source clip and that the 1344×1080 clip should be discarded, that one is a mess and I hope is not still being used for any of this process as that would cause issues.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Let’s back up and recalibrate, and review what we’ve discussed so far. I might need to make clearer the pixel aspect ratio business.

DV video (NTSC) is 720×480, regardless of whether shot as 4:3 or 16:9, and one might say “How can that be?” (and in your case for PAL, it is 720×576). The widescreen version simply uses pixels that are defined as wider (rectangular) so even though the dimensions are the same between the 4:3 and 16:9 recording, the pixel shape changes the output. So widescreen video derived from just changing the pixel aspect and not the dimensions is “anamorphic” widescreen, or basically “fake” widescreen.

Please see this blog I wrote a million years ago – https://blog.sharbor.com/blog/2010/07/anamorphic-widescreen-understanding-pixel-aspect-ratios-3/

The reason I had previously suggested NOT using the anamorphic export settings is because different players will interpret the footage in different ways and may not correctly display your clip since PAR is maybe not considered. Therefore you want to export a 16:9 image using square pixels, with an actual 16:9 ratio between width and height.

Like 1920×1080 or 1280×720 for HD or in the case of SD PAL then 1024×576. You said the latter did not work for you, but I wonder if some other factor is messing things up, like the player or whatever? With NTSC, I have exported SD widescreen as 864×480 with 1.0 PAR to get widescreen playback and works great, not sure why the PAL version of 1024×576 would not provide equally good results for you to create a true 16:9 widescreen file for playback? Maybe you are misinterpreting what you are seeing in the player, with player just adding a border for some reason?

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

And what does the image of smoking woman represent, what stage of workflow are we looking at because no black bars on that, where did that grab come from?

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Assuming you are getting a proper widescreen clip exported without black bars, if you are trying to place that new clip into the old anamorphic DV sequence, that might explain why it doesn’t look right.

Try this – import the exported clip into Premiere, then right-click and select New Sequence from Clip. How does it look now? Post screen grab of Sequence > Sequence Settings please. And make sure Program window is set to FIT so that nothing funny is happening on that end.

What export settings did you use, the 720p or what?

Thanks

Jeff

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers