[Jeremy Cassar]

Hi there Andy,

I’ve tried to downconvert to DV or DV50 from the source footage in toast 9 but in both instances the horizontal lines are extreme.

Before I go ahead and buy clipwrap (seems a shame considering i don’t plan on using it again, but am willing to as a last resort), I thought I’d give cutting the ProRes footage a try. The ProRes footage is on my sisters computer, which i cannot use to cut. Have tried copying the footage to two seperate FAT32 external drives, so that i can work off that drive and my macbook, but I keep getting an error (error code: 0 – go figure) when trying to copy. When i try and plug in my sisters FAT32 drive as a test (which i also cannot use for cutting), they copy over fine.

Do you have any idea why the footage wouldn’t copy over? There’s plenty of space.

If this all sounds like too specific a problem then I might just go ahead and buy clipwrap, but thought I’d check with you just in case.

Thanks Andy,

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

Original source was AHVCD. I am from Australia, so we use PAL, not NTSC, not sure if that helps.
I am not able to get information as to exactly what camera, but i know it was one of those small hd handycam’s. Nothing special. Unfortunately I can’t give any more info than that.

The format I’m used to working with on my macbook (i no longer have access to a power mac), is .mov, i guess.

The finishing format will be DVD PAL, as it is a wedding.

Thanks for your quick reply Andy.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

Steps taken:

Converted test lot of images from their resolution to 720×480.

Imported them back into Final Cut Pro, then matched their settings with a sequence (had to change them all to PAL from NTSC), then dropped them into the timeline.

Images fill the frame perfectly.

However before batch resizing all 12000 images, I thought i’d test the export, using the same settings from the timeline.

Unfortunately the exported image is squashed horizontally.

Is there another step I need to do to the images in photoshop so that it will export correctly? Or is it a setting within Final Cut Pro?

Cheers.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

David I apologise if this post is repeating myself but I just replied and can’t seem to see the post in the thread.

I tried your suggestion and converted a single image to 853×486 in photoshop. I dragged it into FCP and the browser lists the image as NTSC – CCIR 601, as you’ve said. Dropping it into a sequence with the same settings results in the image displaying perfectly, so thank you. But unfortunately there still exists two problems.

Firstly, and correct me if I’m wrong, which I might be, but I think because I am from Australia and we use the PAL format here, I need the image and the sequence to be in PAL as opposed to NTSC. Do you know how I would go about doing the same process you’ve described, but PAL instead of NTSC?

Secondly, when I try to export said frame in compressor, the image is displayed in 4:3, and not in the aspect displayed in the Canvas window. So even if I stuck with the NTSC (which I am pretty sure is a bad move?), when exporting I still have aspect problems, and as I’ve said, I’d prefer to convert all the jpgs to video so it’s easier to edit.

Looking forward to your response. Thanks again. Apologies if those posts end up showing up.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

P.P.S –

When i bring the NTSC frame into compressor it squashes it a little – looking more like 4:3. I’m not sure why it is doing this.

All help greatly appreciated.

Cheers.

[Jeremy Cassar]

Sorry David, and to add to that…
When dropping the frame into a sequence with NTSC CCIR 601 pixel aspect – there are no black bars, as you’ve said, and the image looks awesome. So that’s solved that problem.
The only thing left to do now is to figure out the correct aspect/settings for PAL, as opposed to NTSC. IN Australia that’s the standard format, and I am not sure whether using NTSC will cause problems when sending the file to the festival.

Once that’s sorted – looks like everything will be in order!

Thanks sir.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

David I tried a test resize in photoshop.
All i did was change the pixel size to 853×486
When dragging it into FCP, the aspect ratio comes up as NTSC – CCIR 601, as you’ve said.
Do you know how I find out the PAL equivalent? I’m guessing considering I’m in Australia the photos should be PAL? Sorry if i’ve misunderstood.

Cheers mate.

Jeremy

[Jeremy Cassar]

Thanks Stephen.

So basically what you are saying is that the only way to go about it is to rescale images in final cut pro, thus losing image information? If so, then it seems a batch convert in Photoshop is a better option? Apologies if I’m missing something.

[Jeremy Cassar]

Thanks for your response mate.

I will try to get my head around your post, as well as any additional information, and get back to you.

I’m sure batch scaling down and batch correcting pixel aspect ratio of the photos won’t be a problem, it’s just knowing the correct settings that confuses me. But I shall try your suggestions!

The other thing to be noted is that I’m in Australia and almost universally work with PAL footage, as opposed to NTSC. Not sure if that matters at all. in terms of how you’d respond to my initial question.

In any case, thanks for your help and I’ll let you know in a few hours how I fared!

Jeremy