Josh Olenslager
Forum Replies Created
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Lisa,
Do you have to use Photoshop to create the letterbox mattes? It might be easier for you to use a matte you build in Final Cut. You can use the video generators/matte/color solid and it might be easier if you’re not sure of the photoshop method. Drag a color solid matte onto your video bed in a track above what you want masked. Open it up in the viewer window by double-clicking it. Select the “controls” tab and select black as your color. Move to the “motion” tab and use the “crop” feature to crop out all but the top/bottom remainder (which will cover your video a la letterbox). You’ll have to use two color mattes for each video bed — one cropped down to cover only the bottom, and one cropped down to cover only the top. This won’t be exact mathematically as going the photoshop route, but you can eye it pretty well in real time. If you go this route, make sure that you crop both the top and bottom evenly (say to 92 % each — gives you 8 % coverage top/8 % coverage bottom) so that you are keeping the video centered.
Let me know if this works for you or not.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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And I don’t just want/need 4k for my iphone, Walter. I’d take some decent reception, too!
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Lisa,
It’s pretty simple, but first you need to figure the math on how tall your letterbox will be (ratio for scope 2:35:1, Academy 1:85:1, or traditional 16×9 1:78:1). Do that math for each of your full frame sizes to see how large your cover area will need to be. Once that is done, launch PhotoShop and create a new canvas. You can type in the full frame size there. Use “transparency” as the background. Create another new canvas based on the letterbox size (so one new canvas for each of your 4 frame sizes listed above) at the top/bottom ratio that you want covered by letterbox. Make sure that black is your back ground color in PS and select (instead of transparency) “back ground” color. This will give you your cover area. “Select all” on the new canvas and copy it. Move to the transparent canvas you have set up — the one with the corresponding frame ratio — and paste the copy selection onto two new layers. Position them top and bottom in the canvas, save as a PSD file, and then repeat for each of the four frame sizes. That should give you the accuracy you’ll need for cover area. Then simply drop the PSD files into your video bed.
Good dubbing!
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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You might try “handbrake.” It’s pretty easy to find and free. It works the same way as MPEG-streamclip. Might solve your driver issues.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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When formatting your drive through disk utility, just select one of the MAC formats David mentioned above. I’ve only seen the 4GB limits on FAT-32 formatting.
To use the disk utility formatting, connect your drive to the system, launch the disk utility application and highlight the connected drive. There is an option for MAC format in the menu functions that appear.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Oscar,
I’m not sure that there is a way to export an independent reference file from the Final Cut export options–like there is in QT. Making sub-clips (in and out points around media, then cmnd-u) in the FCP viewer creates a reference file for use in editing, and you can export these sub-clips without retaining the full media. If you’re looking to create reference files to hand to someone else to edit from Final Cut, I suggest that you scrub through your media and create sub-clips (and you can control the description/naming at that point). Once you’ve made your selections, you can copy this file and send to your editor to use as a reference of your selections. If this won’t work for you, you could export using “quicktime conversion” option to make a low-res editing file. This will create much smaller files that you can use as a place marker for editing, but might create problems when reconnecting the full-res media later, as these clips (even at low-res) will act independently of the original source and not reference back to the full-res version. It sort of depends on what you’re trying to do in the long run. If you’re simply scrubbing through the media to make rough selection for editing purposes, using QT is probably the best option.
Let me know how it goes.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Oscar,
once you select “movie to image sequence” for a targa export in quicktime, click the “options” box. This allows you to select your format (targa, png, etc.) and frame rate. I believe that the export takes care of the interlacing, but it’s been a while since I exported an image sequence.
As for reference movies from quicktime, set in and out points (“I” and “O” as shortcuts) around the media you want to reference. Hit cmnd-c to copy it, open a new QT window and paste the copied selection into the new window. Then when you hit save, you’ll be able to select “reference movie.”
Hope that helps.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Justin,
NTSC is still NTSC. It doesn’t playback in a 16:9 container. It plays back in 4:3. If you want to maintain the 16:9 ratio you’ll have to letterbox the anamorphic clip. (Thus the anamorphic — stretching to fill the frame.) If you want to do an export at 864 x 486 that will give you the 16:9 look, but might not work for your DVD. For the youtube segment, try a 480 x 270 for the 16:9 look. But if you’re looking for an SD 16:9 for DVD, you’ll most likely need to go to a letterbox in the 4:3 frame.
Good luck!
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Dianne,
So you are taking your capture file, importing to FCP, syncing with the audio, and then exporting a new master file with audio? You are not rendering is the impression I get. As long as you’re sequence settings are high quality (preferably matching your original capture parameters) and you are not rendering, you shouldn’t be losing quality. You can always check on a reference monitor, and the “cheat” way to get an idea is to look at the original file size (without audio — 2.3 GB or whatever) with the new master clip (with audio). They should be roughly the same size. If you see a huge disparity (as most audio isn’t enormous) then you know something is happening upon export. A different codec or loss of data or something. Best to check new master clips on a broadcast monitor, but you should have a decent idea if file size of original and new masters remains close to the same.
Good luck.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion
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Abby,
in Compressor select the DVD folder under Apple Groups. There a a number of options dealing with total project length (Best for 90 minutes for example). Drag the entire folder — audio and video setting — onto your sequence in the holding window. Make sure that your burning disk is big enough to hold all the media you need for the DVD. (If your sequence is super long, like 3 hours or something, you’ll probably need to export in 2 pieces using in/out points or use a dual layer.) The setting will create files that can be taken into DVD studio where you can build your menus, etc. For HD disks you’ll probably want to select the H.264 setting.
Josh
Digital Media, Thought Equity Motion