[Tom Wolsky]

For MPEG-2 that may be as good as she goes. For me the blue’s still too dark for good legibility. I’m just not getting enough separation from the black for my taste. Maybe a gray edge, not wild about that either.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

Normally when you place an image in the FCE timeline the image is automatically scaled to fit the window. That’s a user preference and the default setting. No squeezing or stretching is involved, simply scaling.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

“The video itself was shot on an iPhone 4, and so it is HD.”

Excuse me while I recover from my belly laugh. HD in whose world? An ant’s? 960×540 is something Apple concocted to half the size and the data rate of its media and display it as HD. It’s a joke.

FCE does not use a sequence resolution of 960×540. Look at the presets. They’re 1920×1080, 1440×1080, and 1280×720.

Open the still into the viewer and reset the scale value.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

What kind of tape? Digibeta? Recorded from the FCP timeline?

The text in the first image is pretty dreadful. I suspect it’s the MPEG-2 encoding, the dark blue and black is very hard to do on the edges, almost like a gradient. The third is not so bad because of the size of the text. Take a look at the credits on the end of a DVD. They’re just dreadful. There is only so much you can do with MPEG-2.

Philip Hodgetts has an excellent article on creating titles for video https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/perfect_titles_phil.html It’s old but it still applies, especially if you’re going to MPEG-2, which is the same size and heavily compressed like DV.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

Trying look at these in the QT7 pro player with the clips set to high quality playback. The MPEG-2 doesn’t look bad for a heavily compressed format, a little soft, but about what I’d expect for MPEG-2.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

Where are you seeing the terrible text? On the output file? Are you looking at it in the QT7 player set to high quality playback? Could you post a screen shot somewhere?

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

No, the graphics colors. You used blue #00A7F. That’s net colors, no? Use RGB values. You’re making the graphics in AE, correct? That’s RGB only.

Elementary stream is for transmission not for DVD delivery. Look at the DVD presets. None of them go beyond 8. The top value that’s usually sued is 7.7. Keep the data rate to these values and the disc will play in a set-top player.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

Don’t use net color values. Use RGB color values.

1920×1440? What the heck is that? That’s a weird size. Why are you bothering with HD settings? You can’t make up 4:3 HD. All HD is widescreen. If you need 4:3 you need to be working in uncompressed SD 720×486.

Field dominance looks wrong. Should be lower for NTSC DVD shouldn’t it?

The data rates are way, way to high for set-top box playback. How are you getting those numbers? Using transport or program stream settings? Max data rate should not be more than 8 including audio for standard player delivery. Look at the Apple presets for DVD.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

Information on the text would be helpful. The same rules apply. No white. No bright colors reds and oranges. Avoid seriffed fonts unless they’re large.

What’s being done exactly to make them SD? What format? What settings? Where are you going when you’re making the media SD? Where are you looking at the finished output.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Tom Wolsky]

First, do not ever make a one pixel line for use in video. It’s always going to look bad. Minimum is two pixels and three is better. Second, the line should not be white. The RGB values should not exceed 235s. Also a one pixel vertical motion blur can be very helpful.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP7,” “Basic Training for FCS” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”