Letterboxing Anamorphic Video

Help please!

I am attempting to letterbox my anamorphic FCP5 project for playback on a 4X3 monitor. I am exporting to tape.

I followed the instructions in the FCP manual -- created a new 4X3 sequence, dragged the anamorphic sequence into it and expected FCP to automatically create the letterbox.

No magic letterbox. FCP squashed the video into 4X3 format.

What is so irritating about this is that I've done it before, successfully.

Does anyone have any tips?

Thanks!

Kathleen

You need to create a NON-ANAMORPHIC timeline. By choosing the DV/NTSC Easy Setup you get that.

What format is your footage?

Go into the timeline and press APPLE-0 (zero) to access your timeline controls.

Load the footage into the viewer, go to the motion tab and click on the red cross next to "distort".
Then go back to the timeline, select the clip you just un-distorted, press "apple +c".
Select all the other clips you have dragged into the timeline, right-click them in the timeline, choose "paste attributes" and tick "distort".

That should do it.

> Load the footage into the viewer, go to the motion tab and click on the red cross next to
> "distort".
> Then go back to the timeline, select the clip you just un-distorted, press "apple +c".
> Select all the other clips you have dragged into the timeline, right-click them in the timeline,
> choose "paste attributes" and tick "distort".

Huh?

If you're talking about removing the letterbox crunch Distort -- which wasn't what Kathleen was asking in the first place -- then why remove it from one clip and then use Paste Attributes? Just select all the clips and use Remove Attributes (OPTION-APPLE-V) and select Distort. There's no need to do one and then apply to the others.

I had already answered the original question a day or two ago. The posts may have become lost in the transition to the new forum.

I think you are incorrect Derek.

When Kathleen dragged the anamorphic footage into a 4:3 timeline it was squashed rather than creating black bars top and bottom. FCP crates black bars top and bottom in order to keep the aspect ratio intact. By doing this, the footage is shruntto a smaller size but it will look Ok on a 4:3 monitor. When playing it back on a widescreen monitor, the footage will have black bars on the sides as well as top and bottom.
If the footage is not set to anamorphic (the anamorphic tab is not clicked in the footage settings) then the footage will be interpreted as 4:3 instead.
This is likely what has happended here. I cannot see any other explanation to her problem.
Perhaps you can enlighten us oh wise one?

Or perhaps you did not understand my post. I did not write it for you however.

Hopefully kathleen can give us some feedback and let us know what the problem was.

"There's no need to do one and then apply to the others."
- you are corerct here, that is a better way of doing the same thing.


"I had already answered the original question a day or two ago. The posts may have become lost in the transition to the new forum."

- Im really happy for you.

> I think you are incorrect Derek.
> When Kathleen dragged the anamorphic footage into a 4:3 timeline it was squashed rather
> than creating black bars top and bottom.

Kathleen wrote me saying the problem was fixed by following my original post, applying the manual -33.33 Distort.

> When playing it back on a widescreen monitor, the footage will have black bars on the sides
> as well as top and bottom.

Yes, it will. But she said she wanted letterboxed on a 4:3 monitor, not an anamorphic 16:9-enabled monitor:

"I am attempting to letterbox my anamorphic FCP5 project for playback on a 4X3 monitor."

> If the footage is not set to anamorphic (the anamorphic tab is not clicked in the footage
> settings) then the footage will be interpreted as 4:3 instead.
> This is likely what has happended here. I cannot see any other explanation to her problem.

This is not a likely scenario, because if her footage had not been flagged as 16:9, then when edited into a 16:9 sequence (she said she did make the sequence 16:9), her footage would have been crunched horizontally with black bars on the side. Hard to miss that.

Sometimes FCP just flat-out doesn't do the automatic 16:9 crunch. That's my guess. It's not much of a problem.


www.derekmok.com

How about you just open up a church and start preaching instead.

Got anything against churches?


www.derekmok.com

Got anything against churches?

-Nope.
I just thought it could be a great place for you to spread your version of certain events without interruption.

Johan:

I don't appreciate you devolving this sort of discussion in the manner in which you have. If you chose to do this, go hang out on the Avid forms, please.

Derek:

Back on topic, I'm surprised to see that FCP does this "sometimes." Every time I drag anamorphic to the canvas, it just does the magic for me. I've never had this problem happen to me, but why do you think this might be?

thanks,

> Back on topic, I'm surprised to see that FCP does this "sometimes." Every time I drag
> anamorphic to the canvas, it just does the magic for me. I've never had this problem happen
> to me, but why do you think this might be?

Good question. I never nailed down the cause either. At my old film school we've had many cases of 16:9 clips not quite behaving like 16:9 clips, refusing to crunch, etc. Back then we were pretty green, so all we could do was to try again. I've seen this issue several times since, and applying the Distort by hand is the quickest solution even if it doesn't nail down the root of the problem.

But if anybody knows why this happens, I'm all ears!


www.derekmok.com

"Johan:

I don't appreciate you devolving this sort of discussion in the manner in which you have. If you chose to do this, go hang out on the Avid forms, please. "

-I certainly did not start this. I never do.
Derek has this thing for me. He has this need to come into every post that I am on and find something wrong and it is getting extremely annoying.
So dont tell me how to devolve any discussions since I did not start this and I am more than fed up with it myself.

Guys

We now have private messaging. Take this there. And find a way to work together. Much more fun.

Michael

I agree. I have better things to do.

I know it's been a couple of weeks since my last post while I was out of town, but I didn't realize my little question would cause so many problems!

Just FYI on future troubleshooting: my video was anamorphic (box checked/edited in proper format). In the past, I have been able to letterbox an anamorphic project by dragging and dropping it into a 4X3 sequence, but FCP 5 will not allow me to do that in this project. When I checked the -33.33 in distort, the problem seemed to be solved and I had video letterboxed for a 4X3 screen. Interestingly, the letterbox effect did not show up when the DVD was played on a HD/Widescreen TV -- the video filled the entire TV with no visible cropping.

In any case, thanks for all the help and input.

Best,

Kathleen

That was the meanest thread I have ever seen in this forum! I don't feel that Derek was to blame.
I hope I don't have to see it again.

------------------------
Dean

"When I see you floating down the gutter I'll give you a bottle of wine."
Captain Beefheart, Trout Mask Replica.

"The DVD was played on a HD/Widescreen TV -- the video filled the entire TV with no visible cropping"

-Thats interesting. Theoretically it should not only have tha black bars on top and bottom but also on the sides. I assume that the DVD player or the TV was set to zoom so that you actually blew the image up.

The quality of your image compared to a proper 16:9 should still be 33% less resolution so this is not the way to do it if you want the best quality. If you are outputting to 16:9, then the best thing to do is to shoot it in 16:9 and keep it like that all the way in post.

Johan Polhem
Motion Graphics
www.johanpolhem.com

Okay, I'm thoroughly confused now. I read this thread in the hope of solving one of my problems regarding 16:9 and 4:3.

I have the opposite situtation. I have a 720 by 480 movie. I've already gone through it and adjusted all the shots up and down and I've laid the 16:9 mask on the whole movie the way Derek explained it to me over a number of threads. I'm very happy with the framing.

NOW...

I want to end up with a 16:9 anamorphic frame of 720 by 405 so that my DVDs can play on a 16:9 TV set as widescreen (without black bars).

And I don't want the 4:3 option at all. ... What do I do? Please step by step because I'm a bit slow-witted. LOL

Hey Vic

? Export the 4:3 with the 16:9 letterbox to a Quicktime movie

? Reimport the Exported movie

? Place this movie onto a 16:9 Anamorphic Timeline

? Blend fields if necessary (ie: if not a progressive source)

? Scale the movie to 133.33% in Motion Tab (check that the Aspect looks correct)

? Add DVD chapter markers on this timeline if necessary (or do it in DVDSP)

? Export new 16:9 FHA Quicktime movie ready for DVD Studio Pro


Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Alternatively, instead of exporting the movie first:

? Create a 16:9 Timeline

? Place your letterboxed sequence onto the 16:9 Anamorphic Timeline

? Blend fields if necessary (ie: if not a progressive source)

? Scale the movie to 133.33% in Motion Tab*(check that the Aspect looks correct)

*Note: to get the nested sequence to open into the viewer, rightclick (or ctrl-click) the nested sequence in the timeline and choose "open in viewer"

? Add DVD chapter markers on this timeline if necessary (or do it in DVDSP)

? Export new 16:9 FHA Quicktime movie ready for DVD Studio Pro


Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Hey, I'm waiting for the dual processor 2.7 G5 FCP5 to render my 99 minute movie -- a few hours each stage. I went through all the phases of instructions, and it looks like it's going to come right in DVD -- as 16:9 anamorphic format.

But ... field blending ? Where's that? I dragged a de-interlace filter over my whole timeline. I don't know what that did. I just went on to export ...

Also, I noticed after I stretched ... to +133.33% that the picture looked like it was shot with a VHS camera. LOL

I started out with a 720 by 480 (DVCAM from 35mm telecine ) 23.98 timeline. I was hoping for a little better quality.

I'll see what it looks like on my TV when I watch the DVD. I'll then have to check it again on a 16:9 TV monitor about 42 inch Plazma or LCD.

I'm doing a compression right now to 120 min DVD mpeg 2 fast encode. It's going to take a few hours. Talk to you later... Thanks for everything.

Hey Vic

Not deinterlace - Blend fields - its a different process and doesn't lose half the resolution.

Use the free plugins Too Much Too Soon from: [www.mattias.nu]


Regards

Ben



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

Oh, I'm glad you told me. I started the compression and went out. It showed it needed 7 hours by the time I left. When I came back a few hours later, it was up to 10 hours, so I stopped it.

Back to the drawing board. Maybe it had to do with the fact I threw interlace on the timeline.