10-15% image loss on TVs

My problem isn't the titles it's the image loss on the sides. We are using FCP 5 and DVD Studio 4.

We added text on our image to see how much is being cutoff on various televisions. Most of the time the TVs are cutting off more than the Video/Action Safe area but less than the Title safe area. Either way it is frustrating because parts of our image disappear and it affects how people perceive certain scenes.

Is there a way to export a slightly smaller image so that none of the left and right side of the image is cutoff?

Thanks,
RG

Look up these phrases in any video reference or even in the FCP manual: "title safe", "action safe", "overscan", "underscan". This is basic video knowledge. It's an integral part of how NTSC and PAL (even SECAM!) video are produced, starting at the camera.

If you don't like it you can shrink your picture into a box in the middle. Then it will appear in different locations on different CRTs, but everyone will see all your image.

Hello and welcome to television.

My copy of SMPTE RP-27.3 "Title and Action Safe" document dates back to 1989 and that one was an update to the one in 1983. I joined NBC in 1976 and it was already an old standard then.

Sorry. It's not a standard. It's a "Recommended Practice."

Periodicaly, someone will stand up and claim you don't need the two safes any more with all the flat screens and projectors out there. That lasts until they see the motel room with the fifteen year old TV on the dresser. Oh, and the modern, up to date plasma flat panel in our conference room is set to cut off the top and bottom of the picture.

If anything, the flat screens made the problem vastly worse. You used to be able to ignore the extreme edges of the picture secure in the knowledge that few if anybody was going to see them. Not any more. Computers show you all the theatrical bits right out the edges, so you *can't ignore them*.

You are more or less forced to conform to the two safe areas (80% and 90%) while still protecting the full screen. Periodically, a forum poster wonders if they can jocky the visible parts around to look good on their tube-type monitor. Sure, as long as you don't leave vast black areas missing around the edges.

Having said all that, the document is a recommended practice, not a standard. It's up to you completely whether or not you want to risk chopping off the work. The other thing you can do is force a viewing situation. If you know for an absolute fact that your work will be shown only once and on a certain projector, you can tune your whole world for that one show.

If, however, you intend on general distribution, there is only one way to be safe.

Koz