What is best method to preserve 16:9 aspect ratio on 4:3 Broadcast

The Broadcast Outlet on which we are placing a 30 minute program, "cannot accept wide screen yet, so it needs to be 4:3".

My dilemma is all footage was shot in 16:9, and of course want to present the best possible quality on the Broadcast station. Also, it is critical to me that wide screen TV's recieve the best possible quality, without being letterboxed or Pillared (or worse yet, both) and understand that letterboxing for 4:3 TV's is necessary.

Any suggestions on best codec and settings to use for output?

Running, FCP Studio 6.0.6, OS X 10.5.8, on G5 Power PC, non-intel chips.

Thanks for any help.

The best codec would be uncompressed, but it really depends on what the broadcast outlet wants. Ask them. They may want some horrible m2t format.

All the best,

Tom

Digital Betacam, but as Tom said, it depends on the network. Letterboxed is best for 4:3 output because your other option is to side crop, and if your stuff wasn't framed for 4:3 safe, the framing may look awkward when the sides are cropped.



www.strypesinpost.com

Thanks Tom,

Waiting for some answers from them, but wanted to get in front of it. What about H.264?

>Also, it is critical to me that wide screen TV's recieve the best possible quality, without being
>letterboxed or Pillared (or worse yet, both) and understand that letterboxing for 4:3 TV's is necessary.

No dice here. You deliver to broadcast specs. It makes little sense to have specs if everyone simply decides to produce to their own standards. Probably the only country with 16:9 SD broadcast is Australia, and they will show everything including promos and ads in 16:9.

Why do you do 4:3 for most SD stations? So viewers tuning into a channel do not have to adjust their TV settings to accommodate for each and every program, and advertisements will not be distorted when viewed next to the programs.



www.strypesinpost.com

>What about H.264?

I think it is a great codec when you want to put your video on the web. Usually you won't deliver half hour eps via FTP or VPN (unless things have changed), so it depends on the station. Most SD broadcasters I know of would require digital beta.



www.strypesinpost.com

Thanks Strypes,

So I take it that Anamorphic DV NTSC would not be an option either? Print to tape will be output on DVCPro Deck.

Anamorphic DV is considered "widescreen" under the general umbrella usage of the often misleading term.



www.strypesinpost.com

Quote

Probably the only country with 16:9 SD broadcast is Australia, and they will show everything including promos and ads in 16:9.

Actually we have been 16:9 via PALplus in UK and most of Europe for a VERY long time (late 1990s). Even before Australia if my memory serves me correctly (when they introduced digital in 2001). We are now completely digital and now simulcast SD/HD on many channels including the BBC in 16:9.

The fact of the matter is that almost everyone else in the world is 16:9 and its only American TV stations and some in the poorer countries (and very few of them), that still have 4:3 broadcast as their de facto standard.



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Thanks Strypes and Ben,

So Anamorphic might be a viable alternative? I know that a number of local commercials have run in a 16:9 aspect ratio. Again, my number one priority is that the program appear in the best possible quality on Widescreen TV's.

>The fact of the matter is that almost everyone else in the world is 16:9

Not for Asia, though. A lot of Asia is still a mixed bag between HD and SD. Most SD broadcast in Asia is in 4:3.



www.strypesinpost.com

>I know that a number of local commercials have run in a 16:9 aspect ratio.

Like I said. Read the specs sheet. Deliver to specs. I don't know, or am I just a little old fashioned, and everyone else is deciding their own specs for broadcast?



www.strypesinpost.com

Thanks Strypes,

I am awaiting specs sheet from station...when you have an entire program to salvage, it would be nice to have at least a couple of options in our modern world.

That's where lunch comes in.



www.strypesinpost.com

Strypes,

That's Great! Lunch, here I come...

Thanks Anyway

The reality is though, that you're going to have to make a 4:3 master here. Inside that you can either crop the edges off your widescreen picture to fill the whole frame, or letterbox it so the sides stay in frame.

Changing the codec makes no sense if you're going to tape. Don't change that. Just drop your master sequence into a 4:3 sequence and make your decision about letter boxing or cropping, then export to tape.



"it is critical to me that wide screen TV's recieve the best possible quality, without being letterboxed or Pillared "

This is unavoidable. If they are sending out a 4:3 picture, it will display with pillarboxes on widescreen TVs. You can't control that. If you letterbox, it will letterbox AND pillarbox. If you crop, it will only pillarbox, but the edges of your picture will be gone, and any text outside 4:3 safe will get cut off.

I hesitate to suggest this, 'cause it'll just complicate things. But where I'm from, the trendy solution to this problem for a few years back in the 90s was referred to by the shorthand name "14:9." You take HD content and scale it down until it does not quite fit inside the NTSC raster. You get small mattes on the top and bottom of frame, but you also crop off some of the sides. The final aspect ratio of the picture within the NTSC raster is 14:9, rather than 16:9 for full letterboxing. It's a compromise move between a full letterbox and a full center-cut.

I haven't the foggiest idea what the virtue of that is. It always struck me as a "worst of both worlds" thing. But I know that the big broadcast station in Dallas ? WFAA-TV ? was an early adopter of HD, and they used 14:9 as their standard method of downconverting locally originated programming for NTSC for quite a few years.