4:3 to 16:9 and mixing footage in Premiere

ministersin

ministersin

Member
I have read several threads from searching and none seem to provide any answers. I hope someone can help me.

I am using a 100p (no 16:9 or squeeze). I was told not to use the letterbox mode because if I got a boom in a shot oir whatever i could adjust the footage up or down if I had it instead of recording black pixels in camera. I shot in 24p.

My second cam was a 3CCD Panasonic GS320, shooting in 16:9 60i. I need to combine the footage and end up with a widescreen movie (it will be displayed in a theater).

Do I have to make black mattes and just add letterboxes to the 4:3 footage and then mix it with the 16:9? It looks like when i add the 16:9 footage in, it is stretched.

In Premiere when you capture footage does the project type (i.e. widescreen/4:3) dictate how the footage is captured? Do I need to capture my 16:9 footage into a 16:9 project and my 4:3 into a 4:3 and then import the 16:9 into the 4:3?

Can someone please tell me what I'm doing wrong?
 
Premiere will always capture in the footage's native format.

I'd recomend working in a 16:9 project, and simply zooming in on your 4:3 footage (cropping off the top & bottom) to make it 16:9

- Mikko
 
Mikko;

Looking at some sample footage on the TV, I can already see pixels on the footage I zoomed in on. I can imagine this would be 100 times more pronounced on the big screen.

I have the instructional DVD from the woman who made the movie November using the DVX100p and she said she filmed native 4:3, but never talked about post.

Of course I am encoding to a DV codec. I could use an uncompressed AVI output, but I don't think that would help since my footage is already compressed to MiniDV output when recorded/captured.

Is this really my best option?
 
First thing, just because it is being projected in a movie theater does not mean it has to be widescreen. It is likely they can just as easily project a 4:3 image. Since some of your footage is already 16:9 and you shot your 4:3 with the intent to crop, let's just assume you will create a 16:9 output of some kind. Also, you are mixing 24p with 60i, so you need to stick with the lowest common denominator and use a 60i project to edit.

First question I would ask is how will it be projected in the theater? What type of source, connection, and projector? For instance, miniDV deck -> S-video -> SD projector... or DVD player -> component -> widescreen HD projector.

If it's going over a composite or S-video connection, then it's a 4:3 signal anyway, and you'd want to work in a 4:3 project, masking your 4:3 footage to 16:9. If you drop your 16:9 footage in your 4:3 timeline, it should automatically be scaled to look letterboxed. If not, set vertical scaling to 75% and you're set.

If it's going composite or an even higher end connection from a DVD player or upscaling DVD player, then you might want to go for it and edit in a 16:9 timeline. Yes, you will lose some clarity due to upscaling, but you can apply a little sharpening if you like. It really is a wash, since any SD footage will look soft on a 40' screen, I've never seen otherwise.
 
Joshua Provost said:
If it's going over a composite or S-video connection, then it's a 4:3 signal anyway,[...]
Click to expand...

Not the case at all.


The signal used has no effect on the aspect ratio what so ever. Aspect ratio only matters at the actual display, and the physical capturing equipment until the sensor/film. There is no such thing as an "anamorphic" ("Squeeze") signal, only an anamorphic monitor/display. (& lens of course).


SD can be 4:3 or 16:9, and it works just fine over any video signal format.

- Mikko
 
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