How do you do 16:9 Web Video with no "bars"?

T

terrierist

Carbonite Member
I need someone to walk me thorugh the steps for the best way of making large, but not quite full-size 16:9 web video, or pointing me toward an existing tutorial. I'm using a DVX100B and Final Cut Pro 4.5 with the Flip4Mac plugin that enables me to output Windows Media Video. Should I shoot the footage in letterbox? Squeeze mode? Progressive or interlaced? How do I capture in Final Cut? How do I crop (if necessary) so that I won't have the black bars at the top and bottom? Most of the discussions I've seen on 16:9 deal with it for either a 4:3 or 16:9 TV. I'd appreciate any help.
 
But no matter what you do, to not have the letterbox bars in the final product, just set the size to what the actual image size is.
 
IMO FCP doesn't reshape footage that well. Therefore I shoot in anamorphic and keep it like that until it hits the TV and is only then unsqueezed.

For the web I unsqueeze it by setting the ouput to a CUSTOM SIZE. I normally use 480 x 288 - that will stretch it out with no black bars.

Does that make sense?
 
Well, 16:9 should be 480x270.

But it won't let you do that (it needs to be on a multiple of 16). 272 works...sort of. You still get leetle tiny skinny letterbox bars, though.

Unless you wanted the 1.66 ratio, of course.
 
GenJerDan said:
Well, 16:9 should be 480x270.

But it won't let you do that (it needs to be on a multiple of 16). 272 works...sort of. You still get leetle tiny skinny letterbox bars, though.

Unless you wanted the 1.66 ratio, of course.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I forgot about the NTSC - PAL size difference. Maybe my maths is off too, but it does look okay with PAL footage and is a reasonable size.
 
Finally got it to output perfectly at 640x360. Trashing prefs before setting up anamorphic capture & sequence did the trick. Thanks for all the input.
 
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