Letterboxing

D

drab

Member
I've read numerous threads talking about shooting in 4:3 with the lcd taped off and then adding black bars in post. I don't understand what the benefit of this is vs just shooting in letterbox mode to begin with? The only benefit I see is being able to adjust the picture up or down slightly beneath the black bars in post, which shouldn't be necessary unless you shoot mistakes to begin with. Can anyone clarify any differences/benefits of shooting 4:3 and cropping in post vs shooting letterbox?

Thanks.
 
Your analasys is correct. The benefit is that in post you can control where you crop.

There are also benefits to beeing able to see outside the final recorded area when you are shooting. For example a boom operator can see when their boom is in the 4:3 shot, but safly keep it out of the final 16:9 frame.

- Mikko
 
HorseFilms said:
Also, if you shoot letterbox, any effects you apply in post will be applied to the bars as well.
Click to expand...
Well that's easily fixed by adding a widescreen matte over the top of the letterboxed footage. You might question what the point is in filming it letterbox then, but it's about the ease of framing and playback on monitors w/ it looking right.
 
There's also the point of not wasting data storage on parts of the image that you're not going to use anyway. (Now, whether you can actually see the difference or not is another question...)
 
drab said:
The only benefit I see is being able to adjust the picture up or down slightly beneath the black bars in post, which shouldn't be necessary unless you shoot mistakes to begin with. Can anyone clarify any differences/benefits of shooting 4:3 and cropping in post vs shooting letterbox?
Click to expand...

Well for all intents and purposes, having planned your shot, then shooting it exactly as you planned without mistake, you could see a slight adjustment in post will give you better framing than what you had originally planned, does happen. If its a problem not to see the framing as you originally intended on your monitor - mask that off as well.
 
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