Exporting 16:9 Material
"When I export my anamorphic clips they become squished non-anamorphic 4:3 exported clips. Why is this happening and what can I do about it?”
You should understand that anamorphic material IS squished. That's the way anamorphic imaging works. It’s an image that’s 16:9 squeezed into a 4:3 frame. The DV format specifies one frame size 720x480 for NTSC. To make widescreen material the image is anamorphically squeezed into that frame. When you do a QuickTime Movie export you're exporting the raw file anamorphic file just as it is. To play it back as 16:9 you have to play it in a device that understands it's anamorphic and displays the squeezed material as widescreen.
If you bring the material back into FCP or FCE you just have to check its anamorphic flag in the Browser column or in Item Properties to tell the application the material is anamorphic. It will take care of everything else for you.
The problem with exporting for the web that does not understand anamorphic material is that you need to export in a format that conforms to the shape you want the image to be. In these cases you need to export to QuickTime Conversion, setting the frame size to 853x480. This will be a 16:9 equivalent of your anamorphic material. If you need a smaller size, set the frame size to same ratio, 800x450, 720x405, 640x360, 600x338, 480x270, 320x180, or any other combination of dimensions that produces the same result.
Exporting to iDVD is also a problem. Look here for different ways to solve this issue.
Copyright © 2007 South Coast Productions