FCP quicktime "iphone "export diff then quicktime "export for iphone web"??

Question

so what i dont get, is when i export out of quicktime using "export for web" and i choose the "iphone" 900 kbit option, i get 480X270 beautiful true widescreen clips. But when I export using quicktime conversion in final cut pro 6 and i choose" iphone"....i get 480X360. Why does this happen? I want true widescreen, just like everything i get from itunes.....not this 360 size (which i know is the phones screen res, but who cares)?

Answer 1

Alistair
Earlybird is exporting H264 ... the Key Frames setting is determining the GOP length. This value should really be determined based on the complexity of the video, to my understanding, the actual frame rate has no bearing on it. If you have very complex fast moving content then a low Key Frame rate is advisable to ensure good image quality (although it will adversely affect the filesize) whereas if you have slow moving or static content (like an interview subject) then a higher Key Frame rate will still produce a good image but at a smaler filesize. The default of 24 should be pretty much fine as a catchall starting point.
Earlybird
Corrupted render files (and render references) can be a pain because FCP will use those files and references  in place of the original media when building the export. And so it should as it does't want to waste time re-rendering sections that are apparently already rendered. Unfortuantely, as noted, if the render file has gone bad and/or starts referencing the wrong media then you'll get these wierd flashes of completely unexpeced and unwanted footage showing up where it shouldn't be. When you trash those files then QT / FCP will just go back and re-reference the original media ... so it's usually a worthwhile step to take just in case thats the problem.  The worse case scenario is that it only that doesn't work and you spend some time unecessarily re-rendering.
As to why these files go bad? That I don't know. Why do Preferences get corrupted? That I don't know either but it definitely happens :-(
Cheers
Andy