Letterboxing and Aspect Ratio problem

I'm authoring a feature film DVD. All menus and movies are 16:9
When I play the Simulator in "16:9" everything is fine.
When I play the Simulator in "4:3 Letterbox" my menus are letterboxed as desired, however every movie is for some reason squished into 4:3.
Any ideas?
The Video Asset box in the Inspector tells me all my movies are 720x480 16:9.
All tracks show in the Track Inspector as display mode 16:9 Letterbox.
All Menus show in the Menu Inspector as Aspect Ratio 16:9
Also of note, one of my tracks is used both as a movie and as a motion menu. Although it's the same track, with the simulator in 4:3 it's correctly letterboxed as a menu, yet squished as a movie!
I exported from a 16:9 Anamorphic project in FCP (as a QTmovie set to Anamorphic NTSC DV) and imported straight into DVD Studio Pro. (I've noticed on these forums most people go through Compressor. I didn't. Would that be the cause of my headache?)
The movies display in my QuickTime Player as 16:9 clips with a size of 853x480

The Simulator is very far from accurate. Burn a disc, then pop it into a DVD player.

Similar Messages

Horizontal bands and aspect ratio problems

Sorry to ask yet another question, but I'm stuck again....
Two major problems here:
1. Thick horizontal bands of distortion across the video when burned on a DVD and played back on both the computer and TV. It's like the video is chopped up into strips and each is offset a bit from the next. This is most noticeable when there's movement, especially when the camera is panning.
I've found a few posts on this around the board, but all of them were solved by exporting to quicktime instead of quicktime conversion, which I already did...any more ideas?? It plays fine in Quicktime by the way.
2. Aspect ratio issues. The video is 16:9 (it exported from FCE squished, which I solved following these instructions: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1431891&tstart=150 (using the dimensions specified by the second poster)), but it plays on both the apple cinema display and the widescreen TV with letterboxing. On the computer monitor it looks right, but there are thin black bands at the top and bottom (thinner than normal letterboxing), but on the TV it looks squished horizontally, with full letterbox bands. Any idea what's going on??
I'm using FCE HD (version 3.5.1) on a Mac Pro running OS 10.4.11. Any advice would be HUGELY appreciated!!!
Thanks in advance,
Claire

1. Regular standard-def video, shot on miniDV tapes in two different cameras and imported through capture in FCE. One camera shot in 4:3 and I zoomed in to make it 16:9 in FCE, but the problems are identical in the footage from both cameras so I don't think that's a factor. The file is now an .mov file exported to quicktime from FCE. DVD was burned in iDVD (version 6.0.4) using one of the widescreen menus, with the video added by drag and drop.
2. Same video as above, same DVD, played through a DVD player connected to the TV.
Thanks!
Claire

CS5 and aspect ratio problem

I am running Master Collection CS5. I have AVCHD clips from from two cameras. One camera is .mod and the other is 720p H.264 (MOV). The .mov show up 16x9 but the .mod show up as 720x480 (4.3). Window Media Player plays them in the correct wide screen format but the properties in Premiere are 720x480. I guess the answer is that adobe doesnt support .mod files but maybe I am missing something.

What you're missing for sure is the fact that this forum is for suite related questions. My assumption is that you need help with Premiere Pro. Please post in that forum.
Bob

Still no fix for aspect ratio problems

I was hoping this new version would fix the aspect ratio problems with importing clips other than in the DV codec, but alas, it was not to be.
My problem is that if I import a clip that is 720x486 (non-square pixels, uncompressed), iDVD doesn't interpret it correctly. It places the clip with small black bars (like a little letterbox) at the top and bottom of the screen, then scrunches the image vertically, sprinkling it with stairstep artifacts.
What's frustrating is that versions up to iDVD 4 didn't have this problem and imported clips in any codec beautifully. It's been a known issue for a long time.
Furthermore, Apple's solution is to convert the clip to a self-contained DV movie (hello, disk space!), which is also undesirable because of the quality loss and poor colour compression. After the latest QuickTime upgrade, exporting in DV doesn't work, creating a clip that is half-field and blocky.
Argh! This is a real problem because many of us use iDVD to make screeners for clients, and it looks unprofessional. It's also a very inaccurate and somewhat useless tool when the clips are of clean lines, titles, and smooth, solid graphics, which show the stairstep effect the most.
I'm at my wit's end having exhausted all other suggested solutions (and please don't tell me to use DVD Studio Pro instead). Anyone else come up with a fix or have the same issue?
Previous discussion on this issue here: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=204675&tstart=0

Sorry, but the answer is - for professional use, use
DVD SP
No, it is absolutely not the answer. EVERYONE I know in my circle of professionals uses iDVD for banging-out quick screeners of TV spots, film clips, dailies. In fact, it's one of the main reasons they added OneStep to iDVD. DVD Studio Pro is for authoring commercial-level DVDs, with a learning curve and pricing structure appropriate to that.
I'm not going to spend time learning DVD Studio Pro just to do quick one-offs, for one, and it's overkill anyway. Not only that, but it costs a lot more than iDVD.
The inablity to import a QuickTime clip -- on Apple software, no less -- is not cool, especially since it doesn't seem an excessive thing to ask (and it used to encode just fine). It's a very basic task considering everything else iDVD has been written to do, and crosscoding and re-encoding video is a basic functionality in QuickTime.
I'm not asking iDVD to prove the existence of dark matter in the universe; I'm just asking it to play a QuickTime movie properly. Which is what it's supposed to do.
There was a work-around, supplied by Apple, but it no longer works for me, so that's why I'm asking what worked for others.

Resolution and aspect ratio.

Could somebody please help me with my problem?
I am creating a slideshow, using iMovie '08, for a party I will be attending. I am going to make copies for several guests but I am lost on the details. The master copy of my project is 1920x1080 HD. So, in what resolution and aspect ratio should I make my guest copies given that each guest will have a different television and aspect ratio setting?

Send the file to iDVD and create standard definition DVD's.

Quality and aspect ratio with FCE and iPhoto

Project started by importing hundreds of slides shot by different cameras with difference settings. Slides were imported into i-photo where I used the slideshow function to make several segments. As I was choosing the photos and dragging them into slideshows I cropped them all into 16x9 ratio so they would all be uniform. I then sent to QuickTime movie using the built in iPhoto export button and selected “custom export” setting with DV/DVCPRO-NTSC compression with quality set to “Best” and aspect ratio to 16x9.
Then imported into FCE and did serious editing (music, effects, titles, etc.). When finished I tried exporting as both a QT self-contained movie and QT conversion (using DV/DVCPRO and 16:9) but the quality is terrible and when I make a iDVD the picture is squeezed and distorted into a 4:3 ratio despite the fact that the IDVD is set to 16:9. I have spent over a month on this project and have fellow travelers waiting for my “creative” touch. Can anyone tell me where I went wrong on both aspect ratio and quality? Thanks.
PS: Am using MacBook Pro, OS 10.7.4 FCE 4.0.1 and iPhoto-11 9.3.2

Hi
I'm not shure - but I can share my thoughts
I tried exporting as both a QT self-contained movie and QT conversion (using DV/DVCPRO and 16:9)
I DO NEVER - Use Export as QuickTime CONVERSION
I DO - Share as QuickTime .mov - straight off
I had problems with 16x9 until I understood that
• I had to select type of project as WideScreen in FC
• Browser Window in FinalCut E and Pro - can extend far to the Right with several Columns. One Column states Anamorphic. When set my material to this. THEN introduced it into TimeLine. Can not be done in after hand.
• Export as above
• In iDVD there are TWO places to set 16x9
- When creating a NEW iDVD Project - SELECT --> WideSrceen
- In iDVD Project / Projectinfo [ Shift+cmd+I ]- ALSO set 16x9
Yours Bengt W

DVCPRO HD Aspect Ratio Problem

Hello, and thanks for looking.
I am working on a project where the source footage is 1280 x 1080 (16:9) frame size and pixel aspect ratio, (1080i60) with an editing timebase of 29.97 (as would be expected). I tend to work with multiple timelines, such that I keep various drafts of my work intact for later referral. I have noticed that one of my sequences does not have the same aspect ratio as my original sequence (it has frame size: HD(1440x1080)(16:9) and pixel aspect ratio of HD(1440x1080) and an editing timebase of 23.98. This is a problem that I didn't notice until a lot of work went into this draft, as the aspect ratio when viewing in the canvas is the same. Where my question comes in is here: the editing timebase, pixel aspect ratio and frame size are all different than my source footage, and I am extremely concerned because when I copy clips to another timeline with the settings the same as the source footage, they aspect ratio goes wacky and all the people in my footage gain about 50 pounds (to their certain chagrin). How do I copy my timeline that I spent hours working on in the wrong settings into a timeline with the correct editing timecode base and aspect ratio? Whenever I do it, even if I drag a piece of the same source footage in to match the settings when FCP asks me to, the copied in footage from the timeline with the wrong aspect ratio looks (of course) too wide. I would have thought that the footage would maintain its original source aspect ratio. Also, it won't let me adjust the settings in the 1440x1080 timeline to the correct settings for the source. Please help me get timeline fixed so that I don't resort to re-cutting the footage from the original assembly cut!
Thanks.

Go ahead and copy everything into a timeline with the correct settings. Find a clip in another sequence (with the correct settings) that looks and behaves correctly. Select this clip, hit command-c. Go to your new timeline, select all (command-a), hit option-v and choose paste all the appropriate attributes. Everything should be adjusted correctly.

H.264 pixel aspect ratio problem after update

Yesterday I updated Premiere Pro CC and Media Encoder CC to version 2014.2. But now I am having pixel aspect ratio problems with the H.264 codec when I export a 1080i50 sequence to PAL widescreen. The problem also seems to occur with other frames sizes.
I am using the same settings as usual with Aspect set to: D1/DV PAL Widescreen 16:9.(1.4587). However, VLC and Windows Media Player play the video with a 5:4 ratio. So it looks like the pixel aspect ratio information is not passed to Media Encoder or to the file.
This problem does not affect other codecs like AVI or MPEG-2, these are correctly displayed.
Is there anyone else having this problem? And more important, does anyone know a solution?

When creating files for computer/online playback (not editing), then best practice is to simply use square pixels with 1.0 Pixel Aspect Ratio, which will ensure that ALL players correctly display your video, no chance of problems.
Export as 1024x576 with 1.0 PAR and that is the square-pixel equivalent of PAL DV widescreen.
For NTSC users, I've seen it two ways, either 864x480 or 854x480.
Merry Christmas
Jeff Pulera

PRE7: Aspect Ratio problem even before opening source media file

Hi,
I am a newbie in Premiere Elements. Read a lot of threads with aspect ratio problems, but didn't find similar problem to mine, so decided to open a new discussion.
I am shooting video with Samsung HMX-H105 SSD camcorder, in 16:9 widescreen HD video.
When I try to make DVD from the MP4 file from the camcorder, it gets skewed even before opening it, when it is seen in the right hand pane with the Media file previews. I am not sure if somebody can understand what I am trying to tell so I have a screenshot of a video that I shot with my camcorder and a video that I have downloaded, shot by someone else with Samsung HMX-H20 in 16:9 HD as well.
So even when I start a new project in 4:3 and not 16:9 my videos always get stretched. This is why I think that maybe Premiere Elements doesn't understand the aspect ratio of my MP4 video files - it can be seen in the left hand side pane, where I have circled (with white elipse) the black stripes above and below the video.
Hope that somebody can help with my problem.

You ROCK
both of you
Thanks wine_snob for pointing me how to find the Interpret Footage option.
And thanks to Steve for solving my problem
In the "Interpret Footage" and "Pixel Aspect Ratio", the working video says: "Use Pixel Aspect Ratio from File: Square Pixels (1.0)"
but on my problem video it says: "Use Pixel Aspect Ratio from File: Other Aspect Ratio (1.778)", so I changed it to "Conform to: Square Pixels (1.0)" and now I have perfectly proportinal video for 16:9
Thank you once again!

Using Win 10 there is a need for an app to determine the full device display area and aspect ratio programitically; the dimensions are needed to create full-screen bitmap.

While Windows.Current.Bounds returns the application windows size, in order to create a full-screen bitmap my app would need to retrieve the full display area of the device. I cannot even get the aspect ratio.
Pre-Win10, using Windows.Current.Bounds I can create a bitmap of whatever size application window the user is seeing. When the user is showing my app at full screen, I can therefore get the full display area and aspect ratio of the device and create a full-screen
bitmap.
With Win10, the user would need to know to hide the taskbar and also display at full-screen before an app can retrieve the display area and aspect ratio using Windows.Current.Bounds.
Before Win10 it's obvious to the user that full-screen is or is not being used. When I create the bitmap, I create it to fit the application window. When the app is displayed full screen, the bitmap will be full screen. Also, the app starts full-screen so
I can detect the display area at startup if I need to.
With Win10, to the user the app "looks like" it is full screen with the taskbar displayed even though it's not really full screen.
I believe that in Win10 determining the full display area will be useful and not just retrieving the application window size.
musical9

Rob, Is this forum best way to get my suggestion to the development team?
Before Win10 it's obvious to the user that full-screen is or is not being used. When I create the bitmap, I create it to fit the application window. When the app is displayed full screen, the bitmap will be full screen. Also, the app starts full-screen
so I can detect the display area at startup if I need to.
With Win10, to the user the app "looks like" it is full screen with the taskbar displayed even though it's not really full screen.
Yes, Windows.Current.Bounds does work the same, but I believe that in Win10 determining the full display area will be useful and not just the application window.
musical9

Stills - Aspect Ratio Problem: Viewer vs. Canvas

Working in DV/NTSC 720x480, A/V settings correct and matched.
I've prepared a number of stills in Photoshop CS set to non-square pixels. I import these images into FCP and everything looks fine in the Viewer, and the aspect ratio under the Motion/distort tab shows a setting of "0".
But, when I then drop the image into the timeline the aspect ratio of the image changes, the yellow render bar appears, and in the Motion/distort tab in the Canvas the aspect ratio changes to a setting of -12.5.
If the pixel aspect ratio was corrected in Photoshop at the outset, why does this occur? And why is this happening in the Canvas only and not in the Viewer as well???
Many thanks.

why does this occur? And why is this happening in the Canvas only and not in the Viewer as well???<<</div>
When you load an image or clip from the Browser to the Viewer, it displays in it's native size and aspect ratio. But once you plave it i a Sequence (Timeline), it takes on the Sequence's settings and will display accordingly.
-DH

In Win 10 technical preview cannot determine the full device display area and aspect ratio; the dimensions are needed to create full-screen bitmap.

While Windows.Current.Bounds returns the application windows size, in order to create a full-screen bitmap my app would need to retrieve the full display area of the device. I cannot even get the aspect ratio.
Pre-Win10, using Windows.Current.Bounds I can create a bitmap of whatever size application window the user is seeing. When the user is showing my app at full screen, I can therefore get the full display area and aspect ratio of the device and create
a full-screen bitmap.
With Win10, the user would need to know to hide the taskbar and also display at full-screen before an app can retrieve the display area and aspect ratio using Windows.Current.Bounds.
Is there any way to get the display area and aspect ratio of the device without asking the user to fully maximize the application window?
musical9

Rob, Is this forum best way to get my suggestion to the development team?
Before Win10 it's obvious to the user that full-screen is or is not being used. When I create the bitmap, I create it to fit the application window. When the app is displayed full screen, the bitmap will be full screen. Also, the app starts full-screen
so I can detect the display area at startup if I need to.
With Win10, to the user the app "looks like" it is full screen with the taskbar displayed even though it's not really full screen.
Yes, Windows.Current.Bounds does work the same, but I believe that in Win10 determining the full display area will be useful and not just the application window.
musical9

Letterboxes, Stretching, and Aspect Ratio...

So heres my problem...
I'm filming on a Sony HD camera (in DV because I dont have the hard drive space for HD right now or the processing power sigh) in 16:9 aspect ratio.
I import it into FCP through iMovie because I can just tell it to capture everything easily and walk away while it does its thing.
Now, when I open a clip from a bin its cropped at a 16:9 ratio (thats good... no letterboxes or anything, just the footage like that). Thats what I want. However, I can't get it to show like that in the viewer. It always has letterboxes, and its stretched when I don't choose Use Square Pixels.
When I convert to a QT movie, its still stretched lengthwise.
I'm assuming I'm doing something terribly wrong here, but not being completely versed in FCP (yet) I'm having trouble fiddling around trying to get this to work. Do you have any ideas?
(o yeah, I have it set on DV-NTSC Anamorphic... which I assume is what I want...)
Thanks for anyhelp you can offer

All right,... my embarassment level is pretty high right, now... having posted three times as of now .... but my problem wasn't as resolved as I thought it was.
I got rid of the letterboxes (yay) but I still have to deal with the pixels. Its fine in the canvas and the viewer when I click Square Pixels, but when they are off or when I convert to quicktime, they turn off and its stretched tall into a 3:2 ratio
Ideally, I'd like a 16:9 ratio for the quicktime movie.
Do you have any ideas (again)?

Aspect ratio problem with consumer camera and Premiere Elements 11

Hello everyone - I'm Steve. I'm new here. I do still photography on a pro level, digital and analog, but I am an absolute dummy with video...but then, I don't want to do much, just rudimentarily cut a few family videos, upload them, etc.
However, I can't get Premiere Elements 11 to output my self-shot clips in a correct aspect ratio.
My camera is a consumer-model Canon Legria FS200. I shoot video in a resolution the camera calls XP. The camera says they are 16:9, the camera monitor shows them as 16:9, and when I use the software (called Pixela Image Mixer) that came with the camera to import the clips to disk, I get mpg files that Windows (7) Explorer says are 720x576 pixel, and that VLC player correctly displays as wide-screen 16:9 without me having to tweak its display settings.
However, the moment I import them into Premiere Elements, they appear horizontally squeezed, and I can't seem to output them any other way, with or even without editing them in Premiere.
I tried to use the recipe given here: https://forums.adobe.com/message/5987538#5987538 , (replacing only NTSC with PAL because I'm in Germany), namely, setting the project preset set manually for PAL/Hard Disk etc/ Widescreen 48kHz and check force selected program settings. But no matter, Premiere displays the video in horizontally compressed form, with large black bars to the right and to the left.
On the export side, setting the output to PAL DVD Widescreen and setting the Pixel Aspect Ratio in the output settings to Widescreen does not help, either. Neither can I force VLC player manually to display the correct aspect ratio. BTW, audio is perfect all along.
This is about as far as I can see myself getting without help. Has anyone any idea?
Thanks a lot in advance,
Steve, from Germany

Steve
I see that you are now in the Adobe Premiere Elements Forum with your problem already solved.
I did not see any Why for what you encountered, so I thought I would give you my take on this.
Your Canon FS200 gives video with MPEG2 video compression with a .mod file extension. That .mod file extension can be found in use with some Canon as well as JVC cameras. The .mod file history with Premiere Elements (any version) is problematic. In some instances, the user needs to rename the file extension from .mod to .mpg before it can be imported, but not always. But, the .mod widescreen comes packaged with the aspect ratio dilemma, presenting as 4:3 rather than 16:9. The classical argument is whether Premiere Elements does not recognize a .mod file's 16:9 flag or whether the 16:9 flag got lost.
There used to be a utility contributed by an user to handle the file extension and/or aspect ratio issues. Now, the general fix is to import the file into Premiere Elements (in your case 11) with Add Media/Files and Folder/Project Assets. And in Project Assets, you right click the file, select Interpret Footage, and go to the Pixel Aspect Ratio section of the Interpret Footage dialog where you
(a) dot the Conform To:
and
(a) set the Contorm To: field to (in your case) D1/DV PAL Widescreen 16:9 (1.4587)
Once you are in the program and have the file on the Timeline, if any black edges, you can click the monitor to bring up the image's bounding box. Then drag on a bounding box handle to scale the image just to the point where the black edges are gone.
If you ever need the Adobe Premiere Elements Forum, maybe bookmark this link
Premiere Elements
You should expect to have this issue with any .mod widescreen file that you obtain from your Canon FS200 camera.
ATR
Add On...If you are depending on the program to set the correct project preset, you may want to check into what it is setting based on the properties the first file you drag to the Timeline. A manual setting of the project preset may be in order. Please see
ATR Premiere Elements Troubleshooting: PE11: Accuracy of Automatic Project Preset (New Project Dialog) Setting

Aspect Ratio Problem (black bars on top and bottom in the preview window)

I have iMovie 08 and I have been shooting video on my new Canon HF100. It appears that in iMovie preview window my 1920x1080 (and even the ones I bring in in 960x540) videos appear to be in wrong aspect ratio - they are stretched beyond 16:9 ratio horizontally. The problem persists if I export the movie through Quicktime - the videos are still stretched. In the preview window in iMovie I have the right 16:9 box but it has black bars on to and the bottom. The clips themselves in the time line seem to be the correct aspect ratio.

Also I have found this on the export video screen which narrows it down a bit...
Here's how the source tab of that screen looks...
compared to the output tab, with the black bars that are my issue...
So where did I go wrong here?

Letterboxing and Aspect Ratio problem

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