Grettings all knowledgable filmmakers,
I am recording in dv 24fps with the 2:3:3:2 pulldown, 16:9 aspect set in camera. When I drop it into my timeline 23.98fps. everything works fine except there are black bars in the canvas. So any effect, key, etc. goes outside the letterboxed picture. I have just made a matte in the past to block it out, but I would like to know the right way to capture! I've used this format before and they were grayed out. (I guess how it should be, except I don't realize what I did different!!)) Now I know this would mean it's in the 4:3 ratio in the canvas, but when i change it to any kind of 16:9 ratio, it streches the image, or changes it both horizontally and vertically. So what am I not setting to get the grayed out letterbox wih the correct ratio? and when it is correct, what setting should i use in after effects to keep it matched? I'm kinda naive when it comes to the many resolutions and ratio conversions you have to fix, so any info at all would be most appriciated. And many thanks to all the contributions to the threads on this site. I have learned many things I would not have considered otherwise.

Best regards
Mason Dixon
www.ahouseafire.com

In FCP, make sure you have your Sequence setting set to Anamorphic.

You DVD player will add the letterbox bars to the video automatically. Alternately, if you really need bars in FCP, I think you can drag your finished sequence (color corrected and all) into a different sequence (which does not have Anamorphic set). I think this should give you letterboxed video.

Hope this helps.

Yeah. Your sequence is set as "non-anamorphic" 4x3 and you have edited anamorphic material in, so FCP automatically scaled and unsqueezed it for you.

Just select "Sequence settings" and checkmark "anamorphic." Your clips won't look right because they already had scale and distort applied, so just select all the clips already in the timeline, then CTRL click to bring up the contextual menu, and select "Remove Attributes." Then checkmark "Basic Motion" and "Distort."

Now everything should be good.

Problem solved, thank you fellas.
What would we do without ya?!?