anamorphic to non anamorphic in FCP4

[Mark Shea]

I have captured footage on my XL1 in anamorphic mode, I wish to run it thru FCP4 as non anamorphic. How do I do this as FCP4 seems to recognise footage as anamorphic even when system settings are on non anamorphic

[Boyd Ostroff]

What end result do you want? A letterboxed image in 4:3? If so then what you did was right. Create a regular 4:3 sequence and drop the anamorphic clip into it. It will automagically be letterboxed. This will require rendering however.

But to really answer your question, it makes no difference how you capture, it's easily changed afterwards. Select the captured clip in the browser and open its properties. You may then either check or uncheck the anamorphic box as desired.

These threads may also be of interest:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...threadid=27748
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...threadid=25441
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...threadid=31987
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...threadid=24850

[Mark Shea]

Thanks Boyd, those links were an interesting read
What I have been doing is editing in 16:9 and resizing the 4:3 photos to 45 in the motion - scale tab. This means some cropping of the photo images vertically, which I don't particularly want.
I want to try and get uniformity in the project, so having a letterboxed 16:9 image in 4:3 in not what I'm after.
You mentioned in previous posts that how you capture footage is unimportant as all you need to do in FCP4 to change 16:9 to 4:3 and visa versa, is go to edit-item properties-format- and untick the anamorphic column.
I've tried all this and the image (on my computer screen) still appears squashed or stretched withever way I go (As yet I haven't tested any of this on a tv monitor)
I've tried capturing 16:9 in a 4:3 sequence (FCP4 recognise 16:9 footage and treated as such)
I've tried ticking anamorphic on my 4:3 photos in a 16:9 sequence (which just made them appear stretched)
I've tried un ticking anamorphic on my 16:9 video footage in a 4:3 sequence (and the footage appeared squashed)

So unless things appear different when converted to dvd/tape...at the moment I still have the problem of having either squashed 16:9 video footage or stretched 4:3 photos when using either a 16:9 or 4:3 sequence.

I appreciate your help Boyd, but I still haven't got the uniformity of images I'm after, without having to crop one or the other

[Boyd Ostroff]

Mark, I think you've confused us all with your 4:3/16:9 photo dilemma. Maybe you just aren't expressing yourself clearly? As other people have said, there is no way to fit 4:3 into 16:9 without chopping off the top and bottom of the 4:3 image. You're trying to fit a square peg into a rectangular hole!

But let me see if I can help... I just created a 16:9 sequence in FCP, then took a 4:3 still and dropped it in. FCP automatically pillarboxes it, with black lines on the left and right of the image. Now that's one way to get the photo into the sequence without distortion.

But I assume you want it to fill the frame. In that case, reduce the view scale in the canvas to 50% using the drop down tab so that you see empty gray space around the frame. Now use the other drop down tab to choose Image+Wireframe. Now grab one of the white boxes (handles) in the corners of the image. Drag outwards and the image will get larger. Stop dragging when it fills the full width of the frame. In doing this you will have cropped off the top and bottom of the still photo. If you don't like the cropping you can point anywhere inside the image with the mouse cursor. Hold down the shift key to constrain movement in the vertical direction. Now you can slide the image up and down inside the 16:9 frame to create a composition that you like.

Now I can't think of any other way to fit 4:3 into 16:9. But maybe I (and the rest of us) are missing something? Hope this helps...

[Mark Shea]

"Reduce the view scale in the canvas to 50% using the drop down tab so that you see empty gray space around the frame. Now use the other drop down tab to choose Image+Wireframe. Now grab one of the white boxes (handles) in the corners of the image. Drag outwards and the image will get larger. Stop dragging when it fills the full width of the frame. In doing this you will have cropped off the top and bottom of the still photo. If you don't like the cropping you can point anywhere inside the image with the mouse cursor. Hold down the shift key to constrain movement in the vertical direction. Now you can slide the image up and down inside the 16:9 frame to create a composition that you like."

This procedure gives the same appearance that one would get if they just went to edit-item properties-format-and clicked on the anamorphic column.
Unfortunately the 4:3 photo image appears stretched.

I think I'm pretty much going around in circles on this one, I want uniformity across my 16:9 video footage and 4:3 photo stills without having to crop or letterbox. Which as you said, is like putting a square peg in a round hole.

What I was hoping was that because the XL1 captures 16:9 by recording the 16:9 frame to a 720 x 480 frame. I could somehow revert back to the SD 720 X 480 (3:2) image and use that. I've read in plenty of places that this is the case...but as yet no one has told me how to get rid of the 'fake' 16:9 on a 4:3 image so as to edit the footage in 4:3

Anyway, it's all a learning lesson....if you wish to incorporate a 4:3 photo into a 16:9 sequence.....shoot with plenty of horizontal height to allow for cropping.

Maybe I could keep my photos at 4:3 and add a picture frame on the sides instead of just black....and to really make it corny...add the sound of a camera click!

[Boyd Ostroff]

<<<-- Originally posted by Mark Shea : Unfortunately the 4:3 photo image appears stretched.

That should not be the case if you followed my directions. The proportions of the photo will not be stretched but the top and bottom will be cropped off.

Now you could use a similar technique with your anamorphic video by dropping it into a 4:3 sequence. Then you could resize it such that the left and right side get cropped off. But the results will probably look terrible. The XL-1 creates 16:9 by just chopping off the top and bottom of the frame, then stretching it back to 720x480. This causes about a 25% loss of vertical resolution for starters. When the XL-1 puts 16:9 into a 720x480 frame it has to stretch the video vertically to do this (think about it). That's why it's called "anamorphic." That word is a combination of the Greek words which mean "changed form." Don't feel bad, I found all this confusing at first myself.

<<<-- Originally posted by Mark Shea : Which as you said, is like putting a square peg in a round hole.

Actually I was trying to be cute by saying a "square peg in a rectangular hole," but you get the idea. Why do you find it such a problem to crop the 4:3 photos? Doing this will probably give you the best results at this point...

[Mark Shea]

yes some of the photos that have been cropped look ok, others such as shots of tall buildings, look crap and poorly framed.
One option is to only convert these photos to 16:9...they will appear stretched...but may be an interesting affect....and not too noticable to the untrained eye...like a fish eye effect.
thanks for your responses Boyd