Aspect ratio question

ducnbyu wrote on 11/20/2008, 4:54 PM
My Canon HV20 shoots at 1440x1080. With a 1.0 par that whould be 4:3. When I import with vms platinum 9.0a and look at the preview window with par 1.33333 it's much wider than 16:9. even doing the media match I get the same project settings with 1.3333 par. Then when I render and write a standard dvd with dvda4.5a it ends up letterboxed in a 16:9 screen and the image is undesireably flattened proportionately.

Goal is to write a 16:9 image to 16:9 dvd without distortion. What is the magic combo?

btw I am carrying the HD image (.m2t) to the last possible step in DVD writing by DVDA to preserve best quality until final compression.

Thanks,
Rye

Comments

Eugenia wrote on 11/20/2008, 5:58 PM
I using the HV20 too, and Vegas does work perfectly with it. Please use my guidelines here: http://eugenia.gnomefiles.org/2008/07/16/sony-vegas-project-properties-with-hv2030/

Then, go to the preview screen, right click on it, and do the following:
Check the "simulate..." option, and uncheck the "scale video...".

There you are, that should do it for editing. At the end, you end to pick the RIGHT mpeg2 template, e.g. the NTSC (or PAL if you are in Europe) DVD Widescreen template, and AC3 for audio. Then, pull the two files on DVDA to create a widescreen DVD.
ducnbyu wrote on 11/20/2008, 8:15 PM
Euginia, thanks for the response. That's what my project properties were and preview screen was already defaulted to and it's too wide to be 16:9

Project: 1440x1080x32, 29.970i <calculates to 1.3333333 - 4:3>
Preview: 360x270x32, 29.970p <calculates to 1.3333333 - 4:3>
Display: 384x216x32 <calculates to 1.7777777 - 16:9>
actual measured with a ruler: 12.4cm x 6.7cm <calculates to 1.8787878>

it is obviously wider/squater than my widescreen tv and I hesitate to attribute it to my monitor because this is also the same proportions I get from the dvd as viewed on my 16:9 tv.

I tried to find where I might have shot with some goofy setting on the camera but all I have is HDV or DV or DV wide and I have HDV selected. pf24 not selected, though at one time I did.

Could it be that it is in fact my monitor distorting the view on the computer and the fact that I'm rendering back to .m2t and taking that into dvda? i.e. unrelated problems causing the same result? It seems like I get a cleaner image on the dvd when compessing from .m2t in dvda rather than I had when compressing from ntsc-avi shot with my old SD camera.

Thanks,
Rye