Project settings advice - 1440x960 or 1440x810?

kdm wrote on 11/27/2007, 11:03 PM

I am putting together a short promo piece for my business of mostly hi res photos, with some stock footage (720p and 1080p), and am wondering what the best project settings would be if my intended output is widescreen DV and 720p QT for web download (as well as Flash video lower res for playback within my website).

Probably an amateur question, but would 1440x960 (1.212 widescreen) be preferrable since it's twice DVD res, or should I go 1440x810 (1.0 square pixel ratio?) for 16:9 directly? What would I render to for DVD widescreen if the latter?

I want to keep as much resolution as I can since the photos look great at full res, but blurry at 720x480 (computer LCD screen).

Many thanks!
Dedric

Comments

Shergar wrote on 11/28/2007, 12:24 AM

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your question but the project settings affect the resolution you preview at, and the *default* render resolution.

You can (and often will) override the project resolution settings to specify the render resolution for each of your output formats. So unless you are rendering intermediate media (eg composites) and bringing them back into your project, your renders will be based on the original footage/photo resolution and the target output resolution.

I would suggest you use 720p or DV Widescreen as your project resolution settings since those are your output targets. If you at some point need to do a higher res output you can achieve that by changing the project settings *or* use a higher res output template.

Do you really mean "blurry"? The pics should just have less resolution at 720x480, - so less detail but not blur.

Check that your previewing is set to Best->Full. Often Best>Auto and the other preview modes don't show the full resolution of your project.

kdm wrote on 11/28/2007, 10:15 AM

Thanks for the reply Shergar. I think you understood my question better than I did.

The crop setting for "Output aspect" was throwing me off since it tracks the render setting, rather than setting everything for 16:9.

Once I went to 1440x810 for the project and skip the render presets for DV widescreen, making my own mpeg2 for 16:9, 704x480 and it looks fine on DVD.

JohnnyRoy wrote on 11/28/2007, 7:34 PM

Actually your best option is to set your project to match your deliver resolution. For you that would be DV Widescreen project with DV Widescreen rendering template. This way there are no surprises. What you preview is what you render.

~jr