16:9 very very wide in edit

[maciejsob]

Dear All;
I have checked all posts concering 16:9 capture with problems similar and exactly the same as mine. I did what was suggested without effect. As I am almost desperate asking you for help:))

1. I have material recorded in 16:9 on my JVC DV camcorder.
2. I was capturing for more than a week to VS8.0 Trial and everything was OK.
3. Suddenly one day after capture at the editor picture was very very "wide" with huge black bars top and bottom. Everything looks ok while capture.
4. I have chceked properties of the clip itself - 16:9 is correctly displayed.
5. Than Project properties - 16:9 and keep aspect ratio (tried also all combinations 4:3, 16:9, kepp aspect ratio, set as project properties no change)
6. I have checked to aske before first clip and selected YES to fit video to project.
7.Yesterday I made check with MPEG to DVD capture insted of DV format which I was using before (and I want to use), and with this conversion everything is OK. No with AVI!!
8. Reinstallation of VS didn't bring me to the previous state when everything was perfect...

Any suggestions Highly appreciate.

[thecoalman]

3. Suddenly one day after capture at the editor picture was very very "wide" with huge black bars top and bottom. Everything looks ok while capture.

Sounds as if it's not anamorphic widescreen but just a 16:9 imposed on a 4:3 video. Some cams have different settings settings for this. Anamorphic widescreen uses the full resolution but will appear elongated vertically when played either in the preview window of most editing software or on a TV via RCA. For playback on a 4:3 TV with the correct aspect you need to either use S-video from the cam (at least on my cam) or author a 16:9 DVD. This is the best way and really the only good way to make 16:9. The full resolution is used, the black bars are created by the DVD player or whatever playback device your using.

What it sounds like your cam is doing is imposing a 16:9 on a 4:3 video, essentially the black bars as part of the video. So what you would really have is 4:3 video with black bars top and bottom, not 16:9. If your capturing a video such as this and spewcifying it's 16:9, during playback the blackbars will be added to the video in addition to the ones on the video producing a very wide area of black top and bottom.

Suggest you look at the options in cam and select the correct one for anamorphic widescreen for the future. The video you currently have will need to be captured as 4:3 if what I suggested above is what's happening.

Edit: probably the best way to test this is to plug it into a TV via RCA and see if it displays as 16:9, if it does it's not