Cropping 4:3 to widescreen in videostudio X2

Annette J · Post by **Annette J** » Wed Oct 21, 2009 10:22 pm

I need to convert some 4:3 footage to widescreen format to fit into a group project. As I don't want to stretch and would prefer to avoid pillarboxing, the obvious method is cropping. The thing is, the action moves during some clips such that I want to be able to use something like pan and zoom so I lose say the floor from the start of the clip and the ceiling by the end of it. But even though I have converted the project to be widescreen format so it currently shows as pillarboxed, the dotted box which the pan and zoom filter uses is still 4:3 shaped. How do I change this? It would be nice if there was a filter to convert between the two.
Thanks in advance for any advice.

Clevo · Post by **Clevo** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 1:44 am

It's not that easy to do this at home as, as you found out, there is no way of avoiding cutting bits out of the image.

However, the easiest way to do this is to put the video in the overlay track and zoom in enough to hide the edges.

Though you will lose resolution when you re-render but this will happen if you used the cropping and zoomed in too.

The other alternative is to leave it in it's normal perspective, put it to one side of the screen and decorate the blank space with highlighted stills from the footage you are showing (overlay stills over the video, or picture in picture)

Black Lab · Post by **Black Lab** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 4:21 am

You say you don't want pillarboxing. Is that because they are black? This tutorial shows how to turn those black pillars into something more attractive.

In my case I used a blurred video, but you can really use anything (colors, still images, etc.) you can imagine.

Annette J · Post by **Annette J** » Thu Oct 22, 2009 9:14 pm

Thanks for the suggestions. It's not me that has a problem with the pillarboxing, as it is a group project. The decision has been made to have it in widescreen and I think there is enough junk at the top and bottom to happily lose some, so I don't mind that. I would be concerned about the loss of quality myself, but that decision is out of my hands, I just have to edit my part of the project.

What I really need is more control over which parts are cropped, ie I need this to move, as with pan and zoom. I have a shot of some people dancing, which starts fairly close and zooms out. I don't want to lose the heads at the beginning, but if the whole clip has that crop then it is unbalanced by the end, with too much space above their heads and losing their feet, which is annoying. It should be possible in video pan and zoom, except that the dotted box is 4:3 rather than widescreen, even though the project has been converted to widescreen. Is there a way to alter this?

If there is no way to do this in VS then I shall either just decorate the pillars as Clevo and Black Lab suggest, or leave it and get the project leader to convert it as she has Adobe.

Trevor Andrew · Post by **Trevor Andrew** » Sun Oct 25, 2009 7:54 pm

Hi Annette

Ok

With the 4:3 video clip in the timeline, edit the project properties to 16:9.
From the Attributes tab select ¡¥distort clip¡¦
Now right click the preview screen ¡V select fit to screen
Again right click the preview screen ¡V keep aspect ratio
Ok¡Xyou have changed the aspect ratio from 4:3 to 16 : 9

The video will loose details top and bottom
Right select preview screen¡Xselect one of the Anchor Options¡Xtry it out.

Or
With the video selected in the timeline,
select the attributes tab
you can use the keyboard arrow keys to nudged the video up and down.
Play the project¡Xstop when you want to re-align
Use the scissors to cut the video.

Select the new right clip¡Xselect the attributes tab¡Xmove the clip up / down using the arrow keys.

Continue to the end of video.

A lot of work, but the cropped heads can be saved¡Xyou loose more of the feet..............

Maybe use a short crossfade between clips

aljimenez · Post by **aljimenez** » Mon Oct 26, 2009 1:08 am

Note that I have not done this but I am very interested in making it work for the future.

If there are two or three obvious parts that should be cropped from the bottom and some parts cropped from the top, then split your video into those parts and position each clip appropriately. I think this should work and wouldn't be too much work as long as there are not too many splits... Al