The attraction with Widescreen?

[Vamp]

Why do so many of you like the black-barred, widescreen effect? Just because it looks more proffesional and more like film?

[Ornsack]

I think it's a more natural framing than having everything boxed. It's more pleasing on the eye. I only go 16:9 though, and don't bother with covering the whole screen with black bars for various reasons (but don't wanna start a big arguement with Faldor and Mushiman! )

[NoRemorse]

widescreen makes your movie look more professional, but only 16:9. Any more widecreen is just bloody annoying.

[U.S.Amateurfilmaker]

Yeah, just more "cinema like" i guess, as Ornasck said, it is more pleasing for the eye to look at a wider image because that's how we see normally, with a wider field of view as oppossed to a box like 4:3.

[Vamp]

I see...

Is there a way in Premiere to convert 4:3 footage into 16:9 without a loss of quality? DV PAL resolution is 720X576 right? or 720X480?

[BenjaminLevin]

What I don't understand is if I shoot 16x9 on my camera it technically isn't native 16x9. Would I just be better off shooting in 4:3 then or should I shoot in 16x9 and encode it in 16x9 on the computer?

[2nd_Recon]

I don't know about your camera, but with most cameras that allow a "Widescreen" feature, all it does is chops off the top and bottom few inches. I wish I knew a way to change it to 16:9 in post... (Now, someone that knows something should step in and save the day!)

[Epsilon]

I see...

Is there a way in Premiere to convert 4:3 footage into 16:9 without a loss of quality? DV PAL resolution is 720X576 right? or 720X480?

Not without distorting the ratio of the picture. You could crop it, but then you lose a lot.

[Matt]

Ok heres my take on widescreen. Camcorder in general have a fixed resolution. There are slight difference between NTSC and PAL but basically you are looking at 700x500 approx. There are 3 ways to use this resolution

1 - A standard camera gives you a 4:3 picture that we are all familar with. This is what my camera does. The lens sees a 4:3 image and pastes that on the 4:3 CCD sensor. 4:3 every step of the way. This is whats known by old people (30+) as 'Old Skool'.

2- Some cameras allow you to do what I consider fake widescreen. The lens sees a 4:3 images and it pastes this on the 4:3 CCD. It just films as normal but then puts black stripes at the top and bottom. Your film looks 16:9 but is only using some of the pixels. The rest are wasted on the black stripes. Some of the image seen by the lens has been erased by the black stripes.

3 - Some (more expensive) cameras can use optical means to squash a full widescreen image onto the full 700x500 block of pixels. The lens sees a 16:9 image and this images is pasted on the 4:3 CCD. This means every pixel is used for picture. No black bars. When viewed on a 16:9 TV, the 4:3 picture is stretched and is viewed in its correct aspect ratio.

Remember that a the actual DVD image is always 4:3. Widescreen is just a flag to tell the viewing equipment (ie a widescreen TV) whether to stretch the image to restore a true 16:9 image.

[U.S.Amateurfilmaker]

Well cams don't necessarily have to be expensive for 16:9 stretch mode, mine has it and is <$500. It uses all pixels and just compresses the image onto the 4:3 ratio, and then when i edit it automatically appears in the timeline as true 16:9.

[foxwood]

I like 16:9, I have shot in the streched kind, but now I just use wideangle lines so its all actualy wide screan.

[ipon70]

Remember that a the actual DVD image is always 4:3. Widescreen is just a flag to tell the viewing equipment (ie a widescreen TV) whether to stretch the image to restore a true 16:9 image.

Everything you said is pretty much dead on, except this last statement. DVD is not always 4:3, if the movie is shot in 16X9 or a ratio close to that and then "optimized" or "enhanced" for 16X9 or most of the time listed as 1.85:1 and 2.35:1. Then basically you are not "hard matting" or "cropping" the movie, they actually format it for the widescreen tv's and you get all the resolution of the dvd player.
Example: You run a normal 16X9 movie on your 4:3 tv, and lets say your dvd player can produce 500 lines of resolution. You will loose about 30% of the resolution due to cropping (black bars at top and bottom). Now if that same movie is "enhanced" or "optimized" you will get all 500 lines on your tv inside that small 16x9 picture, effectively increasing the resolution that you see by 30%. Now with all that said, you still need a TV that is capable of displaying a higher resolution picture.
Hope that all made sense.

[Job]

...because it looks more proffesional and more like film:D

[Faldor]

the easiest way is to film it normally in 4:3 but pretend above and below the battery data etc is black then just slap some pretty bars on later.

looks lovely on a widescreen tele. like it was one of them real filums you see in the cinemultiplex thingys!

[Epsilon]

Or you could just put electrical tape over your LCD screen!

[NaziSentry]

Or, you could use the Letterbox effect in iMovie!

[cwf]

ive got a Sony HDR-FX1E which automatically films in full widscreen mode

[Epsilon]

Hey, that is very cool. I'm very close to getting myself a beauty Sony DSR-250 or something of that realm. You can replace the lens to shoot widescreen, but I'm not exactly sure how it configures. I shall see!