Hello All! I just stumbled across this forum and hope someone can help me. I am getting ready to start shooting for a documentary on the N.S Savannah. It was the very first Nuclear Powered Merchant ship in the world. My father sailed on the Savannah and we will be attending a reunion on Memorial day weekend to start filming interviews and interiors of the ship. My biggest delima right now is... What do I shoot in and what camera should I choose? I have a few options.
I own 2 Sony HDR-FX1's and also have access to 2 Panasonic DVX 100's. Both can shoot 16x9 in DV and the Sony gives me the option to shoot HD. What do you think would be best? I will be using archival footage along with photographs. Will I run into a lot of problems bouncing back and forth from 4:3 and 16:9?
I have ran some tests where I shot a few things in 16:9 SD and cut it between some photographs and 4:3 footage. It just seems to leave two black bars on each side of the 4:3 footage. Now my question is, do people find this distracting? If i am shooting in 16:9 should everything be 16:9 including the archival footage? If so, how would I go about converting it with out blowing it up and losing quality?
Re: SD or HD?? by Steve Wargo on May 6, 2008 at 2:30:11 pm
You can mix 16x9 and 4x3. The 16x9 has to be letterbox but people are numb to this anymore and don't even notice. We recently did a bizarre music video and mixed the formats. The stage stuff was shot in 4x3 on a DVX100. We mixed in quite a few shots from a feature film that we produced in 16x9. However, we inserted those in both letterbox and anamorphic so it's a mix of 4x3, 16x9 letterbox and 16x9 anamorphic.
Re: SD or HD?? by Andrew Conner on May 6, 2008 at 6:46:14 pm
It looks great. How were you able to get your 4x3 footage to fill the frame in 16x9? Usually it leaves the little black bars on each side. Or did you just place 16x9 footage in a 4x3 sequence in FCP? Should I still capture my footage in as 16x9 anamorphic?
Re: SD or HD?? by Andrew COnner on May 6, 2008 at 6:58:23 pm
The video looks really cool! This is the format I want to go with. How did you get the 4x3 footage to fill the entire frame instead of having the black bars on each side? Do I need to capture my 16x9 footage as anamorphic still? Or does this not matter? I am using Final Cut Pro 6.
It would be nice to be able to switch between the 16x9 interviews and then cut to the 4x3 archival footage.
Re: SD or HD?? by Steve Wargo on May 7, 2008 at 6:05:03 am
You'll need to shoot and/or capture the 16x9 footage in letterbox. This makes a 4x3 frame with the 16x9 across the center. The 4x3 will fill the frame. Shoot a bunch of test shots and edit them into a timeline to determine your workflow.
Steve Wargo
Tempe, Arizona
It's a dry heat!
Sony HDCAM F-900 & HDW-2000/1 deck
5 Final Cut (not quite PRO) systems
Sony HVR-M25 HDV deck
2-Sony EX-1 HD .
I would shoot HD. You can scan photos at hi rez and they will be full screen , and if some archival footage is 4:3 so be it... you can blow it up - it might be ok - especially if it was old 16MM film you can transfer yourself... or you can live with the black bars (curtains) - in fact there are many ways to make the curtains more than just black... try the double / blur technique... what a bunch of HD tv and see what others do.
Thanks,
Harry.
Forum Cowmunity Leader: Indie & Doc
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