Media Gallery -
Mixing clips with different aspect ratios in Analyzer
Problem:
I opened several clips in Analyzer, and some of them look deformed.
Answer:
This problem happens when you are mixing several clips that have different aspect ratios.
Aspect ratio is the width-to-height ratio of a video picture. For instance, a standard CRT computer screen, or a standard TV has an aspect ratio of 4:3. That means that if we consider the horizontal size is 4, then the vertical size is 3.
On the other hand, new LCD TV's usually have a 16:9 aspect ratio. This new ratio will probably be the standard in the future as it is more natural to the human eye and fits better to panoramic wide screen movies.
After that small introduction about aspect ratio, let's talk about resolution that is the size of the video picture in pixels. The resolution is expressed as (NumberOfHorizontalPixels x NumberOfVerticalPixels) - for example, 640x480. If you do the math, you will see this is a 4:3 aspect ratio. But you can have a video from another source, for example a HD movie. The resolution could be for example 1920x1080. Do the math again, and you will see this is a 16:9 aspect ratio.
Now, Dartfish will let you open the two videos in the StoryBoard of the Analyzer, but you will see the aspect ratio of the first clip is taken as the global aspect ratio, and the second clip will look deformed. This is to keep an aspect ratio coherency in the whole StoryBoard, as one of its features is to allow to generate a new clip from all clips in the StoryBoard.
If you need to work on clips with different aspect ratios then you shouldn't open them all in the StoryBoard, but open one clip at a time instead and reset the Analyzer workspace in between by clicking the "File" menu, then "New...".
Please note that the Player module is not affected as it only plays one video at a time, so the correct aspect ratio will always be displayed.
To know the aspect ratio of your clips, you can open them in Windows Media Player, then right-click the file in the right-hand library and select "Properties". Both the resolution and the aspect ratio of your clip should be displayed.