Picture Resizing/Pixel Aspect Ratio

[jengerer]

I'm getting ready to start on a big project (Year in Review for my daughter's high school dance team) from scratch that will have several pictures grouped into different folders (Basketball, football, competition, etc.). I will probably make a small movie out of each group and save as an AVI file, combining them for the final project. From reading the forums, I understand that I need to resize my photos in PS to at least 1000x750. Do I also need to change the Pixel Aspect Ratio to 0.9?

Unfortunately, I will be getting pictures from a lot of other people to include. Some will be already cropped to 4x6. How should I resize those?

I have access to PPro and was wondering if the prep work is any different for it vs. PElments.

Thanks!

[ATR]

What version of Premiere Elements do you have and do you also have Photoshop Elements as well? If so, are you going to create your slideshow in Photoshop Elements and then transfer it to Premiere Elements to generate your DVD-VIDEO (if that is your export choice). If DVD-VIDEO is your goal, are you planning on DVD-VIDEO Standard (frame size 720 x 480/4:3/30 frames per second) or DVD-VIDEO Widescreen (frame size 720 x 480/16:9 flag/30 frames per second?

No matter which plan, remember do the mini test runs before the grand project and make sure you have enough computer resources to do the job.
Now for the immediate questions:

Video frame size for NTSC DV Standard = 720 x 480. So, the frame aspect ratio is 4:3.

That 720 x 480 (NTSC) = frame resolution in pixels.

The Pixel Aspect Ratio = 0.9 addresses the issue of square pixels versus video's non square pixels. So, the 0.9 is a correction which the program executes. Bottom line, you do no adjusts for Pixel Aspect Ratio within the preset.

Batch resizing to appropriate pixel dimensions can be done in Photoshop Elements/Process Multiple Files. Individual resizing can be done in Photoshop Elements/Image Menu/Resize/Image Resize dialog.

In Premiere Elements, you could let the program do that itself automatically if your computer resources permitted, leaving checked "Default Scale to Frame Size" in Edit Menu/Preferences/General. That does not usually work if you have a lot of high resolution photos. We would prefer not to run into any black border situations.

More details later once I know if you are working with Photoshop Elements and Premiere Elements integrated or just Premiere Elements alone.

ATR

[ATR]

jengerer

In spite of my long preface, I forgot to ask "What are the pixel dimensions of those 6 x 4 photos that will be involved in this project?"

ATR

[jengerer]

Thanks for the info. I have Premiere Elements 3 and the corresponding Photoshop Elements. I haven't used Photoshop Elements in a long time because I have CS3 on a MAC and use that for my photo editing so I will have to copy the photos to my other computer. I have PPro on the MAC but have not used it before.

I will be creating the slideshow in Premiere and add a couple of videos at the end from a digital Sony camcorder. I planned on DVD Standard because this will go to 35 people and I'm not sure if everyone has a widescreen.

I've tested a few pictures by resizing them and bringing them into Premiere but they don't look as sharp as I thought they would. Is that normal and when you play it on a TV, it looks good?

I've written actions before and am comfortable with doing a batch resizing. However, what about cropping something out of a picture for the artistic standpoint? Would I crop without constraints leaving enough size to resize to 1000x750 or 720x480 pixels?

Concerning the 6x4 prints I have received, the ones I have sampled are 1800x1200.

One last question, when you resize, do you save as jpeg, tiff or Photoshop file?

Thanks for your help. The more I learn, the more I find out I don't really know!!!

[jengerer]

I was thinking about the cropping aspect. Would it be be best when I begin to edit pictures that I know I want to use in the video to crop them to the 4:3 ratio before I resize them to 720x480 or 1000x750?

[ATR]

I will be back later, but, for now, I thought that you might be interested in the following AdobeTech Note on Cropping and Resizing.

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/331/331327.html

If you goal is DVD-VIDEO, I would try to end up with 1000 x 750 rather than 720 x 480 so as to give yourself a little room for pans & zooms and such.

If your photos are not grossly oversized before bringing them into Premiere Elements, you might experiment with the idea of bringing them into a Premiere Elements project .prel
a. with a project preset (New Project dialog) of NTSC DV Standard
b. Edit Menu/Preferences/General where you uncheck "Default Frame to Scale Size".
c. import your photo(s) to Premiere Elements Media/Timeline and use Properties/Motion and its Scale & Position properties to scale/position the image yourself
d. then proceed to Create Menus and Share/Disc/Disc.

ATR

[jengerer]

Thanks for the link! Lots to think about!

[ATR]

jengerer

After reviewing your options, please explore and experiment with your project in the program and see what works best for you.

I will be watching for your progress.

ATR