Broadcast Resolution
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- nosaj
I'm trying to wrap my head around creating animation for broadcast. What is the resolution should I create pieces with on PC? I have heard 720 by 486 to compensate for a 1 by 0.9 pixel aspect ration of televisions. I have also read that broadcast resolution is 720x576 (would this not make development 720 by 518)? I'm pretty confused with this one... Any help clarifying things would be greatly appreciated.
- nosaj0
thump - anyone?
- T_650
720 by 486 is standard. If your start going to HD or Wide screen then you should be looking at adjusting your pixel ratios. Working on PC or MAC also doesn't matter. So if it's standard broadcast look at 720 by 486.
- 4040
agreed with T_65
- nosaj0
Thanks for insight.
Let me throw a kink into the things. How would you go about designing a piece for both an LCD screen running off a CPU and television? Or would you need to change the sizing for both?
- theplanet0
It is going to be different for the two. If you are creating a DVD to be played on a computer, it will be played at the resolution the monitior is set at, thats why DVDs on computers look nasty somtimes. If you are making it as a QT or something to be played off a CD then it can be whatever resolution you want. and its size will depend on what the monitor resolution is set at.
Another big difference between the two is that for broadcast you need to design for title safe areas. An LCD screen is going to show off eevery pixel of your project, a television is going to cut off the edges.
Josh
- vespa0
in the uk it's slightly different - 720 by 576 for PAL, but the principles are same i believe.
on my computer i work to 768 x 576 and then squish it to 720 in the final render. this is to do with the difference between square pixels - computer - and rectangular ones - broadcast.
If for some reason i'm working on my computer to 720 then everything needs to be squashed to 93.75% of its width. my circles should look like eggs - if they look like circles then when the telly stretches them back out at the other end they will look like rugby balls. I find that confusing so i just prefer to work in 768 and squish it at all the end.
hope that makes sense.
- nosaj0
Thanks so much Vespa and theplanet. I almost have it.
If I work at 720 by 540 on my computer (square pixels). I then scale the file down to 720 by 480 to compensate for the rectangular televison pixels. This will look skinny on my PC screen but when played on a TV it will look proper because of the rectangular pixels.
In the end the Computer and the TV can use the same source files, just be sure to scale the TV one before sending it off.
Soes this sound correct?
- vespa0
hey nosaj
again i'm not sure of the exact numbers for NTSC but as far as i know you should only be scaling the width - ie scale the width from 768 px to 720, but the height remains the same.
i would suggest working in 768 so that you don't have to worry about working with eggs instead of circles while you're trying to make visual decisions, then render it out stretching the WIDTH to 720 (leave the height the same. for me it's 576 but you'll have to ask a US broadcast designer what the height is for NTSC)
I don't want to add an extra complication but do you know whether it has to work in widescreen as well or is it just for 4:3?
- nosaj0
Thanks again Vespa.
I thought you scaled the hieght? Does this make sense:
http://www.cglearn.com/articles/… ( I know they are talking about a photo but same thing).Thankfully no wide screen.
- vespa0
i reckon you really need to talk to a US broadcast designer but it's definately the width that gets scaled.
someone linked this above:
http://www.mir.com/DMG/aspect.ht…under the "handy reference table" it says:
Note that one typically tries to keep a constant frame height, by scaling the width as needed.