16x9 4:3 525 60 mumbo jumbo

OK..so all this scan resolution mumbo jumbo....

I have been fortunate to be invited to present a film at the IWFF next month. All that sounds great except they need the video given to them in the following format:

"Digital Betacam, IMX Betacam or HDCAM in 525/60 widescreen anamorphic format with dual mono, stereo or Lt/Rt audio tracks on audio channels 1 and 2. Encoded audio tracks (Dolby E, DolbyAC-3, etc.) should be channels 3/4 or higher if present. Please make sure you label specific scan format, aspect ration, audio tracks, etc."

The audio I get, no problem. I even found a friend who will lend me a Digital Betacam deck. Cool. Now what the heck is "525/60 widescreen anamorphic format?" Now before you start typing...I found a page that really gets to the nuts and bolts of all of this and maybe it should be a sticky considering the transitional times we are all in.

http://lipas.uwasa.fi/~f76998/video/conversion/

I'm never ashamed to say I don't know something rather than put my foot in my mouth even when it is something I should probably already know. If I ever want to make a living doing this craft, I'm going to have to admit my lack of knowledge more often than not. :-)

OK let me see 8 lines of black on top and bottom...rectangle pixels anamorphic stretching to 16x9..uhuh..ok...

Mark

The term 525/60 refers to the analog TV system NTSC used for years in the United States. NTSC is a system of 525 scanning lines (presented as 240 scan lines (a field), interlaced, displaying 480 total lines of visible picture (a frame), at 60 hertz. This 60 hertz scanning rate results in a full frame every 1/30 of second. The 45 scanning lines not displayed is known as the VBI (vertical blanking interval), which contains certain signals that control the TV's scanning system and other functions.

So NTSC is 720/480 @60 fields interlaced or 29.97 (30) fps

And Pal is 720/576 @ 50 fields interlaced or 25 fps

Anamorphic is 4.3 with a different aspect ratio than normal 4.3 to make it be 16.9

Just put a tape into the NTSC Beta Machine, send it the feed and hit record if you source is NTSC.

NTSC = Never The Same Colour