For anims that are going to DVD is 720x480 the right aspect? What about the square pixel thing? Will anims made in poser at 720x480 look correct on DVD played on TV?

I had been struggling with that for a long time myself, however this is what I learned: For DVD you render at 720x480 with a pixel ratio of 0.9 (non-square pixels). You can then bring that into your DVD authoring software and when you burn your DVD it will look just fine. If you have more questions regarding that subject I think that Spike is the man to ask. He's the one that helped me out with all that stuff. <---signature---> Free your Maya Opaque3D http://www.digital-opaque.net

THanks. Where do you set pixel ratio? I'm use P4.

Here come the sad news... I have never seen an option in poser where you set your pixel aspect ratio... In Poser the width and height of the image change only that, not the pixel ratio... <---signature---> Free your Maya Opaque3D http://www.digital-opaque.net

There is a huge discussion of this topic on the usenet video groups. Bottom line is use 720 x 480 x 16 (or higher) bit color and you should be fine. The actual image size is slightly larger than 480 but 480 is the visible area. Keep critical things away from the edges because each tv might be adjusted a little differently. Its worth burning a test dvd with your files to see how it looks. You may need some color correction for proper viewing on tv.

thanks. Is there a video group you would suggest for animators? I've been using MediaStudioPro 5.2, and it seems to do the job.

what's media studio pro?

Markshun, I beg to differ with your usenet video group's recommendation. As mentioned, video uses a .9 pixel ratio - the vertical is .9 of the horizontal. Poser does not render in the rectangular pixels of video, it uses the square pixels of a computer. Therefore you have to convert the number from one relevant to rectangular pixels to one relevant to square pixels. The '480' figure is in rectangular pixels and therefore is .9 of what the square pixel number would be. If you do the math the formula would look like this: 90/100 = 480/x (where 'x' represents the square pixel dimension) When you solve for x you find that the actual number of square pixels should be 533.333333. For your image to perfectly convert, you'd render it at 720 x 534 and then import that into a program capable of converting the square pixels into rectangular pixels. It MediaStudioPro is a true video editing program it should be able to do so. I do this professionally for both broadcast TV commercials and corporate materials. I normally create my graphics at 720 x 540 (square pixels) because that dimension is a true 4:3 ratio and my work often goes to Digibeta or BetaSP tape (which has a 720x486 dimension) as well as to DVD. In fact, that's the square pixel Preset dimension for full screen TV offered in Adobe After Effects. Technically when I take it to DVD there are 6 pixels (540-534=6) worth of vertical distortion but that's better than the 54 (534-480=54) pixels of vertical distortion that would occur if I used 720x480 square pixels. As far as your "visible area" reference, there is a "video safe area" which is usually set at 90% of the image resolution. For ease of memory I usually create a 720x540 graphic in Photoshop and then use a 640x480 rectangle. You can also create a "Title Safe" area by shrinking that 640x480 rectangle 90%. Both the video safe area and title safe area are displayable on most professional video editing programs. They're probably available in that MediaStudioPro. In fact, it may come with a sample still image of the proper dimensions displaying the video safe and title safe areas in it's "goodies" (I've seen that a few times with different software).

Thanks for droping by, bobasaur. Useful comments as always  Cheers <---signature---> Free your Maya Opaque3D http://www.digital-opaque.net

I kinda feel bad. It looked like everything was already settled and I had to go stirring it up again. ;-)

Shaken, not stirred <---signature---> Free your Maya Opaque3D http://www.digital-opaque.net

Hi again, Bobosaur you are entirely correct. However I have used low end video editors for many years and the capture size is 720 x 480. For some of the low end editors its even 16 bit color. My answer was based on a person using Poser / Bryce and a video editor like Pinnacle studio 9 or vegas movie studio 4.0 or Microsoft Movie. (Xp sp2 version is not that bad. My main editing is home video or in-house presentations where the video is sourced from camera, titling is mostly in editor and rendering is out to DVD. If you want broadcast quality you go to higher end software. The biggest hassle in rendering in Poser etc is remembering NO CIRCLES. They don't render out exactly unless you compensate. Also , if you are going to assemble video for dvd do not use a codec that uses a lossy compression method. The files will be converted to an mpeg format when compiling the DVD. usenet groups rec.video.desktop and rec.video.production carry these discussions. Access through Goggle groups. I asked the pixel aspect question and the discussion went for weeks getting more and more detailed.

is anyone familiar with TMPGenc. Can it take 720x540 avi square in and put out 720x480 mgeg rectangle?

Well, I wasn't going to buy a dvd burner until AFTER I finished my anim, but thought better and just ordered one. When I get it and figure out the "best" procedure I'll post my findings here. Thanks to all for the input.

Hey gang, I just stumbled into this thread, and I've bee wondering the samw question myself. So if I'm animating in poser, then compositing and doing post work in aftereffects, then editing in vegas video, what resolution should I start at? And when should I convert to 0.9 pixels? Thanks!

Capture size generally refers to the size coming off tape. If I'm capturing off of a DV tape, for example, my software captures at 720x480. If I'm capturing off of BetaSP or DigiBeta, it captures at 720x486. However, that assumes the source is a .9 pixel ratio source - like those two tape formats are. However, importing graphic or computer-generated movies is not the same as capturing. I'm not familiar with the specific software packages you've mentioned but I know Pinnacle has been around and in the video business for a long time. I can't imagine them putting out something that couldn't properly import computer generated movies or graphics with square pixels. Certainly, if the software has the ability to import image sequences it should be able to properly import square pixel material. If I were using that software I'd check and see if it has any kind of scaling or resizing function. If so, I'd still render my square-pixel items at 720x540 but after importing them I'd resize them within the software to 720x480 (in other words squeese them vertically but not horizontally. If not, well... I guess I'd just suck it up and render at the 720x480 as a last choice. tufif, After Effects outputs .9 pixel files wonderfully. I'd still render out of Poser at 720x540, import it into a 720x480 After Effects comp and resize the Poser renders to fit. The final output would have the .9 pixels