How to switch anamorphic SDV from 4x3 to 16x9

[robertbenson02]

I don’t think this is a bug, it’s more a problem of functionality I can’t find the solution to.

About 20 years ago I made a couple of short films with a 480i DV NTSC camera, but with an add-on anamorphic lens that squeezed a 16x9 image into the 3x4 frame. The problem was, the metadata of the QT files still said it was a 3X4 image. When I cut the films in FCP, I could change that data for the source files and output a file that played back in 16x9. But now I want to take those original source QT and uprez/deinterlace them to 1080p. And Topaz video insists on reading the originals as 3x4, not 16x9. there must be a way to address this but I can’t find it.

What’s weirder, the edited standard definition short films, which I previously uprezed semi-successfully in an earlier version of Topaz Video, now read as 3x4 to the current version. Where before they uprezed to 16x9 without an issue.

Help!

[tony.topazlabs]

Hi Robert,

Video AI currently reads the aspect ratio information from the input file’s metadata. We’re working on adding an option to replace the metadata’s aspect ratio with a custom option, but for now you will need to edit the file’s metadata before importing to the app.

One of the simplest ways to do this is to ‘stream copy’ the original set of files into new files with the 16:9 aspect ratio set. Shutter Encoder is a fast tool for batch-copying QuickTime files and changing their attributes.

[robertbenson02]

Thank you for that quick turnaround! I will look into shutter encoder, but do you happen to know if Apple Compressor can ‘stream copy’? If so I’m ready to go.