To all the people (aHEM) that are may be in the market for a new HDV widescreen mega-cam… Quick way to save yourself a load of cash.
1. Borrow someone else’s DV cam and use it for free!
2. After you watch the FCP tutorial and have the basics, export you movie like this:
This screen is at (… are you ready?):
File > Export > Using Quicktime Conversion > Options > Size
While in this dialogue, set the Dimensions to Custom and enter any widescreen ratio (help with good widescreen ratios, bottom of the page) and then check the “Preserve aspect ratio using” and set it’s menu to “Crop”.
By doing this, you are cropping your DV from the center (essentially trimming off the top and bottom equally) to give it a “widescreen” feel.
And when you read the reviews on Amazon about how “normal” DV cameras look like s*** with the internal widescreen mode enabled (or look like s*** when you crop them in post-production because the resolution is terrible), I encourage you to take a look at the quality of my last export and see for yourself. Keep in mind that this was shot on a 3.5 year old model Panasonic (3CCD!) and was cropped in FCP…
-BOB-