[MacDV] iMovie Titles Using Photoshop

[Ron Woodland]

Is there a compelling reason for such a high resolution in your 
graphic?  The only reason for such high resolution is to allow zooming 
or panning of the still image.  Otherwise, the image dimensions you 
indicate is extreme overkill.  iMovie is going to down sample that 
image to work with it in the video frame.

First, think in terms of actual pixels and video frame size.  Video 
isn't like print where you need high resolution.  The NTSC DV frame 
size is 720 by 480.  It also uses rectangular pixels.  Whenever I make 
a graphic in Photoshop for video use, I start with 720 by 534, then 
once it's ready, I squish the image vertically to 480 and use the 
Unsharp Masking filter on it to get a nice crisp look.  The pixel 
squishing  is done with the Image Size dialog and Constrain Proportions 
turned off.  Photoshop works with square pixels, as does your computer 
in general.  If you bring a square pixel image into iMovie, or FCP for 
that matter, when you put it on the timeline it will have to be 
rendered.  That causes it to appear fuzzy or pixelated.  By squishing 
the pixels so they are rectangular first in Photoshop, no rendering is 
required.  The result is a situation over which you have control.  It 
yields a nice crisp look for the text or other still-image graphic when 
integrated into the video by the DV codec.

Ron Woodland


On Monday, September 8, 2003, at 08:13  AM, Scott Wm Eastman wrote:

> Hello!
>
> I¹m new to the list but have a question regarding a project I¹m 
> working on.
>
> I¹ve just started working in iMovie (for a commercial video project) 
> and
> figured it was gonna be a no-brainer to create title screens in 
> photoshop
> and bring them in to iMovie... Well, I was right about how easy it 
> was... I
> didn¹t foresee having difficutly with the resolution.
>
> I created a RGB graphic in photoshop (2560 x 1920 @ 150 dpi), but it 
> gets
> horribly pixelated in iMovie...
>
> Has anyone ever created titling images in photoshop for an iMovie 
> project?
> If so.... What were the dimensions / resolution settings you used?
>
>
> :o)
> Scott