PE4 photos fit to width instead of height

[ksnielsen]

Hi-

I have a project that is wide screen. When I bring in pictures, the auto fit is to fit to the height. Is there a setting any where that would force it to fit to width instead?

Karen

[Steve Grisetti]

Well, remember that widescreen video uses a 16:9 aspect ratio while most photos are 4:3.

So you'll either cut off the tops and bottoms of your photos or you'll have photos with black along the sides. Which would you prefer?

[Doreen L.]

It all depends on the source of your photos. Digital cameras take photos in the 4:3 format. 35 mm film and most digital SLR cameras take photos in 3:2 with the exception of some of the Panasonic which can do 7:4 as well as APS film. I find that for the best slideshow of photos, each one really has to be cropped manually to display the photo the best way possible.

[ksnielsen]

So I take it that's a no. I had over 200 pics for a slideshow with all kinds a space at the top and bottom of the pics that didn't need to show. It was a play so there was just a lot of stage and curtains. I did them all manually and basically sized the majority so that the width fit and the top and bottom were cropped. It would have been nice to have it size to the width for this project. Oh, well. Doesn't hurt to ask

[VernonRobinson]

So I take it that's a no. I had over 200 pics for a slideshow with all kinds a space at the top and bottom of the pics that didn't need to show. It was a play so there was just a lot of stage and curtains. I did them all manually and basically sized the majority so that the width fit and the top and bottom were cropped. It would have been nice to have it size to the width for this project. Oh, well. Doesn't hurt to ask

You would have to use a tool like Photoshop Elements or a nice freeware tool that I like, called Irfanview. With Irfanview you can resize and specify a crop. Point it at your directory of pictures and let it go. Is that something like what you are looking for?

[ksnielsen]

I will have to play with irfanview. Thanks for the idea.

Karen

[RJ Johnston]

You might be able to use the Crop effect (under the Transform effects) with the Zoom option checked. Then copy that effect and paste to the other clips.

[VernonRobinson]

You might be able to use the Crop effect (under the Transform effects) with the Zoom option checked. Then copy that effect and paste to the other clips.

Robert,
How would the overhead of applying the crop effect to 200 pics affect PrEl? It seems that it might have significant performance degradation. Never having applied that many effects myself, I was wondering.....

-Vernon

[RJ Johnston]

I don't worry about how long it's going to take at first. I slap the effect on 200 clips, and if it seems to me that it's taking to long to export, I abort and try something else.

[JohnnyO]

You could justleave the photos the way they are, move them to video track 2, and put a motion background on video track 1. Thay way you will not have the black band on the top and bottom of the picture. There are lots of motion backgrounds available on this site.

[Cinde]

Karen, I agree with JohnnyO. I often do this because my clients give me photos as small as wallet size up to 8x10 and everything in between. Sometimes I have no option to crop, especially those wallet close ups.

However on those pix that I am at liberty to crop, I use a tool called JPEG Crops. I just posted about it in Tips and Tricks
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