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Correcting for a "Squashed" Logo in HDTV
(as featured in Videography)

Project: Underwater HDTV Video

Description: This excerpt from our January 2003 article in Videography explains how we corrected for the conversion of a native 4:3 logo animation to the 16:9 aspect ratio of HDTV.

The final change we made for the edit was with the ASL and Amphibico logo at the end of the video. In the original edit, the animations became stretched when they were brought in from their native 4:3 NTSC source then converted to the 16:9 HD resolution. Although the sharpness was there, the logos were seriously skewed.

We could have corrected this skewing in a number of ways. The DME at The Creative Group (where we edited the video) could have squashed the image, but the quality would have been sacrificed, and it wouldn't have been numerically accurate. We could have re-compiled each frame of the animation into an HD resolution, and recreated the animation frame-by-frame, but that would be too costly.

Instead, we came up with a relatively inexpensive solution. Each of the animations, which were created by Alex Sanchez of Non-Stop Graphics using Adobe After Effects and Discrete's 3D studio Max, consisted of around 300 separate Targa files. We took the raw files for each animation and, using Equilibrium's Debabelizer, batch-re-sized each file to create a "squashed logo."

Next, we re-composited the animations in Premiere, and exported them to Mini-DV. This, in turn, was brought back into the HD edit system during our re-edit, which in doing so, stretched them back to their original and correct shape.