Shooting 'widescreen' on a DV camcorder

[jonmck]

I have a JVC DV camcorder which has a squeeze function for shooting widescreen.

However the quality seems to go way down when shooting in that mode. Is that bcs it is really just shooting a squashed which you then expand on a widescreen telly??

Is it better to shoot 4:3?

[SheepDip]

I can't say anything about your JVC (Simply because I know nothing about it), but if it's anything like my Panasonic camcorder, all it does is introduce black bars on top and bottom.

This has two detrimental effects -

1 - You would be using only part of the possible lines of resolution.

2 - If you viewed this on a widescreen TV, then the TV would have to zoom the picture in to get the aspect ratio correct. I've seen this, and the line structure is disgraceful - it's really bad quality, worse even than non-anamorphic NTSC zoomed in on.

I would personally always film in 4:3, at least until proper anamorphic camcorders (They do exist) are more commonplace.

[Wayne Moule]

My Panny zooms from cropped 16:9 as well.

My last Sony used the anamorphic method,which looked better.

There is a Sony some where,not the broadcast ones,ones for Joe Public,that has a CCD for true widescreen.

[thescrounger]

Most camcorders bar one or two models (sony has one) use false anamorphic, so you are actually loosing pixels compared to if you just shot the footage in 4:3. Unless you have a camcorder that shoots in true anamorphic mode you are better off shooting in 4:3

[Wayne Moule]

It's the £743 Sony DCR-TRV60 that has a true 16:9 mode.

I was peeved off when this 2.1MP came out,as I'd already bought my 1.3MP Panny.

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