imovie 6.0.2 sony dcr-hc39e pal and 16:9 widescreen issues

[butre]

hi

i am running imovie 6.0.2 on 10.4.6 on my g4 PB and when importing DV from my sony dcr-hc39e (which i use to record 16:9 format footage) i seem to have an issue with displaying 16:9 format

basically i create a new DV widescreen project, when the camera is not switched on imovie shows a blue screen in 16:9 ratio and it the window displays NTSC widescreen, as soon as i turn on the sony camera it changes the bluescreen to 4:3 and the window is titled PAL widescreen. (i have automatic pillar and letter boxing turned off)

i can then import the footage but it shows as 4:3 ration, when exporting it to idvd it still shows as 4:3 although idvd recognises it is 16:9 project, when i burn this to a dvd it still shows in apple's dvd player as 4:3 ratio, only when i insert the dvd in my dvd player attached to my 16:9 tv screen it shows up as 16:9. I also have another 16:9 tv screen and on that one it shows in 16:9 format but with some very thin black bars at the top and the bottom.

do you have any idea how i can change settings so i can see the footage in imovie in 16:9 format and also in idvd as 16:9

many thanks
butre

 

[butre]

i love it when i answer my own questions, although it does a create a new one

in imovie the frame rate preference is key here.

when i changed it from 29.97 fps to 25fps all of a sudden the blue frame changed from 4:3 to 16:9 and the window displayed dv-pal-widescreen instead of dv-pal.

the only question i now have is 25fps a worse quality than 29.97 and why can't i have a frame rate of 29.97fps in widescreen format?

thanks
butre

 

[fryke]

Probably because the camera _records_ 16:9 at 25 fps would be my guess. But then it would worry me that iMovie doesn't recognise the format by itself. Quality-wise it shouldn't be much of a problem. 25 fps is okay - and if the camera really records at 25 fps, you'd actually lose quality by transcoding to 29.97 fps.