Widescreen on Sony DCR-TRV355

[andyholland]

I'm the "semi-official" wedding videographer at the end of august and will be producing a DVD of the day. I'll just be using one camera - the digital 8 Sony DCR-TRV355 and was wondering if it would be worth using its 16:9 mode to film the day. Any suggestions or advice?

[Marc Peters]

I'd ask the bride and groom. If they want widescreen, shoot in widescreen (the image quality will be better than cropping and expanding in post production).

[Alan Mills]

Also, check that the widescreen mode on the camera is a 'true' widescreen mode. I'm not familiar with that camera (I have a TRV33E myself) and it may prove that the widescreen mode is simply doing the 'crop and expand' that Marc mentioned, but in the camera instead of post production.

Other than that, like Marc said, ask the 'clients' what they want.

[Marc Peters]

Even if the crop and expand is done in the cam, it's still better than in post production... so if they do want wide screen, it's best to decide BEFORE shooting

[andyholland]

How would you be able to tell if it is true widescreen? As it is a pretty low end camcorder i'd say it is just the "crop and expand" thing as you mentioned as no "new" picture can be seen by setting the camcorder to widescreen.

[Marc Peters]

Very simply, there's 3 kinds of cams:

1) Adds black borders - completely useless
2) Crops and expands - better than post production, but you don't gain any extra field of vision
3) True anamorphic lens

if your cam is 1, don't bother shooting in widescreen - you can convert (i.e crop) in post production and offer both 4:3 and 16:9. If it's 2, shoot in widescreen if that's what the client wants. If it's 3, shoot in widescreen and persuade the client that's what they need .

I reckons your cam is two above.