HI there
I've shot a movie in 4:3 but its appearing in iMovie as 16:9, which is skewing all the compositions. Looking online, I can see that this is 16:9 is the default for HD footage, but can't see how I can override this. There's some older advice about going to File and going to Project Properties, but that doesn't seem to be an option on my Mac version.
Thanks!
D
The 16:9 screen dimensions of iMovie 10 cannot be changed. When you import a 4:3 clip into iMovie, go to the crop tool (the icon that looks like intersecting triangles in the tool bar at the upper right of your screen) and select the Crop to Fit option. Your 4:3 clip will then retain its original aspect ratio, although there will be black bars to make it fit iMovie's 16:9 screen dimensions.
If you were to choose the Crop to Fill option, instead of Crop to Fit, your 4:3 clip could be made to fill the 16:9 screen, but substantial cropping would be done to do so.
As you have found, iMovie 10 does not have a feature to adjust the aspect ratio as did iMovie 9.
-- Rich
The 16:9 screen dimensions of iMovie 10 cannot be changed. When you import a 4:3 clip into iMovie, go to the crop tool (the icon that looks like intersecting triangles in the tool bar at the upper right of your screen) and select the Crop to Fit option. Your 4:3 clip will then retain its original aspect ratio, although there will be black bars to make it fit iMovie's 16:9 screen dimensions.
If you were to choose the Crop to Fill option, instead of Crop to Fit, your 4:3 clip could be made to fill the 16:9 screen, but substantial cropping would be done to do so.
As you have found, iMovie 10 does not have a feature to adjust the aspect ratio as did iMovie 9.
-- Rich
Thank you so much. Though this was not the answer I was hoping for....:(
As a workaround, you could export the movie out to your desktop with the Fit setting. Then you can do Command-Shift-5 and from the controls that appear at the bottom of your screen, crop out the black bars by outlining and screen recording just the portion of the video that contains the image, thus eliminating the black bars.
-- Rich
Final Cut Pro will enable you to deal with 4:3 but if you don't want the expense you could download the excellent free Davinci Resolve as long as you are on at least Catalina.
Change aspect ratio from 16:9 to 4:3
