Pixelated Title Fonts ?

Question

Pixelated Title Fonts ?

Hello,

I just recently switched from PC to Mac, and have begun creating a project using iMovie HD6. When I add titles to my project, and "preview" them, they look great. When I "add" them to my movie and play them back, they look horrible. Text is very hard to read, and the quality is very pixelated.

Is this a known issue/bug (feature??) with iMovie HD6?

I noticed that the pixelation is worse if I select "over black."

Any help would be appreciated.

regards,
Tom

Powermac Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Powermac Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Powermac Quad Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Posted on Feb 14, 2006 5:36 AM

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Answer 1

David Rice

Level 4

1,970 points

Feb 14, 2006 11:54 AM in response to Merged Content 1

Hi Tom:

You might try setting the Playback Quality preference to Highest.

Also the color of your title can have an effect on the rendering quality. White works much better than bright red, which becomes all blurry and broken up along the edges as viewed on your computer. It is even worse on a TV.

There is a bit of info here on color selection that may help if this is the problem:
http://www.rqs.ca/RollingCredits/faq.php
Scroll down to the "What are TV-Safe colors and why use them?" section.

HTH
David

PowerBook G4 1.5 GHz 1GB / Power Mac G4 733 MHz Mac OS X (10.4.4)

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Answer 2

Feb 14, 2006 3:16 PM in response to David Rice

Hi David,

Thanks for the link.... as it turns out, my whole problem with pixelated fonts was that the color I was using was pure Red !! I changed the font to a more mellow hue, and it now looks much, much better. I still think the "pre-rendered" preview looks sharper than the "rendered" version, but at least it is now usable.

many thanks,
Tom

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Answer 3

David Rice

Level 4

1,970 points

Feb 14, 2006 3:38 PM in response to Merged Content 1

Hi Tom:

The pre-rendered version is using the Quartz imaging system to display the preview at your full screen resolution. It is not affected by the colors and can do a great job of displaying the image. When iMovie renders the title to DV, the process degrades the image quality - again more so for some colors.

On top of that, I may be wrong here, but I believe that iMovie does some things of its own when displaying DV in its preview window that can further degrade the apparent look.

BTW here is another link to some info on titles and video:
http://www.creativecow.net/articles/hodgetts_philip/titles/

Cheers,
David

PowerBook G4 1.5 GHz 1GB / Power Mac G4 733 MHz Mac OS X (10.4.4)

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