Hello,

I am starting my first real video editing project and have questions on the proper method of scanning images for video output. I want to make sure I get the best quality in terms of color and saturation with minimal flicker or buzzing. I have a few questions:

Can you please advise on what resolution to scan at; would you go 72 dpi at 300%, or 300 dpi at 100%, or something totally different?

Any tips to achieve proper white balance, color or saturation levels?

Do you apply an NTSC filter or something similar to reduce flicker or buzzing to make it ready for TV?

Which file format would you save as?

All help and advice is much appreciated!

I often scan photos for video and the scanning resolution depends on the size of the original photo and on the size it will have in the video. For most photos I personnally use 150dpi.
But when I have to modify a photo (remove elements in the photo, create masks, ...) I will use a higher resolution, modify what I need then scale down.
In your editing software you should have a filter to correct the colors for NTSC. In Premiere, it is in the Video filters.
You should save to any lossless format that your editor understands (PSD, PNG, TIF, TGA, etc.). If you use Premiere and Photoshop I recommend PSD as it is very easy to modify your photos afterwards.


Hope it helps.

December 2001 issue of DV Magazine had a good article on this, which is in their archive ("Creating Legal Stills: Part 1") if you are a subscriber.

The same article is available here, if you agree to a (free) trial subscription:

http://www.highbeam.com/library/doc0.asp?docid=1G1:80206105&dtype=0~0&dinst=&author=Jackman%2C%20John&title=Creating%20legal%20stills%3A%20how%20to%20create%20great-looking%2C%20broadcast-legal%20still%20images.%28Statistical%20Data%20Included%29&date=12/01/2001&refid=ency_botnm

Personally I scan at fairly high resolution into photoshop, apply white balance and levels, resize to 720x480, apply the 'NTSC color' filter, save as a good-quality jpg, then pull into premiere and apply the antiflicker filter. (Some Gaussian blur in photoshop is an alternative to antiflicker.)

However if I want to move the "still" (i.e Ken Burn effect) then I start with a higher resolution still and do the motion control in Afterfx, because it has better motion blur capability.