Getting my head around Aspect Ratios, Resolutions and Black Borders

[Locarno1]

Hi All,

I am new here, and really apologise if this question has been asked to death.. I want to start making Flightsim Youtube videos of my flying but I'm struggling with Sony Vegas at the moment and how they are outputting to YouTube. My monitor is 1920x1200 and I'm trying to create a 1080p video for Youtube. I'm only testing out short clips at the moment to make sure the aspects are right but I keep getting black borders around my video.

However, when I go into fullscreen mode for the video on youtube, it's absolutely fine. Probably because I've rendered it to come out as 1920x1200? But the problem lies when I am not in fullscreen mode, I have black borders either side of it which is quite annoying. How do others do it and make their videos flawless in both small screen and full screen for 1080p?

Here is a link to the short video, I am still very new to this and Sony Vegas and would really appreciate your help. I'm using OBS to record my videos.

If you wish to see various settings etc, let me know and I will post.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYzhHRmKe60

Thanks, I really appreciate it,

Tristan

[manono]

Ordinarily 1080p means progressive 1920x1080. That's what you should be making for YouTube. You say your monitor is 1920x1200, so it's expected there are slight black borders above and below 1920x1080 videos. If you're uploading 1920x1200 videos to YouTube, of course there are black bars on the sides because (I'm guessing here) YouTube resized it to 1728x1080 or thereabouts and 1152x720.

[Locarno1]

Ordinarily 1080p means progressive 1920x1080. That's what you should be making for YouTube. You say your monitor is 1920x1200, so it's expected there are slight black borders above and below 1920x1080 videos. If you're uploading 1920x1200 videos to YouTube, of course there are black bars on the sides because (I'm guessing here) YouTube resized it to 1728x1080 or thereabouts and 1152x720.

So is there any way of getting rid of these black borders as I find them quite annoying to watch a video like that on Youtube if I don't want to go fullscreen or if I do want to go fullscreen?

Thank you!

[manono]

I have no idea what you're asking now. The YouTube player has a 1.77778:1 ratio. 1920x1080 has a 1.77778:1 ratio. Using YouTube's player at whatever size for 1920x1080 videos will have no black bars. Of course, using your monitor or a different ratio player (many blogs, for example, use 1.33:1 players) will have black bars somewhere.

If you upload 1920x1200 videos, the YouTube player will always show it with black bars on the sides. Me, I have no problem with black bars. What's important is that the aspect ratio is correct. For example, in my YouTube channels I upload old 1.33:1 ratio films and they always have black bars on the sides. Big deal.

Again, make and upload 1920x1080 videos (aka 1080p) and there will be no problems. That's what you want to do, right?

[jagabo]

Again, make and upload 1920x1080 videos (aka 1080p) and there will be no problems. That's what you want to do, right?

Of course, then he'll complain that there are black bars at the top and bottom when he plays the video full screen.

[Locarno1]

Again, make and upload 1920x1080 videos (aka 1080p) and there will be no problems. That's what you want to do, right?

Of course, then he'll complain that there are black bars at the top and bottom when he plays the video full screen.

I appreciate what you are saying.. But what about other videos on youtube, such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pltwN-ouWiU

In this video, there are no black borders at all in the video when in fullscreen or not. This person has 3 x 27" monitors at 1440p/144hz it states, so how do they not get black borders?

I understand that if I make a project in Sony Vegas as 1920x1080 I will get black borders as I have a monitor that is bigger than that. But.. I have a GoPro which also does 1080p videos and the video when uploaded to Youtube has no black borders both in Fullscreen and non-fullscreen.

Sorry, I'm just very new to this and incredibly confused as it works with no borders for some and borders for others.

EDIT: To add, I have set my project up in Sony Vegas as 1920x1080 and an Aspect Ration of 16:9. I just don't get why I get black borders when not in fullscreen on Youtube. I'm on my laptop at the moment, and just looked at the test videos I uploaded last night, in fullscreen it looks great, but when not in fullscreen those black borders are back again! My laptop resolution is 1440x900

[sneaker]

I appreciate what you are saying.. But what about other videos on youtube, such as: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pltwN-ouWiU

In this video, there are no black borders at all in the video when in fullscreen or not. This person has 3 x 27" monitors at 1440p/144hz it states, so how do they not get black borders

That video is 16:9. 2560x1440, 1920x1080, 1280x720 etc. Why your browser doesn't display black borders in fullscreen mode I don't know. My monitor has 1920x1200 and that video is played with black borders on top and bottom in fullscreen Chrome.

I understand that if I make a project in Sony Vegas as 1920x1080 I will get black borders as I have a monitor that is bigger than that. But.. I have a GoPro which also does 1080p videos and the video when uploaded to Youtube has no black borders both in Fullscreen and non-fullscreen.

Did you actually test that? Test again. If you play your Vegas export in a player like MPC-HC does it have black borders in windowed mode with 100% zoom?

Either way: produce and upload 16:9 videos. The rest is outside your control.

[JVRaines]

In this video, there are no black borders at all in the video when in fullscreen or not. This person has 3 x 27" monitors at 1440p/144hz it states, so how do they not get black borders?

Because the size that you render depends on what you choose in Vegas, not on the resolution your monitor happens to be.