Video Editing - What should I use? 4:3 > 16:9 possible? worthwhile?

[thestormtrooper]

Hi,

Looking for some help!

I've quite a few short video clips from a trip around the world. I'd like to put these together and have music playing over them and occasionally hear the audio involved in the original content. Problem is... I'm not sure of the best package or format etc etc...

I tried using Windows Movie Maker and it seems easy enough and will probably do what I need? However... It publishes the files as .wmv I believe? Does that matter? Normally files seem to be .avi to be universal etc?

Also, I'm wanting the quality etc of my end product to be as good as possible. The original content is 640x480 but most things these days seem to be 16:9 rather than 4:3. Is it possible for me to convert my content so it is 16:9? or should I just stick with the original 640x480 resolution?

Other software I'd heard mentioned was tmpgenc?

Basically just looking for advice on the best package to use before I go ahead and waste a lot of time to then discover I could of done it better?

Any help is greatly appreciated!

Cheers
Stuart

[jlearmonth]

Well I am no expert but I do dabble a bit.
I think ffmpeg can do this.See
FFmpeg
Also there are a number of GUI front ends, I use SUPER, it has lots of options for conversion.
I suggest cutting out a short(5 mins ) clip and then keep trying that and fiddle with all the options till you get what you want, or not!

[Kalos Geros]

I'd say there is no need to convert to 16:9 in another software prior to editing - all editing software will allow dealing with 4:3 footage within a 16:9 project...however, I hope you understand you will lose top and bottom parts of your 4:3 frame if you try to conform it to 16:9 and also lose resolution due to "zoom in"...