Having a problem with aspect ratio and Premiere

#1

Okay, I’m starting to edit videos, but I’mn having a problem setting up the aspect ratio and the dimensions when I first start. I use custom settings, editting mode “Video for Windows”, and set the aspect ratio to 320 x 240, but it says that the ratio is 6:5 (makes no sense), but I went through with it anyways. Then this happened:
Original: [media=youtube]9O7S1W-Yj04[/media]
Messed up version: [media=youtube]Dqp_S46q2ug[/media]
Picture of settings: http://img249.imageshack.us/my.php?image=preap3.jpg
So, the horizontal sides are cut off, which is weird. Anyone know the problem?

I experimented a little bit and got the sides to show up after I set the ratio to 360 x 240 (which is 4:3 by Adobe’s standards, apparently; also, everything else in that screenshot stays the same except for the aspect ratio and dimensions part).
360 x 240 version: [media=youtube]SH58HN0Aaco[/media]
But even then, the video is different frm the original. How can I keep the original’s propoerties (ie size) when editting? For example, when I go full screen, the original covers everything, while the 360 x 240 version shows everything yet does not fill the whole screen and the 320 x 240 version fills the whole vertical area and just has the sides cut off.

So, I guess these are the main questions:
[LIST=1]
[]Does anyone know the problem when I use the 320 x 240 settings?
[] Should I just use the 360 x 240 instead? But the problem in this lies in the fact that the main video gets shrunken a bit.[/LIST]

#2

What is the size of the original? If it’s 640 x 480 there should be a filter for ‘half size’

#3

Okay, I seem to have fixed the problem by changing the “Pixel/Aspect Ratio” setting to "Square Pixel."
Link now: [media=youtube]YinFCB9-Yh0[/media]

#4

Yeah, I was just about to say that.

Old editing software like Premiere does a very poor job of stressing the importance of this stuff.

Any time your end audience is a computer screen, you’ll want to use square pixels. Televisions use rectangular pixels, so D1 (the TV standard) is 0.9 pixel aspect. So yeah, 360x240 is the same video as 320x240, but 360 would look correct on TVs and 320 would look correct on computers.

This is just one of the absolutely hilarious mathematical things any video editor has to know. Editing is a fickle, fickle mistress. Wait till you need to do the math on a 3:2 pulldown for film. -_-