{"id":65746,"date":"2015-10-28T10:49:00","date_gmt":"2015-10-28T15:49:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.premiumbeat.com\/blog\/?p=65746"},"modified":"2015-10-28T10:49:38","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T15:49:38","slug":"default-title-safe-guides-are-a-sham","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.premiumbeat.com\/blog\/default-title-safe-guides-are-a-sham\/","title":{"rendered":"Default Title Safe Guides Are a Sham"},"content":{"rendered":"

Real talk: the classic 20% crop Title Safe is completely unnecessary for the modern editor. Here’s why.<\/h2>\n

If you’ve spent\u00a0a lot of time in the industry, odds are you’ve heard about the term title safe<\/strong>. Some editors will swear by\u00a0adhering to default title-safe<\/strong> guides \u2014<\/strong>\u00a0but should a modern video editor follow them? Let’s\u00a0take a look at\u00a0title safe<\/strong> and discuss why you may not need to use this old-school method of laying out text.<\/p>\n

What Is Title Safe?<\/h3>\n

Title safe<\/strong> is\/was a designated area inside a video frame in which you could place text without worrying about the\u00a0words getting cut off by the edges of the TV. Every major video editing application\u00a0has title-safe guides<\/strong> that will pop up\u00a0over your image so you know that your text is in the designated safe area. Many editors still stick to these standards. You will typically see a title-safe guide<\/strong> and an action-safe guide pop up together.<\/p>\n

\"Title<\/a><\/p>\n

The title-safe guide<\/strong> will be the inner box and the action safe<\/strong> will be the outer box. As the name implies, title safe<\/strong> is the area where titles are supposed to go, and the action-safe area is where any important moving parts should be. However, these guides are flawed.<\/strong> To understand this, we need to take a step back into the not-so-distant past.<\/p>\n

In the days of tube-based\u00a0TVs, a TV set would use a picture tube to project the image onto the screen. Inside the picture tube was a series of magnets that, over time, would wear out, resulting in a cropped and warped image known as\u00a0pin-holing<\/a>. It was a common problem, and it\u00a0stands to reason that broadcasters would want to keep all text away from the edges of the frame.<\/p>\n

So, in 1961<\/a>, SMPTE issued SMPTE RP 8, which created a 20% cropping guide for broadcasters to place their titles in. This would ensure that 100% of the viewers at home could still see the\u00a0titles. However, it’s not the 60s anymore.<\/p>\n

(Almost) Nobody Uses Picture Tube TV Sets<\/h3>\n

\"Shutterstock
\n<\/a>Image via Shutterstock<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

As of 2014,\u00a080<\/a>% of all\u00a0households have HDTVs<\/a>. Out of those households,\u00a075% of HDTV households watch video primarily on an HDTV<\/a>. HDTVs, unlike digital projection TVs, don’t use tubes to project their image. Instead, HDTVs use pixel-based technology that doesn’t degrade\u00a0over time. This means that\u00a0image cropping stays consistent and certainly won’t dip down into the 20% default crop for title-safe<\/strong> areas.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Overscan: Reinventing the Title Safe<\/h3>\n

That’s not to say that HDTVs don’t crop. HDTVs have a cropping issue as well, but it’s not quite the same as the cropping issue found in old CRT televisions. Most modern HDTVs have a small 3% crop inwards, known as overscan<\/strong>.\u00a0The reason for this: some broadcasters simply leave garbage pixel information on the edges of the frame. Sometimes broadcasters will put important broadcasting data into the edges of the frame, known as a blanking area<\/a>,\u00a0so it would stand to reason that a\u00a0audience doesn’t want to see distracting blinking pixels on the top of their screen.<\/p>\n

\"Title
\nOverscan example from Engadget<\/a>. Notice the black and white vertical\u00a0line at the top left of the image? That is an example of a blanking area.<\/em><\/p>\n

While this cropping is annoying, most modern TVs allow users to\u00a0change to a 1:1 pixel mapping<\/a>, which will get rid of the overscan cropping. However, most HDTVs have overscanning by default<\/a>, meaning there’s a good chance that your audience is watching\u00a0an overscanned image at home. Side Note: This is why modern video games make you set the boundaries of your image frame when you log in for the first time.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\"ESPN<\/a>
\nNotice how\u00a0even ESPN’s logo only fits within the 10% action-safe box, not the 20% title-safe area.<\/em><\/p>\n

In an effort to address overscanning issues, and the shift from SD to HD in\u00a02008, the\u00a0SMPTE ST 2046-1 broadcasting standard <\/a>was introduced. It stated that the new standard for HD broadcasting was a 93% crop action safe and a 90% title safe<\/strong>. This accounts for overscanning, only without the absurd 20% title-safe crop<\/strong> that was the broadcast standard\u00a0in 1961<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, most editing applications will have the old 20% crop title safe<\/strong> and 10% action safe as default. This is simply unnecessary for modern editing. You can change the default percentages to 93% and 90% respectively in most major video editing applications. Here’s a look at the difference created by the new title-safe margins.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"title<\/a><\/p>\n

The Takeaway<\/h3>\n

The biggest takeaway from this should be\u00a0that the classic\u00a020% title-safe crop<\/strong> is unnecessary for modern editing. In fact, if you’re using a 20% default title safe<\/strong> as your guide, you’re continuing to use standards that were around from before we landed on the moon!\u00a0If you simply adhere to the SMPTE standard<\/a> 10% title-safe crop<\/strong>, your audience will still see your titles.<\/p>\n

For more information on this change in the industry, check out the TV Safe Area Redefined white paper<\/a> from NAB.<\/em><\/p>\n

Should we be adhering to old title-safe standards?<\/strong> Share your thoughts in the comments below!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Real talk: the classic 20% crop Title Safe is completely unnecessary for the modern editor. Here’s why.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":65871,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3843,21,39],"tags":[4692,4696,4697,4691,5376,472],"class_list":["post-class-post-65746","post-class-post","post-class-type-post","post-class-status-publish","post-class-format-standard","post-class-has-post-thumbnail","post-class-hentry","post-class-category-filmmaking-2","post-class-category-tutorials","post-class-category-video-editing","post-class-tag-action-safe","post-class-tag-broadcasting-standards","post-class-tag-modern-editing","post-class-tag-title-safe","post-class-tag-video-editing","post-class-tag-video-production"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nDefault Title Safe Guides Are a Sham<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Real talk: the classic 20% crop Title Safe is completely unnecessary for the modern editor. 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