5.1.1

Chapter 6 Create and manage projects 167
About high-resolution still image les
You can import still image les using most popular still image formats, including SGI, Photoshop,
BMP, JPEG, TIFF, TGA, and JPEG-2. As with video clips, you can mix still image les with diering
frame sizes and pixel aspect ratios. For a full list of eligible le types, see File types supported by
Motion on page 165.
A common and eective use of still images in motion graphics work is the animation of high-
resolution les. The dots per inch (DPI) of image les as dened in programs like Photoshop
does not apply to video, because the dimensions of each imported still image are dened by the
number of pixels. If the dimensions of an imported image are larger than the frame size of the
Motion project, the image extends beyond the borders of the Canvas.
You can reduce the scale of the image to t the project’s frame size. You can also animate its
Scale parameter (in the Properties Inspector) to zoom into or out of the image, or animate its
Position parameter to pan the image.
Because Motion is graphics-card dependent, le-size import limitations vary from computer to
computer. When you import an image that is too large, an alert dialog appears, stating: “This
media is too large to render at full resolution, and will be shown at a lower quality.” Click OK to
import the image at a lower quality. For more information on recommended graphics cards, visit
the Motion website at http://www.apple.com/nalcutpro/motion.
For guidelines about working with high-resolution graphics, see High-resolution graphics
overview on page 1058.
When you import a still image, the image assumes a duration equal to the current duration of
the project. Increasing the duration of the project does not increase the duration of an image
that’s imported. Still images have innite duration in Motion, so you can stretch them in the
Timeline to be as long as necessary. For more information about modifying objects in the
Timeline, see Timeline overview on page 2 51.
Import large still images
For importing large still images, you can set an option in the Preferences window to import les
at their original size or to scale images to t the Canvas size.
Set the large still image import preference
1 Choose Motion > Preferences (or press Command-Comma).
The Motion Preferences window appears.
67% resize factor