How to cut the sides off a movie scene using WMM or Premiere Pro?

Question

I don't mean to ask how to crop a video in the usual sense but the way you would crop a picture. I want to cut the sides off because there's an object in the shot and it'd just be easier to do this if possible.

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

You crop in video the same way you would crop in Photoshop.  But you will get black where the video was.

You could also enlarge your video for that scene, and then adjust it's placement in the frame so that the part you don't want to see is outside of the frame.  But, you loose resolution and it could look a little 'bitmappy' if you have to zoom in too much.

Another option, if it is an option in this project, is to cover it with a lower third (the words that say who's talking) or a graphic of some sort.  Or  you could do one of those blurred head things where you blur the 'offending area' - but everyone will know that there's something there that you didn't want them to see and it may be a distraction.