Setting Safe Zone Preferences

Over-scanning television picture tubes, a common industry practice, causes a portion of the outer edge of an image to be lost. If you are creating projects for videotape or television broadcast, you need to position important content so that it will not be cut off.

Since the amount of over-scan is not consistent from one television set to another, use safe zones to help avoid eliminating important elements.

The Action safe zone represents the cutoff of most televisions. Anything outside this boundary may not be visible on screen. The default value is 90%, which is the commonly accepted setting in the video industry.

You should keep any text, such as titles, phone numbers, and so on, within the Title safe zone. The default value is 80%, which is the commonly accepted setting in the video industry.

To set safe zone preferences:

1. Choose File | Preferences.
2. In the Host category, click Safe Zone.

The Safe Zone preferences appear.



3. Set the following options as required.
   
   

   Use:	To:
   Action Safe	Set the size of the Action (outer) safe zone. The value is a percentage of the pixel dimensions of your project.
   Title Safe	Set the size of the Title (inner) safe zone. The value is a percentage of the pixel dimensions of your project.
   Color	Set the color of the safe zone guides that appear in the viewports. Click the color box and then choose a color from the Pick Color dialog. See Using the Pick Color Dialog.

   
   
   
4. Click OK.

To view safe zones:

1. Select a viewport.
2. Choose Window | Show Safe Zones or press the single quotation mark (') key.

Note: This option is also available in the viewport context menu.