How to Quickly Change Video Aspect Ratio in DaVinci Resolve: A Step-By-Step Guide

Ever wondered how to change aspect ratio in Resolve? DaVinci Resolve offers a wide array of post-production capabilities, one of which is the ability to change the video aspect ratio easily. This tutorial will guide you through the process.

To start, open DaVinci Resolve and navigate to the project you’re working on. Having a clear view of your timeline is crucial when learning how to change the DaVinci Resolve aspect ratio.

From your existing timeline, select the media file you want to manipulate. For this example, the video I initially imported is horizontally oriented. But imagine you want to change the video aspect ratio to vertical.

As you can see, the media I’ve imported does not have the proper aspect ratio for the video settings I currently have. There is a black space above and below the image, and it is very small. Now let’s quickly change the video aspect ratio using DaVinci Resolve’s Inspector Tool.

Start by clicking on the media in the timeline.

After selecting your media in your timeline, you need to open the Inspector panel. To do this, select the Inspector panel in the upper-right corner of your screen.

In the Inspector panel, find the Zoom control. This is where you can adjust the zoom settings. We’ll start by changing the Y-axis of your video to change the aspect ratio. You’ll be changing this value to vertically fill your screen. Try increasing it to around 3.1.

And that’s it. You’ve successfully changed the aspect ratio of a single clip. Now, what if you have several clips that you want to change?

Now, you might wonder, “What if I need to change the aspect ratio of multiple clips?” Instead of individually adjusting each clip, there’s a more efficient solution.

Let’s start over. Assume you haven’t made any changes and you are preparing your workspace for the import of clips. Start by scrolling down to your Media Pool, right-click on your timeline, and then click on the Timeline Settings option.

Here, uncheck the Use Project Settings box. This will allow you to customize the default settings for this project.

In the Mismatch Resolution section, click on the dropdown and select Scale full frame with crop.

Proceed to the output section of the menu by clicking on Output.

In a similar fashion as before, select Scale full frame with crop. This step ensures that DaVinci Resolve will automatically zoom every clip in your timeline vertically.

After making the necessary changes, click the OK button.

Now that DaVinci Resolve has zoomed every clip in your timeline, you may need to reposition some clips for a better view. Change the position of the clips as required by adjusting the Position option in the Inspector section.

And there you go! You’ve successfully changed the video aspect ratio in DaVinci Resolve for multiple clips.

After you’ve made all your adjustments, it’s time to render your project. To do this, click on Deliver in the bottom right-hand corner.

Once rendering is complete, you’re good to go.

After reading this tutorial, you should now feel comfortable whenever you need to change the video aspect ratio. It’s a common requirement in video editing. Thankfully, DaVinci Resolve makes the process straightforward and efficient. Practice these steps, and soon you’ll be adjusting aspect ratios like a pro!

Now take your video-editing work to the next level by checking out the DaVinci Resolve video templates on Envato Elements.