Turn landscape footage into a vertical edit

Changing a video's shape changes its composition. A 9:16 export from a 16:9 source cannot retain the whole image while also filling the frame without distortion. You must crop, add space around the image, or choose a different arrangement.

Make that decision before polishing titles and transitions. Otherwise, an important subject may disappear only after the rest of the edit feels complete.

See the crop in source pixels

For a 3840 × 2160 source, the largest 9:16 rectangle inside it is 1215 × 2160. That keeps about 31.64% of the original image area. This is geometry, not a measurement of creative quality: the retained portion might contain exactly what you need, or it might remove the reason you recorded the view.

Try your own dimensions in the crop calculator. Fractional results describe an ideal rectangle; the editor still has to use a supported pixel grid.

Choose between crop and padding

A fill crop makes the image occupy the entire destination frame but removes content. A fit treatment keeps the original composition and leaves space above, below or beside it. Neither is automatically correct.

For a distant person against a broad landscape, a crop might clarify the person while removing the context. For a sweeping reveal, preserving the landscape could matter more than filling every pixel. Evaluate the shot's purpose rather than choosing one treatment for the whole trip by default.

Inspect movement, not just a thumbnail

A centred crop can look right on the first frame and fail later as the camera turns. Scrub the middle and end. Watch hands, faces, signs and moving objects near the edges. Check any horizon that was already close to the top of the source.

A reframing control can move the visible window, but it cannot reveal material outside the original recording. Do not expect a larger export size to restore missing composition.

Revisit text after the crop

Place titles only after the basic frame works. Keep them away from important subjects and verify the actual destination preview. Social interfaces can cover parts of a video, so a clean exported frame alone is not the entire viewing experience.

YouTube's official encoding guidance explains that its player adapts to other aspect ratios. That is a platform-specific behaviour, not a reason to assume every service uses identical framing.

Sometimes make two edits

A landscape film and a vertical recap can use different shot selections. A scene that explains the place in one may be too wide for the other. Keeping two deliberate versions can be better than forcing every choice from the first edit into the second.

Check Stitch's available formats and review the exported file, not only the crop preview.