IGTV (or Instagram TV) is out, and it brings portrait or vertical video even closer to the mainstream.

In this post, I’m going to run through a few easy tricks and tips that you can use to convert 16:9 video to 9:16 videos for IGTV, and still get great results.

Quick Navigation

• Step1. How to Convert 16:9 Video to 9:16
• Step2. 4 Ways to Make Your Videos Still Look Good as You Are converting it to Vertical

A Quick Note before We Get Started:

Before we begin, the video editor used for this post is the Filmora Video Editor. However, the methods here can be applied to any other video editor you can lay your hands on.

That said, let’s go on to converting that video from horizontal to vertical.

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Step1. How to Convert 16:9 Video to 9:16

Launch your Filmora software or any other software you want to use to convert your video, then adjust your default aspect ratio to 9:16 which is the ratio we are converting to.

Select the Full Feature mode to fully start the application and enter the work environment.

Next, open up one of your existing videos that you want to repurpose over from widescreen to portrait.

To do that in Filmora, click the big Import Media Files Here button, and select the target video clip that you want to edit to import:

Click on the ‘+’ sign showing on the video you have selected so it can be added to video track on the timeline for editing:

From the preview, you should notice now that your video has been converted from a resolution of 16:9 to a resolution of 9:16 as shown in the image below.

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Step2. 4 Ways to Make Your Videos Still Look Good as You Are converting it to Vertical

Obviously, as you are converting the original horizontal video to vertical, you will notice that there are two blank spaces on the top and bottom of your video.

So this is what we’re going to cover in this part:

4 ways that you can remove black the bars and make your footage still look good as you’re repurposing it for portrait.

Now, the first thing you want to do is to play through your entire video, and just reposition everything so that they fit in this new format.

To make your videos look good as you are converting it to vertical:

You may want to scale up or scale down your actual video content, or slide or reposition it to the left or right so that it fits centered on the screen.

What’s more, you may want to reposition, and even rescale, or resize any titles, or graphics, or animations that you’ve got in your video so that they fit in this new format.

Method1. Add Text and Titles to the Top and Bottom of the Frame

There are 2 ways to add text to the top and bottom of the frame with Filmora.

#1. Use the Built-in Text and Title effects in Filmora

First, you can explore and choose from the vast collection of text effects that Filmora Video Editor offers you. You need to navigate to the Text/Credit tab and choose an effect from the Titles category. Click and hold the selected effect to drag it to the Title track on the timeline to apply:

Double click the Title effect on timeline, you can enter new text content, or reposition the title effect through the preview window:

Repeat the steps to add some text to the bottom of the video.

#2. Create an Image Design that Will Go above and below (or around) Your Horizontal Video.

You can create this image using something like Photoshop, PicMonkey or Canva. Then embed the image behind your video.

Check out a video tutorial below to learn how:

Method2. Split the Vertical Video into Two

You can actually split the vertical video into two and stack your videos on top of each other, so that you’ve got one on the top half of the screen, and another piece of footage on the bottom half of the screen like below:

To do that, go to the Media tab, in the Sample Colors library, drag and drop the Black theme onto the timeline:

Now go to My Album folder in the Media tab, and then import both two video clips to Filmora. Drag two clips to the Overlay tracks under the Video track like below:

Select each video clip on the Overlay track and reposition it like below:

This would work really well if you’re talking about a product.

Mothod3. Move Your Video around So That It Fits Centered on the Screen.

If you are doing an interview, where your original widescreen video would’ve had one person on the left, and one on the right, you can scale the video up so you are just seeing one person at a time, and then you can jump across, back and forth, to the two different people as they’re speaking in the interview.

To do that in Filmora, import the video to the media library of Filmora, then drag and drop it to the video track on timeline:

Right click the video on timeline, go to Crop and Zoom. In the crop and zoom window, select Constrain at 9:16:

Then move the rectangular around to set a new focus on your video. Duplicate this process if the focus changes.

Method4. Add a Blur Effect to the background

This is the easiest way but my least favorite one of all of them, because if you’re picturing viewing this on a mobile phone, then the actual piece of content that you’re watching is going to be pretty small on the screen.

To remove blank spaces on the top and bottom of your video by adding a blurry background to your video in Filmora:

Once the video is added to the video track on timeline, go to the Filters tab. In the Bakcground Blur library, select one you like, click the tiny Plus icon in the middle to apply to your project like below:

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Final Words

It’s worth mentioning that it’s always a great idea to try and have a combination of all of the methods, or mix them up. Don’t just stick to one method for your entire video.

At the end of the day, the whole idea is to create a great experience for your viewers watching your content.

You don’t want it to be annoying or hard for them to see, but you want it to be engaging to keep them engaged while they’re watching.