Set DivX aspect ratio to display 720x576 video as widescreen

[AndreWilley]

I'm not sure if DivX can do this, but if anyone can correct me?

I've got some DV-sourced material which is 720x576 25pfs PAL, but which needs to be displayed in 16:9 widescreen ratio. I can obviously resize the source material to around 720x404 before encoding it with DivX, but I'd prefer to encode the full 720x576 resolution and make it display as widescreen, just like the camcorder and TV do. Can this sort of pixel aspect ratio modification be done in DivX?

(I'm encoding using VirtualDubMod and DivX Pro 5.2.1)

Andre

[guns1inger]

Are you saying that the source is anamorphic ? (stretched vertically to fill the screen ?). If the DV is full screen, then displaying 16:9 will only compress it vertically. If it is anamorphic 16:9, and you can't get your TV to compress it, then you may have to resize it, as I don't believe that Divx has the facility to differentiate between 4:3 and 16:9.

[celtic_druid]

For DivX you would need to set it after encoding with MPEG4Modifier. If you were to use XviD you could set it during encoding.

Next problem is playback. I don't think DivX does any PAR resizing so you would have to use XviD or ffdshow for decoding. mplayer or VLC would also work.

[guns1inger]

I get the impression he wants to play back on a standalone, not the PC.

[celtic_druid]

They never mentioned it. With hardware players I am sure that some support PAR resizing.

[AndreWilley]

Yes, the DV source material is indeed anamorphic 720x756 PAL, which should be displayed at 16:9.

I tried using the MPEG4Modifier program, but as someone else said even when you set the 16:9 flag, PC players don't seem to recognise it (well Nero Showtime, DivX Player, PowerDVD and Windows Media Player didn't seem to anyway, and that covers most of the major market contenders).

I've gone ahead and encoded it at 720x404 and it looks pretty good, it just would have been nice to have left it anamorphic for better playback on a large TV or possible subsequent re-conversion to anamoprhic widescreen PAL rather than letterboxed PAL.

Thanks for the input.

Andre