Keeping Aspect Ratio & Resolution

[Scarpad]

If I'm Encoding a 4:3 Aspect Ratio video and I want to keep the Original Resolution of 740x480, how can I do this and maintain the Proper Aspect Ratio? I'm using a MAC and Handbrake. Handbrake automatically sets 4:3 material to 640x480, If I uncheck to maintain aspect ratio and set it to 740x480 the image is distorted. Do I need to Crop? I can set the aspect ratio in VLC to 4:3 but I don't want to do this everytime.

[guns1inger]

Handbrake is in fact doing the right thing. DVD is designed for playback on television, which does not have square pixels. NTSC DVD at 720 x 480 (4:3) is actually equivelent to 640 x 480 when you convert it to a format with a 1:1 pixel aspect ratio. Have a look at this table : http://www.mir.com/DMG/aspect.html#reftable for an explanation. If you want to maintain a 720 width, you have to resize the height to 540 pixels to remove the distortion.

On the windows platform there is a program called mpeg4modifier which will also allow you to set an aspect ratio in the mpeg4 file, however many players do not recognise this setting, so it is limited in it's effectiveness. I don't know of a MAC equivelent.

[Scarpad]

Definately cannot keep that height in Handbrake, My interest is in playing these files back on the Mac thru my LCD and a 720 encode looks alot better than 640x480

[Case]

Definately cannot keep that height in Handbrake

You should round the sizes to multiples of 16, so: 720x544.

[Scarpad]

Handbrake will not let you select that resolution in the dial ups, have'nt tried manually

[live4ever]

The CLI for HandBrake will though. Check out this guide for its use.

http://caenim.com/HandBrake.CLI.Guide/index.php