16:9 video -> Letterboxed 4:3?

[CDickey370]

I have a 16:9 video file that needs to display properly on a 4:3 TV. The original video file is 544x304 according to ffmpegx. How do I know what aspect ratio to use and what numbers for letterboxing to avoid having the video vertically stretched when displaying on the 4:3 TV?

[rumplestiltskin]

How will you be displaying this on your TV? Through an iPod? DVD?, direct connection from the video "out" port of your Mac?

[CDickey370]

Actually I had planned to send it to a networked Series 2 TiVo which is picky about handling a 16:9 video being sent to it. It has to be properly boxed in order to display properly on a 4:3 TV.

[rumplestiltskin]

You may have to experiment a bit here. I would use MPEG Streamclip for something that requires that I manually letterbox the video. If you do some math, 544 > 640 would mean that the 304 comes up to about 357. I believe ffmpegX will require a multiple of 16 so use 352. As you want to get to 480, that means padding the top and bottom by 128 pixels; 64 - top, 64 - bottom. That should work.

In other words: Forget about aspect ratio and use whatever numbers will mathematically work for you.

[CDickey370]

I admit this is not an area I am knowledgeable so I am following your lead. I also just learned that TiVo requires the final video to be one of the following "720 x 480, 704 x 480 (D1), 544 x 480 (3/4 D1), 480 x 480 (2/3 D1), or 352 x 480 (1/2 D1)". So with that in mind what Video size should I choose and what padding would i need?

I took a look at MPEG Streamclip but after loading up the XviD all the needed export to mpeg options in the file menu were greyed out. So lets just stick with ffmpegx

[rumplestiltskin]

From your last post, it appears your TIVO likes MPEG2 (you probably don't have the MPEG2 QT component from Apple installed). I am not sure whether ffmpegX requires this for mpeg2 output or not; I have it but I've always had it so I can't give you a definitive answer on this.

Use the DVD mencoder setting. I would do the math as if you're going to 640x480 (so make your height comply with the example I gave you in my previous post), but then set 720 as the width and encode it as mpeg2 for DVD but uncheck the "author" checkbox as you don't need the VIDEO_TS folder.

Be sure the "Letterbox" checkbox in the Filters tab is checked. Click the Encode button and let us know what happens.

[CDickey370]

Will do it overnight. Though, I do have the mpeg2 QT component installed.