Cedocida DV Codec - 16:9 not recognised?

[BertRito]

Hi guys,

I am converting a 16:9 MPG2 file (ripped from a DVD) into a DV-AVI using the Cedocida DV Codec - all of this using VirtualDub.

In the Configuration settings of the Cedocida Codec there is an option to choose 16:9 for the aspect ratio. Despite selecting this before processing the video, it always comes out in 4:3.

Am I doing something wrong a long the way? The original MPG video plays in 16:9 without an issue, but when converted to DV-AVI using Cedocida in VirtualDub it reverts back to 4:3.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers.

[El Heggunte]

Are you using the most recent version of Cedocida?

Released Cedocida 0.2.2

The biggest changes (compared to version 0.2.0) are as follows:

- fully support of 64bit operating systems
- fixed generation loss in color due to yuv422-to-yuv411 subsampling
- fixed rgb-to-yuv colorshift
- added means for setting the "16:9" flag in encoder and GUI
- fixed other bugs

[jagabo]

Oh good, he finally added the 16:9 flag!

[BertRito]

Yep. Definitely using 0.2.2.

[El Heggunte]

Well... have you played the DV-AVI in other applications than Windows Media Player ???

[BertRito]

Yep. Played in VLC and also imported into Premiere. Both programs still think it's a 4:3 piece of vision.

VLC's 16:9 setting will force it to play in the right ratio but that's not the point.

I'm mainly looking at importing it into Premiere, so I'm surprised it's not working. Unless I'm doing something wrong.

[jagabo]

After importing the DV AVI into Premiere, just tell Premiere the source is 16:9. I don't use Premiere but in most programs you right click on the video in the timeline and use an option in the context menu to select the aspect ratio. An explicit aspect ratio option or "properties" option.

[BertRito]

Unfortunately Premiere doesn't work that way - it recognises the file as 4:3 and will deal with it as 4:3 accordingly.

Surely there's something with the Cedocida codec that is incorrect if the output isn't actually in 16:9?

[jagabo]

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/PremierePro/4.0/WS03BF7479-8C7B-4522-8C75-210AD102524Ea.ht...0-206F1D18D8D0

[BertRito]

Thanks. Will give it a go.

[lordsmurf]

You control the AR of the project in Premiere.

[El Heggunte]

Well, my PC has Windows XP SP3, WMP 9 ( plus the decoders from WMP11 ).
I've created a test DV-AVI file with AR=16:9 through VirtualDub and the latest Cedocida.
Much to my surprise, WMP 9 DOES play the AVI file correctly.

As for MPC 6.4.9.0, and the standalone filter "AviSplitter.ax":
it honors the AR flag, but only after pressing the PAUSE button.

Mplayer (r30886) simply ignores the AR.

[vhelp]

If you want to view (1.78AR) 16:9 material in virtualdub:

1. right-click the video window
2. select 16:9 frame (Wide)

And, of course, this is assuming true 1.78 AR source, like camcorders shot in 1.78 aspect ratio.
Letterbox will look too squished and incorrect.

-vhelp 5401

[BertRito]

Thanks for your help guys. Here's what I've found:

- The test DV-AVI file (Cedocida) does not play in 16:9 in VLC, or in media player classic
- It DOES play in 16:9 in WMP 11
- The file imports into Premiere but DOES NOT play correctly: A 10 second file will play the full audio but "hover" on the first couple of frames of video
- Running the file through Adobe Media Encoder allows the file to import and play correctly, but even choosing PAL DV Widescreen gives me a file that is recognised as 4:3 when imported into Premiere.

- Fully aware of the aspect ratio settings in Premiere. The project is set to PAL Widescreen.

There must be something I'm doing wrong along the way, particularly as the Cedocida DV file won't play in Premiere correctly unless I run it through Adobe Media Encoder first. Regardless, when I import the file into Premiere it is recognised as 4:3.

Any help would be great.

[jagabo]

MPCHC plays the videos I encoded with Cedocida properly. You have to be careful with media players though. They can use a mix of internal filters and external (system installed) filters. All of those filters (file reader, file splitter, codecs, colorspace converters, video rendering device) have to pass along aspect ratio information to get the correct AR at playback. In short, MPCHC isn't using the same filter chain that WMP uses. You have to figure out which filter is causing you problems. MPCHC can show you which filters are in use while playing a video. Right click in the video window and hover over "Filters". You can click on any of the filters to get more information about that filter and sometimes control its settings.

VLC didn't play my Cedocida encoded 16:9 tst video with the correct AR. I don't have any "native" 16:9 DV AVI files to compare with so I don't know if this is a shortcoming of VLC or something wrong with Cedocida. I suspect it's VLC fault. VLC doesn't use system filters so that eliminates one big level of difficulty in figuring out why it's not playing the files correctly.

[BertRito]

Thanks for that.

I suppose the issue is getting Premiere to recognise the files as 16:9. Otherwise there's no way to "force" Premiere to change the AR on them - even manually changing the scale height and width isn't a possibility because the image quality suffers greatly.

[poisondeathray]

what version of premiere are you using?

on recent versions, you just right click and interpet the file

[poisondeathray]

I just did a test with the new cedocida (re-encoding a PAL DV-AVI source) and PP "sees" the file correctly PAL DV-AVI widescreen . You don't even need to interpret the file like you used to (used to be interpreted as square pixel, and you had to manually specify the AR)

[BertRito]

Using Premiere CS4.

That's strange that you can get it to work at your end.

I'll try and play around with the interpret settings again and see if I can get it right.

Or perhaps I can upload a sample?

[poisondeathray]

Sure upload a sample if you want

Interpret definitely works in CS4/5 (although shouldn't even need to anymore, the native cedocida files are working properly with the new version)

Are you sure your sequence settings were setup properly ? What settings did you use for cedocida? Did you use DV chroma sampling (instead of MPEG) ?

[BertRito]

Currently uploading a sample for you if you're able to help.

But...

An interesting thing I've discovered is that it works on an older machine I have which is running Premiere CS3. Not a problem once I interpret the footage properly.

On my CS4 machine, however, Premiere can't handle the file properly.

Thoughts?

[poisondeathray]

Hi , I got your PM and sample and it works fine for me in PP natively (don't even have to interpret file) - it shows up as PAL DV Widescreen 16:9 (1.4587)


Are you saying your CS4 machine can't even interpret the file/conform the aspect ratio? is it greyed out or something ?

Maybe try reinstalling PP ? reboot Windows?

[BertRito]

Are you using CS4?

If you are, then I'll definitely need to look at the machine I'm using. Sounds like something is upset somewhere.

[poisondeathray]

Yep, I checked on both CS4 and CS5 - works on both natively (don't have to interpret)

[BertRito]

Thanks so much for your help. I'll have a crack at re-installing CS4 and see what happens.

Out of interest, are there any "service packs" or updates that might have addressed the issue do you think? Perhaps it's just a matter of simply updating CS4 to fix the issue.

[poisondeathray]

Out of interest, are there any "service packs" or updates that might have addressed the issue do you think? Perhaps it's just a matter of simply updating CS4 to fix the issue.

Not sure , it should work out of the box without updates (since DV-AVI is pretty common)

Can you at least conform the file to the proper AR ? or are you saying that you can't even do that ?

[BertRito]

Interpreting the footage to conform to DV PAL Widescreen works fine. The problem is that the actual playback of the footage inside Premiere doesn't work properly.

The sample file I gave you is 27 seconds long. When imported into Premiere the file is interpreted as 27 seconds long, but when placed on the timeline it only plays a few frames, even though the clip length is still 27 seconds.

[poisondeathray]

But it works ok on your other CS3 computer? That is weird

Do you see red render bar when you put the clip on the timeline?

The only other thing I can think of - Your sample file had AC3 audio (which usually doesn't come with DV-AVI) , but it decodes fine for me. Do you have AC3ACM installed on your CS4 computer? Or try saving out the DV-AVI from vdub with PCM audio instead

But I suspect something else is up, because even just importing in the clip bin it shouldn't need interpreting (should be correct AR)

[BertRito]

Mate, you are a genius.

I changed the audio from AC3 to PCM and the file works perfectly - interpreted as 16:9, plays the full 27 seconds and looks a treat.

Thanks so much for your help. At least it saved me the trouble of going through a re-install as well.

So we have learnt that Premiere CS4 has some sort of issue with Cedocida files if they have AC3 audio. Change the audio to PCM and everything is rosy.

Thanks again.

(I'm sure I'll have another issue with something else shortly... )

[poisondeathray]

Well I'm glad it worked out for you, but I'm still a bit curious as to why your particular DV-AVI sample (with AC3 audio) worked ok for me in PP CS4/5 ?

There must be something configured differently between our setups.