Losing edges of picture

[headless chicken]

I am converting an xvid with an aspect ratio of 2.35 to SVCD for playback on a 4:3 TV screen. The mpg2 file has the entire image when played back on my computer. However, there is a chunk of the picture missing from the left and right side when viewed on my TV.

What settings should I specifiy in TMPGEnc for the source aspect ratio and aspect ratio to ensure that my picture isn't cropped? I've played with the various settings for both the source aspect ratio and aspect ratio (4:3, 16:9, 1:1 VGA, etc.), but that just changes the height of the image (in other words, how tall or squished the image appears in relation to the size of the black bars). A few inches are missing from the edges of the picture on each side regardless of whether the aspect ratio is set to 1:1, 4:3, 16:9 and the source aspect ratio is set to 1:1, 4:3, 4:3 525 line, 16:9, 16:9 525 line (NTSC).

Is this the case with all 2.35 played back on a 4:3 TV, or is there some way of seeing the whole image?

[mats.hogberg]

If you do a search for overscan, you'll get tons of explanations to this. It's normal.

/Mats

[NamPla]

I didn't get tons of explanations, but I did get this: add 8 or 16 pixels frame to your picture. My TV works with 16 added frames. Probably more could do, too. (Does it have to be multiples of 8? Why?)

In TMPGEnc, does "Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio 2)" do the overscan compensation??? Because I noticed in the "Clip Frame" window that "Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio)" is slightly BIGGER than "Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio 2)"... So does that mean that "Full Screen (Aspect Ration 2)" will fit in my TV screen better?

Weird stuff, I'm still trying desperately to "see" the evidence...

[headless chicken]

Thanks, I didn't know there was a term for this or that this was a common place issue.

I checked out the guide to determine aspect ratios here:
https://www.videohelp.com/guides.php?guideid=360&howtoselect=1;3#360

According to this guide, this first table indicates that I should resize the avi to 480x272 for a NTSC SVCD with source aspect of 2.35 during the conversion to MPEG2. Or am I not understanding this correctly?

[DJRumpy]

You've got it right. The remaining vertical will be filled with letterboxing. TMPGenc can be tricky, because there are three different settings that can all effect how your output looks.

Click the SETTING button, and on the VIDEO tab, ensure that your settings are as follows (if a setting isn't listed, it's not important to your border problem..use whatever you normally use):

Video Tab:
SIZE: 480x480
Aspect ratio: 4:3 Display

Advanced Tab:
Source aspect ratio: 16:9 525 line (NTSC)
Video Arrange Method: Center (keep aspect ratio)

The above settings should give you a properly letterboxed 2.35 aspect for SVCD.

Once you get those settings in, just select PREVIEW from the FILE menu and verify that it looks correct. It only takes a second, and may save you hours of grief

[headless chicken]

Thanks, DJRumpy! I've tried all the aforementioned settings, except configuring the video arrange method. For some reason I thought it had to bee on Full screen (keep aspect ratio). I changed it to center (keep aspect ratio) and lo and behold, the full image appeared on my TV screen. Go figure, the one setting I didn't meddle with during these 15+ trials was the key!

Thanks again!!

[Sakuya]

I have read this guide:

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/userguides/174200.php

But I still don't understand what to set for the Video Arrange Method. I am converting an AVI to MPEG-2 for DVD. The AVI's resolution is 640x480. So I divide that and I come up with 1.333 which means it is 4:3. Since I have a 4:3 TV, the setting for the Video Arrange Method will most likely be Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio) right? But then once I did that, there's a bit of video cropped from the left and right sides on the TV. It seems a bit unnatural to me. Should I really be using Center or Center (KAR)? How can I tell which setting to use in future conversions?

[headless chicken]

I have found these settings to work for a 4:3 TV:

Aspect ratio: 4x3
Source Aspect ratio: 1x1 VGA
Video arrange method: Center (keep aspect ratio)

You shouldn't lose the edges of your picture that way.