Maintaining Widescreen Resolution

[JGill]

Hello,

I have a video that is 640 x 272 (Widescreen). In order to author it, I need to make the resolution 720 x 480. So, I loaded the file into Adobe Premiere and attempted to change the resolution to 720 x 480 while maintaining it's widescreen ratio of 640 x 272. However, the process takes over 2 days to complete. Is there an easier way to maintain the Widescreen resolution of my video without having to wait so long?

Thanks

[thecoalman]

The aspect ratio is determined by a attribute not the resolution. If it's captured video capture it using a widscreen template or widescreen or attribute. If you have no other source it has to be converted to a DVD compliant resolution to be authored.

[JGill]

Hello,

Is the only way to convert it to a complaint DVD resolution through something like Adobe Premiere? Or is there a different program I can do that in?

Thanks

[thecoalman]

Correct, look under the "What is" section. It will give you the different compliant DVD resolutions. There are other apps that will encode it for you but Adobe is a good one. 2 day is is quite a long time, what are your system specs?

[JGill]

Hello,

I am only running on a 450 Mhz processor with 640 MB of ram. I've converted a two minute video file before, and it took an hour and a half. So maybe it takes that long because of my slow processor. Or is there a way or changing the settings so it won't take so long?

Thanks

[thecoalman]

You could use a lower resolution but that will affect the quality. Check the specs to the left. Do a couple of tests runs on a very short clip and compare.

Turn off all uneeded programs running in the background. Which os do you have?

[JGill]

Hello,

My OS is Windows 2000 Professional.

I tried to convert a small 2 minute clip, and it took 45 minutes. So I'm guessing that it would take a day or two to convert a larger video file. Will turning off all background processes affect the speed?

Thanks

[sacajaweeda]

You can use AviSynth to letterbox it with a script like...

AviSource("clip.avi")
AddBorders(0,104,0,104)
LanczosResize(720,480)

Then feed it to any number of editors/encoders from there.

[thecoalman]

Yes, turning off any unnedded background programs may help a little. It frees up ram and they won't be using any processing power if they need it. I don't know what the average processing time is for a system like yours but that sounds about right. I've heard of similar times.

The thing that is really holding you back is the processor speed, you have plenty of RAM.

[JGill]

Hello,

Since my clip is already converted to an mpeg, it's saved as "clip.mpeg". But I changed the code around so DirectshowSource is used since I'm not using an .avi file.

It plays in Virtualdub, but how do I author the file? If I try to open the .avs file in TMPEGEnc DVD Author, it says it cannot open the file. What do I have to do?

Thanks

[sacajaweeda]

If you can author a DVD with an mpeg file with a 640x272 frams size, I'd like to know how as well. As far as I know you have to encode it to a DVD legal frame size.

For using AVS files in TMPGEnc...

http://www.avisynth.org/warpenterprises/files/readavs.zip

( http://www.avisynth.org/warpenterprises/#other )

[ggrussell]

JGill -- there are now several consumer video editors that will import and burn anamorphic 16:9 DVDs. Pinnacle Studio 9 and Ulead Video Studio 8 both will do the job. Ulead's preview shows it on screen as letterboxed, but the final results was indeed anamorphic.