widescreen to fullscreen!

[pc22575]

hello!!! does ANYONE know how to author a STANDARD FULLSCREEN/16:9 DVD FROM A WIDESCREEN/4:3 DVD!?!?!
i've been asking this question for some time and have had no resolution. Can it be done? i have tried the method of using tmpg and cce to do the work, turning my .vob files into dvd-ready files, then using ifoedit to complete the processing. tmpg creates the fullscreen format BUT doesn't give the great quality that is created be cce. these both take a considerable amount of time. i've tried dvd patcher but have had no luck. i tried to patch the first header, then the entire file, etc... isn't dvd resolution is 720x480. hmm?? well can N-E-BODY HELPPPPP!!!???

p.s. thanks in advance

[Quigonsean]

Well I'm abit thrown off by the wording of your question, but I will share what I know, mostly thaks to DJ-Rumpy on this board, and the guy at Widescreen Advocasy Page. Now, if what your talking about is an Mpeg file from a DVD Rip, that is force Letterboxed, that is the Letterboxing is part of the image such as on a widescreen vhs tape then this will work. If not it won't.

How to Author a true 16:9 Anamorphic DVD from a Non-Anamorphic/Force Letterboxed DVD or VHS

Tools Needed:
DVD2AVI (If you are using a DVD)
AVISYNTH
CCE, or Tmpegenc
Maestro, Scenarist, or any Authoring App that Supports Anamorphic Widescreen to Spec

IMPORTANT- I AM assuming an NTSC Movie in the following, please make sure to adjust your numbers apropriatly if your source is PAL

First if you are using a DVD rip it to the harddrive, then run load it in DVD2AVI, and save as a project so you get a .d2v file. For this discussion, we will call our mpeg video only stream by the name "Movie" So save "Movie.d2v"
Next you need to create an Avisynth Script in a text editor, I will list the lines you need for the basic process, but you can also use any filters you like at this time as well. I prefer to use AVSGenie cause I ain't the greatest at scripting, I always misspell something and that results in an error. You need these 2 lines in you script.
Crop(0,60,720,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

NOTE- Make sure that the crop line comes before the line to rezize. You can use BilinearRisize, or any type of Resize to resize to 720x480, I just prefer Bicubic as it tends to sharpen the image and I am partial to a slightly sharper image over smoother.

When your finished writing your script save it as whatever you want.avs for this we'll continue with "Movie" so save as Movie.avs
NOTE-Make sure when you save it to put the entire name and extension in quotes so Notepad saves it as a avs not a txt. Save like this ex "Movie.avs"

Now, it is time to encode. Fire up CCE (You can use Tmpegenc, or any encoder so long as it supports 16:9)
In CCE load your file Movie.avs Now Make sure to setup your properties just rightclick on movie.avs and click "Edit" from the menu. Now you need to set a few things Set the DAR or Aspect Ratio to 16:9 Set it to NTSC unless your video is pal, but the all your risizing etc.. will be different also so make sure you took this into acount at the begining. Click the "Video" button and tick the "DVD Compliant" box. Also make sure the resolution is set to 720x480. There are many other setting you may need to set or boxes to tick, but they very based on the properties of your source file. So make sure to set them if you need to such as 3/2 Auto Detection, Progressive Frames, 29.97fps etc..
Now hit the "Encode" button, and grab a coffe, or a beer, or a beer and a coffe. Let it encode this will vary from close to realtime in CCR with CBR, to many hours in 3 pass Multipass VBR, or days in Tmpegenc if you pc is slow.

When it is done you are ready to author. If you look at the .m2v file from CCE in Media player, or any other Ap that does not read/take into account the 16:9 Flag encoded in the mpeg stream your mpeg will have the "Funhouse Mirror Effect" People will be skinny, and tall but this is fine, infact this means you've done it correct so far.
Now fire up Maestro and import your flick "Movie.m2v" your Audio and any other assets you need/want for Authoring your DVD.
In the prefaces you must set the DAR/Aspect Ratio to 16:9 and make sure it is set to "Auto Letter Box"
Author your DVD as you like, and when your done burn it to DVD. Provided all when well you now will have an Anamorphic DVD of said movie. In other words, when this DVD is played on a Widescreen TV and the DVD player is set to Widescreen TV it will fill the entire screen with no black bars, but if you watch it on a Standard TV with the DVD Player set to 4:3 it will be letterboxed, but show all of the image. This only works if the Capture you are using is Letterboxed to a 16:9 DAR if it is Letterboxed to 2.35:1 Cinemascope there are som adjustments to the Avisynth Script that have to be made because Cinemascope is even wider then a 16:9 Widescreen TV, and is Letterboxed even on a Widescreen TV albeit very small letterboxing, but letterboxing none the less. With VHS this usually isn't a problem, but quite alot of DVD's are in Cinemescope, but they luckily are usually already Anamorphic, and then you ain't gotta do all this. This is only needed to be done on a movie that is Letterboxed Widescreen as opposed to Anamorphic Widescreen.

NOTE - If your source is 2.35:1 Cinemascope then use these Values in Avisynth
For 2.35:1 Cinemascope
Crop(0,104,720,272)
AddBorders(0,44,0,44)
BicubicResize(720,480)

Those are the adjustments if your capture is 2.35:1 On a side note, an added bonus of doing all this to a VHS Capture anyway is that because you have to crop the top and bottom you end up removing the noise found in the area that's usually hidden by the TV bezel in the Overscan area.

I hope this helps out,
Sean Ward aka - QuiGonSean

[F-ING HOSTILE]

I think what he was asking was how to convert a 16:9 widescreen movie (2.35:1 or 1.85:1) in to a full screen movie (4:3). It looks like he got his 16:9 and 4:3 descriptions backwards. I would imagine this could be accomplished through the use of an AviSynth script, although I do not know the exact script!

I personally would NEVER waste the contents of a widescreen movie in this fashion, but was also curious as to the method in which it could be done. I guess I could understand why someone might want to try this. I enjoy viewing the entire video in widescreen (as it was filmed), but many people would much rather take advantage of their TV's entire screen, and are willing to sacrifice the sides of their video. My parents have asked me to convert several of their widescreen DVD's into full screen. They view their movies on a small television, and are more concerned with seeing the full screen, than preserving the original aspect ratio. Hey, whatever makes you happy!!!

If anyone does know how to do this (the exact AviSynth text), I sure would be interested in learning.

THANKS!!!

[F-ING HOSTILE]

Sorry Quigonsean

I didn't read through your whole post before responding!

[Quigonsean]

Nosweat oh hostile one haha, Yes I agree the inventor of Pan and scan should be shot. It ruins movies, but if you would like to do it you can with Avisynth.
I can't remember all the math, but it is very easy to do.

Movie Butchery 101:
In Avisynth instead of only croping 60 from top and bottom, you crop 60 from the top and bottom, but also crop the right and left by whatever number gives you a ratio of 4:3 in respect to vertical hieght of 360.

After that resize it to 720x480 as long as you crop the correct amount from the sides to mak you ratio of width to hieght a 4:3 ratio using the 360 hight (Height After cropping) your resize to 720x480 will not distort the image, just blow it up larger.

Then encode this time set your encoder to 4:3, and then author in anything since everything supports 4:3 Standard Screen.

Oh, I got your numbers for ya ah cross multiplication you crop to 540x360. So here is your Avisynth scrip doodad

Crop(90,60,540,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

That's it. Encode now, in CCE set your DAR/Aspect Ratio to 4:3, in Tmpegenc Set it to 4:3 Keep Aspect Ratio
Then Author in anything since even the cheapest crap Authoring App supports 4:3, just make sure if you are using a pro type app to set it to 4:3 most cheapies it isn't even an option to change it cause it's 4:3 only.

This is how to butcher your film. You will get the same resulsts as buying the Raped er..I mean Pan and Scan, aka Fullscreen Version.

Thats about it. Just incase you cannot go from 4:3 to 16:9 Anamorphic though. Well you can, but unlike my post above where you retain the entire screen that is the entire veiw wide and all, if you do it to a full screen movie you actually lose about 25% of the picture, so it will be butchered even further.


I hope this info helps ya'll, or at least someone,
Sean Ward

[F-ING HOSTILE]

This is how to butcher your film. You will get the same resulsts as buying the Raped er..I mean Pan and Scan, aka Fullscreen Version.

Kool!
I would never Rape...er...apply this to my own DVD's, but now I can help those who "haven't seen the light".
Hopefully this will help all the people who have been posting questions about this topic (there have been quite a few lately)!

THANKS!!

[Quigonsean]

No sweat my freind. I am glad I could help, but I also owe gratitude to DJ-Rumpy, the Widescreen Advocacy Page and a great page on DV Maestro and such from Australia thet where resources of unimaginable proportion.
Yeah My parents like that too every movie they buy the buy the hack, and whack version.
Yeak I too noticed alot of people posting about going from W/S to Hack and Whack, or from Forced Letterbox to Anamorphic W/S it seems to be hitting everyone all at once. Well I'm glad I could finaly contribute something that helps someone. Good luck.

Sean Ward aka QuiGonSean

[F-ING HOSTILE]

I can't seem to get the numbers right
I tryed the Crop(90,60,90,60) and bicubicresize(720,480).
The video was WAY blown up, almost zoomed in?
I wrote the script for a D2V of "Mystery, Alaska" I still had on my computer.
It's a 2.35:1 widescreen movie if that makes a difference.
Any ideas?

[Quigonsean]

Yeah 2.35:1 will make a differance. Let me see if I can fu=igure out the mat..

Okay you want 408x272 then resize to 720x480. One thing to remember you are taking an image that is 272 pixels high and blowing it up to 480 so it will get very large looking, but this is how a widescreen vs. pan/scan of a flick compare.

Also these new numbers will only work if the movie is displayed in a trye 2.35:1 aspect. So after running the crop and resize on the file was any black bar left on the one you tried? If so use these new figures I'm passing on. If there was no black bars showing at all then you had it correct remember you are increasing the vertical resolution by 25 percent with the previous numbers so it will look considerably larger. Also if this movie is letterboxed in at 2.35:1 turning into a pan/scan will result in it looking even larger than your last try because the last one based on 16x9 increased the image size by 25 percent, you lost image area, but gained size, just like cutting the centre out of a photo of 4 people cutting out 2, but then blowing the cut out peice up to the size of the org photo, thie people in that peice you cut out will get much larger. But where as the 16:9 figures increased the image you see by 25%, based on 2.35:1 they will get even larger, becuase your blowing up an are of 408x272 as opposed to an area of 540x360. Well here goes.

EDIT-

Crop(156,104,408,272)
BicubicResize(720,480)

Encode in 4:3 then author in 4:3

Just remember it will look huge, as in way blown up compared to the org+++++++++. But then it should. Just put the movie on your 4:3 tv set take a good look at how small it is in between the black bars. Now imagine how it would look if you blew it up to fit the whole tv hight without black bars also remember your losing about 24 percent on each side in screen area but blkowing it up to fit. If you do that look at it on the tv with the black bars then imagine blowing it up toi fit without black bars you'll be like woahh it gets huge.That is another effect of making movies in hack and whack err pan and scan.
Just make sure there was black left from the letterboxing after cropping with the old scrip before running these numbers or you will be doing the equivalent of making a pan/scan from a pan/scan essentially losing over 90percent of the image.

Hope this helps,
Sean

[F-ING HOSTILE]

Thanks, those seem to be the correct settings!
Man, the quality really sucks when you do that. There has to be a way to improve it (even just a little bit). Mabye there are some AviSynth filters or something that could make that transition a little less painfull? At least with a commercial resizing (wide to full screen), the only thing you loose is a portion of your picture on the left and right sides (and not so much video quality)! I wounder if there isn't a better way? Just another reason why I wouldn't want to do this!

THANKS Quigonsean !!!

[Quigonsean]

Um I ain't learned the filters yet but I'll see what was recomended to me for going from letterbox to Anamorphic. Yeah I imaginge it looks bad cause you blowing it up so much bigger. You know you might try anyway I don't know if it will help, but it should work. Try resize(352,240) or even mayber resize(352,480) that might help as your not blowing the image way up. I'll post those filters when I find the document I pasted DJ's post to.

Sean

[Quigonsean]

You know what the crop command may be off. I use AvsGenie to generate my scripts and the line to crop comes out like I gave you, but if you read all the guides it should be written differantly, on the crop line add the minus sign befor the 3rd and forth number.
ie..
Crop(0,60,-0,-60)
I think that is what is required, I also think this may fix the hack and whack some, as befor without the minus signs I think Avisynth uses the last 2 numbers as resizing info so with that 2.35:1 movie it might be rezizing it to 156x104 after croping the rezizing up to 720x480 with the resize command. This would result in insanely large blow up. The image should inlarge, and do so quite abit I think it gets about 40% with a cinemascope image 25% with 16:9, but it should'nt get like 200 times bigger. This is why I use AvsGenie, cause I always beef up the script when I type it myself from scratch. Try that when you crop add the minus sign to the last 2 nembers in the crop line.
Let me know if this is better.

Sean

[Quigonsean]

oh Alternate script line. I think...

Making 16:9 anamorphic
Crop(0,60,720,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

For Cinema Scope 2.35:1

Crop(156,104,408,272)
AddBorders(0,44,0,44)
BicubicResize(720,480)

To Destroy your vid up to Fullscreen

From 16:9 to Fullscreen

Crop(90,60,630,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

From 2.35:1 up to 4:3Fullscreen

Crop(156,104,408,272)
BicubicResize(720,480)


Alrighty, that should do it. In fact I would use these as opposed to the other ones in my original post. In fact I may go back and edit them to these settings.

Sean

[F-ING HOSTILE]

Great!!
I'll tinker with these for a while
It's amazing the shit you can do with AviSynth

[F-ING HOSTILE]

To Destroy your vid up to Fullscreen

From 16:9 to Fullscreen

Crop(90,60,630,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

These new settings work great, but the "crop(90,60,630,360)"has the video slightly off center to the left. Is it the 630 and 360 that would need to be changed?

[D-Ran]

this is all so simple, convert your video with TMPGEnc before authoring. under TMPGEnc settings, select video arange methode to no margins ( keep aspect ration) . your movie will now be in fullscreen with no distortion.

[Quigonsean]

Yup don't know what I was thinking
Crop(90,60,540,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

You nmay be able to in Tmpegenc, but that auto setting there won't crop off the black bars, doing it with this Avisynth script will. Doing it with Avisynth like this get the same picture as a production Fullscreen DVD not that thats a good thing. But best of all IMHO is the timeframe. Both Tmpegenc and CCE are great in the quality dep. but in the time dept CCE smokes it. Actually I think most of all is the fun of messing around with it, and doing yourself instead of just ticking a box and hitting encode.

Not only all that, but you cannot convert a Letterbox into true Anamorphic Widescreen that way, for that you have to do something along this way.

Sean

[F-ING HOSTILE]

this is all so simple, convert your video with TMPGEnc before authoring. under TMPGEnc settings, select video arange methode to no margins ( keep aspect ration) . your movie will now be in fullscreen with no distortion.

Your kidding , RIGHT?
It's not that simple!
And I do select "keep aspect ratio", which DOES NOT turn a widescreen movie into full screen!!!

[F-ING HOSTILE]

Actually I think most of all is the fun of messing around with it, and doing yourself instead of just ticking a box and hitting encode.
Sean

EXACTLY!!!

[Quigonsean]

Man those smilies are great especially I'm with stupid, and the Iwogima flag one.

They rule


Sean

[Conquest10]

Crop(90,60,540,360)
BicubicResize(720,480)

Quigonsean, that script may need a little tweeking. with an anamorphic dvd, it makes it look a little stretched vetically.

[Quigonsean]

That perticular one actually is to turn a letterbox into a 4:3 fullscreen. Yuck!!!

Sean

[Conquest10]

oh, ok. i was using it with a 2.35:1. don't have any 16:9 dvds.

[Quigonsean]

Conquest, are are you trying to turn a 2.35:1 wide into a 4:3 fullscreen? Oh, and what is the source VHS, LD, TV etc...?

Sean

[Conquest10]

i was using a dvd. just experimenting to see what it would look like. i always do them widescreen. its just the rest of the family thinks there is something wrong with the tv cuz there's black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. i might do some full screen to shut them up.

[Quigonsean]

Yeah, I know what ya mean, I keep trying to tell my mom that not only do you not lose any picture on W/S, you gain an incredible anmount more. She does not get the concept that you take an image thats wider than the tv and shrink it on all sides proportionally untill it fits the tv so you see all, its just smaller image. Maybe I should try a demo with 2 identical photographs I'll get a 5x7, and an 11x14, but 2 8x10 frames. I'll put the 5x7 in the frame and fill the unused area with black construction paper. Then I'll take the 11x14, and cut a rectangle out that is 8x10 cut from the centre, and put that in the other frame, and ask her which one do you lose picture on. That may work to get the point, across as well as a small understanding of W/S. Beats me.

Sean

[j1d10t]

If you use AviSynth to crop and enlarge, do you recommend sharpening the picture as well? Or smoothing it out? Or nothing after cropping, and resizing?

[F-ING HOSTILE]

If you use AviSynth to crop and enlarge, do you recommend sharpening the picture as well? Or smoothing it out? Or nothing after cropping, and resizing?

That's exactly what I was thinking. The AviSynth script does the resizing job fine, but could really benefit from some sort of filter (sharpening, smoothing...).

[Conquest10]

what was wierd was that with the fullscreen resize filter and kwag's optimized script and templates, i can fit 120 minutes with a CQ of 70 on one cd.

[Dasio]

Newbee method:

I’ve just buck-up my kids anime “Sponge Bob” to extend the life of original disc.
I ripped movie only files with DVD Decrypter, and burned with IC7. In about 45 min. later kids were watching new copy. It comes out 16:9 format.
They did not liked very much, so I went back to the computer to look for ways of changing format.
I’ve opened files with IfoEdit and in the beginning of the files I’ve noticed 16:9 format. Having nothing to loose and not knowing exactly what I was doing, I changed this to 4:3 and resaved file. Went back to IC7 and burned again. This time it took it much longer to burn, but to my surprise I have perfect copy in 4:3 format.
How that happened so simple?