Vcd - video stretched vertically

[nexus123]

I've got a video cd that appears to be stretched vertically like it should be letter boxed but it's missing the bars at the top and bottom. I want to pull the video back off of the vcd and adjust the proportions so that it displays in letterbox. I would give you the current dimensions but vdub gives me an error when I try to load the video into it from the cd. I use tmpgenc and any suggestions on fixing this would be greatly appreciated. I've done dozens of vcd's and occasionly I get this problem. Thanks in advance for any help.

[andyp1]

As long as the source is looks correct. You may simply have forgot to click on 'Full Screen (Keep Aspect Ratio )' in the advanced settings of TMPGenc before you started encoding.

[nexus123]

I believe the source did look correct but I deleted it months ago. I need to squish the vcd that I have. I'm going to go ahead and try doing that with what I have. I'll let ya'll know how it turns out.

[aguillon]

Andyp1 pointed you in the right direction but stopped short of the true answer to your question.

You have a source that in full screen appears stretched vertically, which you want to show as a letterboxed video instead, encoding through TMPGEnc.

Your best bet: in the advanced MPEG settings, play around with the 'Source aspect ratio field' (not the 'Video Arrange Method').

For instance, set the source aspect ratio to 16:9 display while leaving the Video Arrange Method to 'Full Screen (keep aspect ratio)'.

Encode a small portion of your file: you will notice that now TMPGEnc is compressing the source vertically (since you told him the source has a 16:9 aspect ratio) and adding the letterbox (since you asked for a full screen/keep aspect ratio output).

If the ratio 16:9 doesnt work, play with other source aspect ratios.

Now, if you find no aspect ratio that works (unlucky but possible), another solution could be to use VirtualDub, open the MPEG file, use the smart resize video filter (written by Donald Graft if memory serves, must be downloaded separately from Vdub), play around with the ratio settings until satisfied, then frameserve the result back to TMPGEnc for re-encoding (frameserving guides are in the how-to guides).

Hope my answer helps - any clarifications do let me know.

Cheers

[nexus123]

Splendid answer and I will difinately give that a try. Last night I ran it back through tmpeg enc. using full screen keep aspect ratio but I also chose the sharpen edge filter and color correction etc. 5 hours later (for the first half.) It looked tons better but still stretched also unfortunately I forgot that I had chosen my one cd vcd template and it got encoded at 900/b s arghhh. Oh well I think I'm going to start from scratch. Thanx a ton for the help guys.

[nexus123]

Well I got another clean copy of the source. It is 640x272 I screwed around with it in tmpgenc until I got it to look about right I set source aspect ratio at 16:9 and set it to full screen keep aspect ratio it still doesn't look as wide as it does on my computer but it doesn't appear to be stretched at all. Thanx guys for all the help this should help me in the future as well because I do get this problem with about 2/5 movies I burn. If I pull the video off of the movies I have do you think that the process would correct those as well. Because with this one I started from scratch with a whole new source file.

[Ibme]

You got some good info there, but let me share what I do in TMPGEnc.
I found a simple way to verify how the encoded video will look, w/o having to encode any of it.
Go to Setting -> Advance -> Cilp Frame -> Arrange Setting.
Move the slider to display the video source. Click in "Arrange Method" box.
Now use the up down arrows on your keyboard to cycle up and down the list.
The video will take on the characteristics discribed on the list.
You will be able to see what effect each setting would have on the encoded file.
While you are there checkout the values for the "Input & Output Formats"
Hope that helps.

[nexus123]

Thats great! I will be using your suggestion from now on. I get this problem fairly regularly but it doesn't usually bother me so I ignore it. This was a special case though so I appreciate all of the help from you guys.