vcd screen size

[liftedz71]

I have a bunch of mpegs that I want to watch on my tv. They are 352 * 240 in resolution. The problem I am having is that when I create a vcd it stretches the video out to cover the whole screen and the quality is bad then. Is there something out there that will let me keep the quality by putting black bars on all four sides of the video somewhat like widescreen does on the top and bottom of the video? Or do you guys have any other suggestions that will help me.

[wayne421]

Hi,

I believe TMPG Encoder will do what you're looking for. The free version should include MPEG1 support. There should be an option in the advanced section to 'maintain aspect ratio' when encoding, which will add the black bars you're looking for (also known as letterboxing).

<------ Look through the Tools and Guides sections for more info.

Good luck!

-W-

[DRfrankenpimp]

one method i use is to resize the the video to a 352 by 180 in resolution under the settings tab in tmpgenc,you can try that,it would look like letterbox after encoding.works for me

[celtic_druid]

They don't want letterboxed though. They want a small video the same AR as the original in the centre of the screen, surrounded by black. You could try zooming out on your player if it supports that. Otherwise you would need to re-encode which will further degrade quality. Could also sit further away from the screen.

[Krispy Kritter]

Are you talking VCD or SVCD? NTSC VCD spec is 352 x 240

[Cornucopia]

Sounds like your source mpgs were encoded for VCD (352x240), and so you naturally made a VCD out of them (or re-authored them onto DVD), but don't like the quality of the normal stretching/expansion that goes on whenever VCD is played full-screen (~aka on settops). VCD is lower resollution, but fullscreen shouldn't look "crappy", just "soft/dull" compared to 720x480 DVD resolution.

You will need to decompress the mpegs to AVI (or use an app that reads mpeg natively) and re-compress. Follow what wayne421 was suggesting, but make sure you DON'T export to VCD settings again (352x240), as then your image will be small in the middle of the screen, but MUCH softer/duller still. Export with an image size of 720x480 (DVD D1 resolution).
At least then the only loss will be that of re-encoding to mpeg again (this time MPEG2).

However, it could be that the files were just encoded badly to begin with and that won't change for the better with any conversion.

-or, if you really do want to make a VCD, you're stuck.


Scott