Jacket Picture and DVD Architect - Good question!

[Cunhambebe]

I've just authored and burned my first NTSC Widescreen Project with DVDA, and wanted to include a jacket picture at the same size (widescreen) - pic was previously resized with PS to NTSC Widescreen. When I paly the DVD and hit stop, the picture does not show properly at 4:3 (even selecting on my Sony DVD the options 4:3 letterbox, pan scan or 16:9) - the top of the picture does not match the top of the screen for a few milimeters or centimeters I can only guess the jacket picture has to be 4:3, in spite of the fact that DVDA's preview screen shows the correct size. What do I do? Change the size of the JP to 4:3 or keep the same size and test on a 16:9 plasma or LCD screen? Thanks in advance.

[Cunhambebe]

Some people say DVDs cannot support 16:9 Jacket Pictures (but I guess we can blame it on DVDA because it considers the whole project at 16:9 Widescreen or 4:3). So, resizing the pic to 4:3 doesn't do any good. I have re-authored the project and burned another DVD with a 4:3 JP - Same Problem. Any ideas? Thanks.

[dipstick]

Have you tried making the JACKET_P's manually with TMPGEnc?

You should be able to set it to 16:9. I don't shoot in 16:9 and I never tried to do a 16:9 JACKET_P, so I can't confirm if it works. You should be able to play the file in MPC to see if it displays correctly or not.

[mikiem]

Have you tried the DVD in another player? According to the help files support is not universal.

[Cunhambebe]

Thanks for answering - I'll try playing the DVD with Media Player Classic - but I don't think I'll be able to reach the JP, but the file, though. The file is shown correctly on DVDA's preview mode.... Let's see it!

According to the help files support is not universal.

-My DVD Player is a Sony which supports JPs.
Thanks to all

[Cunhambebe]

I've just found out the problem - it's DVDA; it doesn't render the JP at the correct size. Media Player Classic shows the file incorrectly. I guess I'm going to do it on Vegas, serving from its timeline to TMPGEnc as it's been suggested. Now, I'd like to know the correct sizes fot those 2 smaller pics that comes along wtith the big one - for widescreen.
JP__5L (the big one lol 720x480 widescreen)
JP__5M (What's the Medium size for widescreen?)
JP__5S (What's the Small size for widescreen?)

Thanks a bunch!

[Cunhambebe]

This is to let you all now that... no, it doesn't work. I HAVE tried everything, re-resizing again with PS, rendering with TMPGEnc Plus, etc... BTW, this method - rendering the pics manually with TMPGEnc - is even worse - you don't see anything at all as a jacket pictute. If any of you have a workaround for this problem, please let me know - well, there' are 2, but not very bright ones: 1) on DVDA menu choose properties for you project at 4:3 and insert your videos 16:9 (the project MUST have a menu, a Movie DVD will not work either). This way you jacket picture will show correctly. 2) Author a DVD Movie with DVDA and link the last clip to a menu that uses the pic as a background, inserting also a simple button to restart the whole stuff.
BTW, I was just reading what B_JM (is that his nick??) had written on this subject ages ago: Jacket Pictures must have a 4:3 aspect ratio menu. Guess that JPs will not work with 16:9 Widescreen - what a pity

[mikiem]

Totally guessing...

If you need movies or menus to make whatever work, would dummies help? I know I often use 1 second black videos (can be shorter) whose only purpose is for the end action -- to go somewhere else. & dummy menus with auto-action or activate are common.

http://www.dvd-replica.com/ has the technical info, but very short version is 16:9 & 4:3 content have to be separate, & there are restrictions on jumping between the 2... perhaps the reason for your 2 work-arounds?

That said, if the jp is encoded as video, the player I think might obey the video tags rather then the vob tags. If you could access & replace the jp video in the rendered DVD files, could change the size &/or aspect flags, which hopefully the player will honor.

[Cornucopia]

Cunhambebe,

re: size...

(from cdfreaks website)

For NTSC:
J00___5L.MP2 720 x 480
J00___5M.MP2 176 x 112
J00___5S.MP2 96 x 64

For PAL:
J00___6L.MP2 720 x 576
J00___6M.MP2 176 x 144
J00___6S.MP2 96 x 80

Those filenames consist of an uppercase letter 'J', followed by two digit 0's (not letter 'O's), followed by three underscores, another digit ('5' for NTSC, '6' for PAL), another upper-case letter ('L' for large, 'M' for medium, 'S' for small), and finally the .MP2 extension.

re: 16:9 Jacket_P legality...
(Don't have DVD DeMystified in front of me right now) AFAIK, Jacket_P pictures are ALL 4:3. However, if you want to try making them 16:9, here's what I would do...
1. Load 16:9 files in Pix editor (Photoshop, etc). For NTSC, try 853x480. For PAL, try 1024x576.
2. Squeeze down to 720x480NTSC/720x576PAL. Save.
3. Convert to Jacket_P pictures as usual.
4. Open Jacket_P .MP2 pictures in DVDPatcher or ReStream, and change AR to 16:9 and SaveAs.
5. Swap out originals for 16:9 versions, then make sure names are same as originals.
6. Now, burn as usual. If it gives you an error message, it's probably NOT DVD-legal.

-or-

Resize still to 720x360NTSC/720x405??PAL and then pad/letterbox out to 720x480/576.
Then Do regular Jacket_P method.

re: DVDA not making good Jacket_P pictures...
Are you sure? I have no problem with my copy of DVDA (v3.0c) doing this correctly. If you do, try the TMPGEnc method listed in the guides, and replace.

HTH,
Scott

>>>>>>>>
BTW--Beautiful site you've got there (both virtual & real)!

[Cunhambebe]

Thanks so much to both of you who took time to respond

2. Squeeze down to 720x480NTSC

-You mean regular NTSC 4:3 or NTSC Widescreen??? - (I was saving the JPEGs as NTSC Widescreen 1,2121)

3. Convert to Jacket_P pictures as usual.

- Guess you're talking about preparing the project with DVDA... right?

What a wonderful idea - I hope it works - let's try it, for the 100th time lol. BTW, thanks so much for the input on DVDPatcher and ReStream!

e: DVDA not making good Jacket_P pictures...
Are you sure? I have no problem with my copy of DVDA (v3.0c) doing this correctly.

-I'm sure DVDA is perfect for making 4:3 Jacket Pictures. I have just said that DVDA is not doing a good job with 16:9 JPs.
-About TMPGEnc method and the sizes: I already new them, since I have responded to a Topic myself sometime ago based on some kind of tutorial by one of the administrators around here. My doubt was about the sizes for "Widescreen" - now (I guess) sizes are the same but not the size of the pixel which is different.

BTW--Beautiful site you've got there (both virtual & real)!

- Thanks so much. It's simple, but I like it too. In fact I don't have time to update the English and the French versions - Sorry (but they will look like the Brazilian Portuguese version). Maybe I'll publish a site on the Northen Shores soon (places like Ubatuba and Paraty, located on the border of the States of São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro - more than 300 islands and 150 beaches there). Thanks again and let's see if I can make those JPs work!
Cheers,
Mark

[Cunhambebe]

I followed the guide and it works so well - thanks, really. Media Player Classic shows the correct size for the JPs (in the project folder on my HD and also in the JP folder on the DVD). On the other hand, when you watch the DVD on a regular 4:3 TV set, the result is as the same as if you had made everything with DVDArchitect - the Jacket Picture does not reach the top of the screen by just a few centimeters (maybe for a few inches - but anyone can notice this). I'm going to test the DVD on a 16:9 Plasma and LCD screens. Let's see what happens. Thanks so much for your help.

[dipstick]

I made a 16:9 Jacket_P for the large image with TMPGEnc. I also saved the Template if it works for you. I have no way of testing, because I only have 4:3 TV. If it works for you, let me know.

Here is the zip file with Jacket_P and Template:
jacket_p.zip

It's important to go into the Advanced Tab and Choose 16:9 525 lines NTSC. See the included image.

Good luck.

[Cunhambebe]

Thansk so much Mr. dipstick - lol. I'm poor too - that means; neither have I a plasma TV nor an LCD one (hope the grammar is OK - lol). I'm going to a shopping mall around here, there's a store called Fast Shop with dozens of plasma and LCD screens - let's see what happens! Thanks again for the ZIP file - If I can do anything to help you, pls let me know

[Cunhambebe]

I went to the Mall this morning and here are the results: I tested the 16:9 DVD with 2 Sony Players, 1 Samsung and 1 Panasonic. Samsung and Panasonic newest models seem to have no support at all for jacket pictures - since hitting <STOP> we only saw the DVDs displaying their own screens with their own logos.
Sony Players are compatible with JPs (dozens of 16:9 TVs were connected to them), but some of those plasma and LCD TVS were not able to show the JP correctly. For instance, Sony's newest models show 2 very narrow black stripes, one at the bottom of the screen and the other one on the top. Philips plasma TVs were great; the JP filled the whole screen. Some Salesmen told me that this happens according to the manufacturers, the way they format their screens (note: all of 16:9 TVs at the Mall were configured for displaying correctly 16:9 AR).

So if you're planning to author a DVD with this AR 16:9, you should consider all these variants. And there's more; as it's been mentioned here, 4:3 regular TV sets will not display the image correctly either (the image does not reach the top of the screen - as it used to happen when the voltage dropped and/or when the TV screen was defective). The weirdest thing is that if you try to do the whole process with DVDA, it's going to render a 4:3something JP that will show incorrectly. If you follow Cornucopia's guide, right above, the JP is rendered correctly but on the other hand, it will not show correctly on some TVS (no matter if they are 4:3 or 16:9). Note: Media Player Classic show the AR correctly.
Besides, someone at Sony told me to start a project as 4:3 and inserting the 16:9 clips. This would be OK, but the jacket picture will also be at 4:3 and will not fill all 16:9 screens.
So, if you are thinking about authoring a 16:9 DVD with JP, you should consider all these problems - no perfection at all. I guess the best option (when authoring a Movie DVD with DVD Architect) would be inserting all clips in a row and a simple menu right after the last one, linking the end action of the last clip to this menu. This way, you may configure an end action for this menu as HOLD, displaying one only button to restart the whole thing, so this menu would work as a JP...that will show correctly on all ARs.
Cheers!

[mikiem]

Haven't tried a JP, but might as this has raised my curriosity. If nothing else seems a good change to try out some graphics edge effects. If image fades to black, and that's part of image, who knows or cares where the display or picture ends.

RE: menu page on hold... why not video loop of waves at beach? Why button visible when first thing anyone will do is press enter on remote anyway?

[Cunhambebe]

RE: menu page on hold... why not video loop of waves at beach? Why button visible when first thing anyone will do is press enter on remote anyway?

- Do it as you wish. My JP is a still, that's why I wanted to use it as a background for my menu. If you have recorded the ocean, the waves, that's going to look perfect!
The button? Yes, the invisible button IS definitely a good idea, but I was authoring this DVD for a City Hall - they are presenting the DVD on the main square for the general audience; they've got a big 16:9 screen overthere with a good video projector - and... I thought the button could be a good idea and I have already sent the DVD this afternoon (too late). Anyway, I'd like to thank you for your help and your ideas! - and I hope you all download my Xvid files at www.litoralsulvirtual.com (check out for New Xvid Files).
Cheers!
Mark