How to make the DVD both 16:9 and 4:3 resolution?

[triumph2004]

I'm kinda new to DVD authoring/encoding so I just have a quick question regarding the DVD encoding outcome. I want to know how to make the DVD that when you play it on a standalone DVD player, when you select letterbox, it will become 16X9 resolution (black on top and bottom) and when you change it back to 4:3, it will become full screen without the black and top and bottom. Thanks.

[thecoalman]

If you are referring to authoring two separate videos, one 4:3 and the other 16:9 on the same disc two applications that I'm aware of that will do that are DVD workshop and DVD Lab Pro.

[kevo777]

Many commercial releases have a "firstplay menu" (don't know if that's what it's called) that allows you to choose Fullscreen or Widescreen. In those cases there is actually two copies of the movie on the same disc. I would imagine you would have to do the same thing. Encode your video twice; once with a 16:9 flag and once without. Then author a menu to let viewers decide which one to watch based on the display they are using. Any authoring software should be able to accommodate since the 16:9 flag is encoded before authoring.

I could be wrong.

[thecoalman]

Any authoring software should be able to accommodate since the 16:9 flag is encoded before authoring.

I could be wrong.

Unfortunately you are... :P The 16:9 flag on a DVD is in the ifo file. Seems simple to support such a trivial thing but most do not.

[j1d10t]

This may be a stupid question, but are there really 2 different version of a movie encoded on to a DVD that has both the widescreen and full frame versions? In ifoedit (and most likely other tools that let you edit the ifo file) can’t you tell it what to do with a 16x9 flagged video? I thought the options were “letterbox”, “pan & scan” (i.e. crop) and “let player decide”…. So I thought that when you selected the “version” that you wanted from the menu on the DVD it just pointed to the .ifo file for that menu selection, and it told the player to crop/zoom or letterbox it (if you don't have your player set for a widescreen TV)…. But both used the same .VOB files. Am I totally wrong about this? Because that would make sense to me. But I’ve never looked at the set-up of a DVD that has both widescreen and full frame version on it, I just assumed (I know you should never assume ) that the .ifo file was the only difference…

[Baldrick]

j1d10t: It's possible to use the pan & scan flag to get full screen but no dvd uses it, https://forum.videohelp.com/viewtopic.php?p=1595688#1595688

[j1d10t]

OK, so it could be set-up to work that way.... That makes a lot more sense than having the video encoded twice on the disc. That seems like a waste.

[GeorgeW]

I have seen DVD's that have two versions on the disc (one 16:9 and the other 4:3).

Regards,
George