Difficulty In Converting .Vob to Any Format & Keeping Widescreen

[RachelArcher]

Dear all,

Firstly, my many thank to those of you who are taking the time to read this and doubly so to those who post. I realize you folks must see tons of posts like this so thank.

OK, here we go. I have a British DVD (PAL, 25fps) that I had to go to great lengths to purchase; it hasn't been released here in Canada nor is it likely to be any time soon. Realizing this, I wanted to make sure that I could preserve the movie lest anything happened to the disc.

So I ripped the DVD to my hard drive using CloneDVD 2. Was very pleased with the resultant .vob files, plays like a charm. I didn't rip the menus or subtitles or any of that, just the film. The .vob files are saying in any player I play them in that they are 720 x 576, PAL, 25fps, etc. When, for example, I play the .vob files in PowerDVD, they play in the appropriate widescreen aspect ratio, wide if left on the compact view, and with the two black bars (one above, one below) if set to view on full screen. All perfectly fine and just as I want it, it's like having the DVD right on my hard drive.

Now here's my problem.

I want to convert the .vob files that I now have on my hard drive into other formats, i.e. DivX .avi, .wmv, .mpg etc. I have ImTOO Mpeg-3 Encoder for this task, but no matter what I do, it always ends up removing the black bars and stretching the picture, so that everyone looks like they are far too skinny and tall for their own good! This sucks, naturally!

If anyone can please help point me in the right direction, I'd be grateful. Unlike several others here, I want to keep the widescreen aspect ratio! Thanks in advance,

Fondly,

Rachel

[jagabo]

For Divx AVI resize the frame to a 16:9 ratio first, the crop the black bars from the top and bottom (if any). For example, resize to 704x400 then crop the black bars.

For NTSC DVD just resize to 720x480.

[RachelArcher]

For Divx AVI resize the frame to a 16:9 ratio first, the crop the black bars.

For NTSC DVD just resize to 720x480.

You misunderstand, I want the black bars there. They are supposed to be there, and are, in the .vob files anyway. Also, thank you for your post jagabo so quickly, but you didn't really tell me how to do what you suggested, or with what program, etc.

I await your replies folks, thanks in advance *hugs*

Fondly,

Rachel

[Soopafresh]

Hi Rachel, you want to resize to 720x400 or 640x352, or 480x272 to maintain 16x9 aspect ratio.

[RachelArcher]

LOL, wow, I was expecting some godawful two or three hour wait at least before I got any help - so thank you both firstly! *hugs*

OK, jagabo & Soopafresh, bear in mind the DVD is a PAL DVD, 25fps, not an NTSC one. The .vob files I ripped from it are also PAL, not NTSC. I was concerned that being Canadian with all-Canadian equipment this might be a problem but no it hasn't been so far, lol.

I will try to convert a brief portion to 720x400 and see if that helps ok? In the meantime, please do expound on matters here, thanks in advance *hugs*.

Fondly,

Rachel

[jagabo]

As a beginner making Divx AVI files you should probably use AutoGK. It will handle just about everything for you.

If you want more control try VirtualDubMPEG2 or VirtualDubMod. There are many guides on how to use those programs here.

Frame rate doesn't really matter for AVI files. If you want to make an NTSC movie DVD you'll have to convert to 29.97 fps. Assuming a progressive source, this is best accomplished by resizing to 720x480 and encoding to MPEG2 at 25 fps, then using DGPulldown to add pulldown flags for 29.97 fps. Then author and burn...

[guns1inger]

Why do you want to keep the black bars ? If you are converting to Divx then you do not need them. If the player requires them to display correctly on your TV, it will put them in for you.

[RachelArcher]

OK wow Jagabo, lol ... much of your last post just there went way over my head. Progressive source? Author and burn? Haven't got a clue what you're talking about hon, lol, I just want to convert these widescreen .vob files to the equivalent in some kinda .avi or such. [EDIT: Dear guns1inger, the .vob files when played in compact mode have no black bars, the black bars appear when played in full screen mode, and ditto when I play the .vob files in DivX Player. Also, I am just trying to convert these files to a format that can be fiddled with in Windows Movie Maker etc without being all stretched and deformed as they are, please see below. Btw, my monitor is very nice, but I have no TV worth mentioning. My television is from 1983, lol. And now back to my post ...]

OK, so - I did try just now with ImTOO MPEG Encoder to convert the first minute of the first .vob to an XVID .avi .... I didn't fiddle with any of the settings, except to manually type in 720 x 400 as the size.

This was the resultant file: a 9-plus MB file that has black bars on all four sides now! What went wrong? This thing seems destined and determined to stretch the actual picture to make everyone look skinny and stretched. It's small enough that I've decided to upload the 1 minute XVID .avi I just created now for you guys to download and see. Perhaps it will help you determine what went wrong and how to get things right, thanks in advance! *hugs* P.S. I re-named the file too.

http://www.badongo.com/vid/496638

Fondly,

Rachel

P.P.S. It is worth mentioning that in every attempt, regardless of picture, the sound in the resulting converted files seems to be just the TINIEST bit out of sync with the picture, as you can see for yourself in the small 1 minute file above. If I need to rip afresh from the DVD to .vob, differently than I did originally, I can (that is I assume I can, lol). Your thoughts are welcomed.

[RachelArcher]

Dear all,

OK VOB2MPG didn't work properly either. It created an MPG from the .vob files but no thumbnail would show for the .mpg, and the .mpg was not usable or convertable in any other programs except playback in Windows Media Player.

So we're back at square one, please read the post above this one and I look forward to your answers. Awaiting (with thanks in advance),

Fondly,

Rachel

[guns1inger]

Frankly, I wouldn't use anything from ImTOO. Jagabo's suggestion of AutoGK is a sound one.

Yes, you can uninstall the .net framework, however anything that requires it will then fail to work. More and more, even commercial applications are requiring that it be installed. It's not that big, and doesn't slow your system down, so you might as well leave it there. Expect the next service pack for XP to include versions 1, 2 and 3 of the framework. Vista already has them built-in.

This post : https://forum.videohelp.com/topic239865.html covers most issues related to grabbing still images from videos. Something here should help you out.

[Soopafresh]

By the way, I *can* easily uninstall the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 from my computer, correct???

Yes, but you'll find that a lot of programs require .NET 2.0 these days. Still, it will uninstall if you so choose.

[RachelArcher]

Soopafresh, guns1inger, I made a major edit to my last post. Please read, I am screwed still, lol! Thanks

Fondly,

Rachel

[guns1inger]

I have used VOB2MPG to extract the video/audio from recording made on my DVDR. I know the recordings are 16:9, however the video that VOB2MPG produces is 4:3. This is a simple issue of flags not being carried over by VOB2MPG, and this can be fixed easily by using ReStream to put the 16:9 flags back.

Open the .mpg file created by VOB2MPG in the latest version of G-Spot, then post a screenshot here for us to look at. This should, hopefully, tell us if the issue is with the file, or something else in your system. WMP's handling of mpg is pretty basic, so if it can play the file, I suspect the file is OK.

[RachelArcher]

Guns1inger, I have already uninstalled the Microsoft .NET Framework as well as VOB2MPG, and deleted the 3.36GB .mpg that it created from my .vob files, so no can do with regards to that.

As far as playback of the .mpg within Windows Media Player, it played back fine, which was why I initially thought I was OK now, despite the lack of a thumbnail appearing. But when I tried to import that .mpg video into Windows Movie Maker (with the 'Make Clips' checkbox checked) it imported the entire video as one clip. When I dragged said clip into the timeline, it was not recognized by Windows Movie Maker as a video, but instead as an audio track. When I attempted to play it, all I heard was horrible, screeching static with no picture. Also, none of my converter apps were able to convert any part of the .mpg. So the .mpg that VOB2MPG created was pretty much crap apart from playback in WMP, i.e. it was not a proper, 'true' .mpg.

So bottom line, I would really appreciate it if a few of you guys & gals would download the 1-minute XVID .avi I created from the first .vob file and let me know why you think I ended up with 4 bars, 1 on each side and still a stretched image instead of the proper one. The link once more:

http://www.badongo.com/vid/496638

Thanks in advance and sorry this is taking so long; I trust we'll fix it together! *hugs*

Fondly,

Rachel

[guns1inger]

I think you have jumped the gun uninstalling everything and deleting the file. I suspect the file was actually OK.

That said, I can confidently say the problem with your Xvid is your choice of encoder. Try AutoGK. It understands VOBs, knows how to crop them and encode them correctly, and should give you the outcome you want.

[RachelArcher]

I think you have jumped the gun uninstalling everything and deleting the file. I suspect the file was actually OK.

That said, I can confidently say the problem with your Xvid is your choice of encoder. Try AutoGK. It understands VOBs, knows how to crop them and encode them correctly, and should give you the outcome you want.

Will do, I shall give 'er a try and post back shortly to let you know how it went.

Fondly,

Rachel

[guns1inger]

The other thing that AutoGK understands, and that ImToo appears to miss the point on, is that DVD does not use square pixels. That is why you get stretched images when it encodes. It needs to compensate for the fact that most Xvid/Divx files use a 1:1 (square) Pixel Aspect Ratio. There is facility to use a non-square PAR, however most software players do not respect the flags, and so give distorted playback. AutoGK will resize the video correctly to give proportioned playback through any player.

Good luck.

AutoGK isn't the only option to consider, either. There is also FairUseWizard, which is well respected
AlltoAVI
AVI.net (although you would have to put .net back on your system)
DVD2AVI

And if you want to get you hands dirty, Virtualdubmpeg2 and the original GordianKnot

[RachelArcher]

Well I'm back - finally, lol. Alright, I won't lie. AutoGK wanted to put a lotta weird stuff on the computer with its install. Filters and codecs and the like, much of which I wasn't sure about and had no idea about how it would affect my computer. I am leery of installing any converter apps nowadays after some bad experiences in the past - some programs will have older or weird things in them that cause general problems across the board down the road.

It took a hell of a long time to do its job too - ripping the DVD to crystal-clear .vob files took like 10 minutes, not even, with CloneDVD. The iffy .mpg took only 4 and a half minutes to create from said .vob files with VOB2MPG. ImTOO MPEG Encoder, while not giving me proper aspect ratio, also was fairly quick, doing its thing in under 10 minutes. This program AutoGK however, took like 2 hours and guess what? It created an .avi movie with no sound! Bravo to AutoGK, lol. Guess it takes longer to methodically remove something that I wanted and never asked you to remove eh?

Actually to be fair, the audio was removed and placed into a separate .mp3 file. However, it is damaged goods - it plays back fine in WMP, but when I try and use said .mp3 in Windows Movie Maker, we hear only silence. So I am left with audio that is of little use to me, and a mute video.

Since I have a massive hard drive, I was able to take the .mp3 that AutoGK created and open it with Nero Wave Editor and save it as a .wav file. Windows Movie Maker was able to recognize that .wav file (755 MB in size!) and so with the .wav and the muted .avi, I was able to export a brief 2 minutes of the film via Windows Movie Maker, which is all I wanted to do in the first place.

But surely there's a more reasonable and simple way to do things re: converting .vob files to XVID .avi or other formats, etc! That was a real take-me-round-the-rosebushes way of doing things and then some. Thanks to everyone who helped, but all in all I would appreciate personal recommendations from you folks for something simpler - something that doesn't take three or four conversions and 10+ GB of space every time I want to take a tiny piece of a .vob and convert it to .avi etc. Thanks in advance for your posts! *hugs*

Fondly,

Rachel

[guns1inger]

Many of your issues seem to be either system related, or because you don't want to install all the required components. The .mp3 file that AutoGK created is obviously fine, as you can play it and convert it to other formats. If you open the AVI that AutoGK created in G-Spot, I suspect you will find that it does have an audio track.

Admittedly, I have a slower machine than you (3 Ghz single core), so things are slower for me, but to produce quality video in 10 minutes is simply not feasible.

AutoGK takes around 4 hours to process a 50 minute mpg file into an Xvid encoded AVI on my system. That produces a high quality file, correctly deinterlaced and with the right aspect ratio. That is just the way it is.

You are either the unluckiest person around, or something else is fundamentally wrong. You are having problems with so many pieces of software that work without issue for the vast majority.

Either than, or your expectations are skewed.

Can I also suggest that you bite the bullet and install a couple of basic tools and make some changes to your processes.

First, install VLC. Use this to test play your files. It uses it's own codecs, and so isn't reliant on you having other things installed. If the video plays correctly in VLC, and not in other things, you know you have a codec missing and need to install it.

Do not rely on WMP or WMM for testing. WMM in particular works with such a narrow range of video and audio formats. Basically if it is not WMV or DV-avi, anything could happen.

If all you want is to export a few minutes form a larger clip, use Virtualdubmpeg2 to open you VOB file, edit it, and export the results. Export as uncompressed avi (yes, it's big, but it's only a couple of minutes long, and it's temporary), then convert this to WMV (which is what I assume you are using WMM for). Shouldn't take more than a few minutes to complete. You could also try AVIDemux instead of Virtualdubmpeg2. Either will do the job.

[jagabo]

This was the resultant file: a 9-plus MB file that has black bars on all four sides now! What went wrong? This thing seems destined and determined to stretch the actual picture to make everyone look skinny and stretched. It's small enough that I've decided to upload the 1 minute XVID .avi I just created now for you guys to download and see. Perhaps it will help you determine what went wrong and how to get things right, thanks in advance! *hugs* P.S. I re-named the file too.

http://www.badongo.com/vid/496638

The software you used thought the source video was 4:3. You told it to create a 16:9 output file. So it pillarboxed the video. When you play it back with a media player it sees a 16:9 video (including the pillarboxing) and adds letterboxing (top and bottom) to fill your 4:3 screen. The result is black bars all around.

Look for a setting in the conversion software to overide the source aspect ratio. Set it to 16:9.

[JamesC01]

I'm having a problem similar to yours, Rachel, so I hope you don't mind if I post it here instead of in a separate thread.

I have recorded a 16:9 HD program to DVD using my DVD recorder, and now I want to convert it to an XVid avi file. I recorded the anamorphic output from the TV tuner (i.e., horizontally squeezed into the 4:3 SD frame) at 720 x 480 NTSC DVD resolution. Unfortunately my DVD recorder doesn't set the 16:9 anamorphic flag, so the resulting DVD title looks like a regular 4:3 aspect ratio initially, but after I transfer the DVD files to my PC, I use IFOEdit to set the 16:9 flag, and it then plays with the proper 16:9 aspect ratio in all my DVD player programs.

Now I understand that the avi container doesn't have a 16:9 flag, and that most players don't recognize the 16:9 flag in the XVid data even if it is set. Therefore I would have to resample the video data to a 16:9 aspect ratio if I wanted it to have the correct aspect ratio in the avi file. But I would prefer to just keep it a the original resolution of 720 x 480 to avoid quality degradation, and let the player or the TV deal with stretching it on playback.

But I can't seem to get any of the DVD-to-XVid converters to keep the 720 x 480 resolution - they all claim that the source is 4:3 aspect ratio and want to resample it to 720 x 544. I've tried AutoGK (updated to 2.45), EasyDivX, FairUse Wizard, and xDVD. None of them seem to recognize the 16:9 flag in the DVD source that all the DVD players recognize, and I can't find an easy way to override their 4:3 resampling.

This must be a very common problem! Can anyone offer a suggestion?

[jagabo]

I would prefer to just keep it a the original resolution of 720 x 480 to avoid quality degradation, and let the player or the TV deal with stretching it on playback.

Use VirtualDubMPEG2 or VirtualDubMod. Leave the frame at 720x480, set the Divx or Xvid encoder to 16:9 DAR. Many of the more recent set-top Divx/DVD players (Philips 5960 and 5982 for example) will respect the DAR setting. Keep in mind that the larger frame size will require a higher bitrate to maintain quality.

[JamesC01]

Use VirtualDubMPEG2 or VirtualDubMod. Leave the frame at 720x480, set the Divx or Xvid encoder to 16:9 DAR.

Tried that. Unfortunately VirtualDubMPEG2 will only accept one VOB file at a time, and this DVD recording stretches across two VOB files. It won't let me append VOB files directly, so I tried converting each VOB file separately. But when I append the resulting AVI files to make one big AVI, there's a video glitch at the join, and an audio sync problem in the second one. I suppose I could fool around with trying to fix it, but now you're talking about going to too much trouble to do this routinely.

Someone else mentioned using the Ctrl-F9 hidden menu in AutoGK to tell it keep the original aspect ratio. After a few false starts (complicated settings), I think it's doing that now. But AutoGK doesn't seem to have any awareness that the source is flagged 16:9, and for some reason it insists that the source is 24 fps film, when it's not - it's 30 fps interlaced video. I haven't found the way to override those things yet. AutoGK seems awfully dumb about everything except calculating optimum bit rates.

[jagabo]

Use VOB2MPG to join multiple VOB files into one MPG file. Or rip with DVD Decrypter in IFO mode with no file splitting.

[manono]

None of them seem to recognize the 16:9 flag in the DVD source that all the DVD players recognize, and I can't find an easy way to override their 4:3 resampling.

You can do just that in the AutoGK Hidden Options (CTRL-F9):

"Aspect ratio" is an option to override AR setting that comes out of DGIndex (indexing tool for MPEG2 files used by AutoGK). If source is misdetected as 4:3 or 16:9 then you have a choice of manually setting correct AR.

http://www.autogk.me.uk/modules.php?name=TutorialEN#6

[JamesC01]

My last try with AutoGK didn't work. I set the Override Input AR on the hidden Ctrl-F9 menu to "Original", but it decided to resample my 720 x 480 down to 640 x 432. Now I'm also overriding the horizontal size to 720 on the Advanced Settings menu, and it seems to be working to keep the 720 x 480 resolution.

I also set Reduce FPS to 29.97 on the hidden menu to keep it from selecting 24 fps. Don't know yet how well that works, but it does give a 29.97 frame rate, which should be right for this source.

I can't see any way in AutoGK to set the output AR flag to 16:9 using the XVid option, but I can do that afterward if necessary using MPEG4Modifier.

I just don't understand why AutoGK isn't selecting better defaults and requires all these convoluted overrides for what must be a very common input: DVD track containing anamorphic 16:9 video (flags set appropriately) at a source resolution of 720 x 480.

[jagabo]

I just don't understand why AutoGK isn't selecting better defaults and requires all these convoluted overrides for what must be a very common input

Because Divx and Xvid didn't support DAR settings up until a year or two ago. And many playback devices still don't. So using square pixels avoids DAR problems. And most people are more more interested in squeezing files down to very small sizes for internet upload/download.

[guns1inger]

It doesn't do it by default because they aren't common, and in the past were rarely used. Most avi files use a 1:1 PAR because most players only see that format. Therefore, converting DVD to avi requires some resizing. Even now, many hardware players do not properly recognise avi files with non-square pixels and produce distorted images.

[manono]

My last try with AutoGK didn't work. I set the Override Input AR on the hidden Ctrl-F9 menu to "Original", but it decided to resample my 720 x 480 down to 640 x 432. Now I'm also overriding the horizontal size to 720 on the Advanced Settings menu, and it seems to be working to keep the 720 x 480 resolution.

640 x 432 is the original, allowing for it being resized and allowing for Mod16 resizing. You didn't tell it to make it the original resolution, just the original aspect ratio. The original DAR has been (incorrectly, you say) set in your recorder as 4:3. If you want it to be resized as if the source is 16:9, then check the box and then set it for 16:9. If it's been set for 4:3 in the DVD (open a VOB in DGIndex and run the Preview to confirm), then ticking 4:3 will have it treated as if the DAR is 4:3. Ticking "Original" will get it fairly close to 1.5:1 (720/480=1.5), also incorrect, unless you later plan on using MPEG4Modifier to set a DAR so your player can resize it at playback.

If you want to keep it at 720x480 and later set up a DAR for your player in MPEG4Modifier, then check the "Original" box and set the width in the Advanced Settings to 720. You might also set the cropping threshold to zero to keep it from cropping away any black bars that might be present. As guns1inger says, most players won't respect the DAR and will play it distorted if you keep it 720x480.

I also set Reduce FPS to 29.97 on the hidden menu to keep it from selecting 24 fps.

If you are getting 23.976fps, you can rest assured that's the proper framerate (unless it's some sort of a hybrid, in which case there may be an honest difference of opinion as to what the correct framerate should be).

If you have any other problems, you might post a log for any encodes that you claim AutoGK is screwing up.

I can't see any way in AutoGK to set the output AR flag to 16:9 using the XVid option, but I can do that afterward if necessary using MPEG4Modifier.

That's correct, you'll need to set it afterwards in MPEG4Modifier. Most people want their AVIs 1:1. Most DVD/MPEG-4 players are expecting 1:1 AVIs.

[JamesC01]

Setting the AR to Original and the horizontal width to 720 in AutoGK worked to keep the original 720 x 480 resolution.

Considering that I used IFOEdit to set the 16:9 aspect ratio flags correctly in the DVD IFO file before running AutoGK, I'm surprised that AutoGK didn't pick up that source AR automatically instead of assuming 4:3. Oh well...

My DVD player and TV don't seem to care about the AR flags. As long as I keep 720 x 480 resolution, it is shown as full-screen 16:9 when playing the XVid avi file. The versions that were resampled to 4:3 have very thin black bars on the side, but I won't bother figuring that out since it's fine now.

I'm puzzled about the 24 fps though. This recording was made from the 480i output of my satellite receiver, from a 1080i HD broadcast that I'm pretty sure was originally recorded in digital HD video, not on 24 fps film. However when I try to override to 29.97 NTSC output, I can definitely see interlacing errors in the resulting XVid video compared to the 24 fps output which AutoGK selected by default.