Aspect ratio problems

[MarioB]

Hope someone has the solution for the following issue:

Besides making my own videos, I am frequently asked to convert miniDV home made videos into DVD, which I usually do with Pinnacle Sudio 11 Ultimate (capture & edit) and with DVDlab (DVD authoring) - either 16:9 or 4:3 material.

Recently, on the last request I have received, I found a strange situation on the picture aspect ratio: after capturing the material to the computer, I got a 16:9 picture with black bars on top and bottom of the screen and the picture stretched to both sides (please see an example on how it looks on the attached file).

So, do you know a way to fix this issue in order to get a picture with the proper aspect ratio? Or is it a problem in the origin, i.e., during the shooting of the film, an incorrect camera setup...?

Your help is really appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

Mário

[minidv2dvd]

use mediainfo in tree mode on the file and take a screenshot. post it here.

[MarioB]

OK, here's the screenshot of the file info.

Regards,

Mário

[minidv2dvd]

did you try telling the editor it's not 16/9? looks like DVavi shot in normal 4:3 mode.

[MarioB]

did you try telling the editor it's not 16/9? looks like DVavi shot in normal 4:3 mode.

Yes, I did it. By default, Pinnacle captures the video based on the aspect ratio of the 1st frame. It always worked fine with all the videos I've made so far, be it 16:9 or 4:3. As, with this one, I have this issue, I've forced the capture in 4:3 but the result is always the same, as mentioned in my 1st post. I've also tried to captute with NeroVision... the same problem!

So, if you still can help me...

Thanks,

Mário

[SatStorm]

You have a 16:9 source with a 4:3 flag. For some reason the capture tries to correct that and compress more vertically the image.

Better capture as 4:3, encode as 4:3 and patch the header to tell it is 16:9.

[minidv2dvd]

don't capture with pinnacle.

use winDV, capture as type II avi. then import it.

[SatStorm]

Can winDV bypass the flags pinnacle receives from the source?
That's interesting to know.