streaming anime no subtitles showing half the time/off screen

[thewhiteboy23]

I hope this is the right place to post this. I have a Samsung HL-S5087W 1080p and a ton of anime that i'm streaming from a HDD. Half of the anime's subs will be off the screen by about 2"(estimated) I'm kinda at my wits end with trying to re-size all of these. I've tried converting some using several different resolutions and also tried different screen modes on the TV. Of course the "original" size works but is really small on the tv . These are mostly sized at 640x480. What's the optimal resolution that i should be using so the subs show up? Any help would be fantastic.

Thanks in advance!!

[Ai Haibara]

You might be experiencing the TV's overscan. You can try encoding a black border around the videos, or see if your TV has options for disabling the overscan (or even Just Scan options?).

[thewhiteboy23]

forgot to mention I'm streaming this through a PS3. I checked and didnt see any scan options anywhere in the menu or manual. How do i encode borders around the video? Is there a guide you could point me to please?

Thanks again.

[Bwizzy]

You might have already tried this, but can you adjust the screen ratio. I know on my BRAVIA you can do that by going into the picture mode in the options. Have you tried that?

[thewhiteboy23]

yea i only get a few options on this tv and none really help. I get 16:9, 4:3 a couple of zoom options and a wide fit option. Subs are off the screen no matter what i do. I have messed around with the ps3 settings as well and changing those screen ratios dont help either. I'll be more than happy to do the black border option if someone knows how to do it. I've used virtualdub before as well as some other video editing tools, just never added borders.

[guns1inger]

It is because the people who fan-sub anime do it for people who what the videos on a PC. This has been a problem for as long as I have been on the boards here, and I suspect somewhat longer than that. Unless you can load them via an avisynth script that adds borders, and transcode them on the fly as you stream, you will have to go back and re-encode the lot with borders.

[Bwizzy]

Is it only one anime series or just specifically the ones that are 640x480 doing it? And are you using any 3rd party software or are you using whats in the PS3 for streaming. I have a few friends who use TVersity and Nero and they don't have the problem your speaking of.

[thewhiteboy23]

Its most anime series. I've been using both tversity and Playon. I think its an issue with the tv or ps3. I can stream the same anime's to my other tv (vizio 32"lcd) via my xbox 360 and the subs show up fine...very frustrating!

[guns1inger]

On your TV look for a Just Scan type settings that shows the entire visible image sent from the PS2.

On the PS3 press the Triangle button during playback and choose the option to change the display size. You can set the PS3 to display the video at it's native resolution. This will give you big black borders all around if the resolution is low, but you will see the whole thing.

[thewhiteboy23]

On your TV look for a Just Scan type settings that shows the entire visible image sent from the PS2.

On the PS3 press the Triangle button during playback and choose the option to change the display size. You can set the PS3 to display the video at it's native resolution. This will give you big black borders all around if the resolution is low, but you will see the whole thing.

yep I tried a variety of things with the different display modes. I even hooked the xbox360 to that tv and it's still having subtitle issues. So yea it's the tv If someone could post a guide or just a few instructions to adding the letterbox bars to an .avi file I would appreciate it. I tried a few things in virtualdub but didnt have any luck.

[guns1inger]

The simplest way is FitCD to create an avisynth script that adds the borders, then load the script into vdub and re-encode

[jagabo]

Maybe this:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?p=17099666#post17099666

The "just scan" setting is kinda hard to find

Press Home
Select Settings
Select Setup
Select Screen Settings
Select Display Area - Normal is default - change to full pixel

If your TV doesn't have the "Full Pixel" setting you should just use VGA. Most HDTVs don't overscan the VGA input because Windows would be useless without being able to see the Start bar at the edge of the screen. The degradation from using VGA rather than HDMI will be less than the loss of image quality from reencoding all your videos.

[thewhiteboy23]

The PS3 is hooked up using the HDMI port. I'm not using the VGA port at all in this process. I have my PC upstairs that's running Playon and TVersity streaming the Anime from my external HD to the PS3 downstairs. These aren't being streamed from a website nor is a PC hooked directly up to the TV itself.

[jagabo]

I'm not sure what your point is. Most TVs overscan. Fan subbed anime usually don't take this into account. You either need a TV that doesn't overscan, find some software that will display the frame less than the full size of the frame that's being sent to the TV, or reencode the videos with black borders around the edges.

[thewhiteboy23]

I'm not sure what your point is. Most TVs overscan. Fan subbed anime usually don't take this into account. You either need a TV that doesn't overscan, find some software that will display the frame less than the full size of the frame that's being sent to the TV, or reencode the videos with black borders around the edges.

Do you know of such software that will change the display as it's being streamed or can you direct me to/or write a simple guide to re-encode the .avi files? I took a look at avisynth and was totally lost with the scripting. I didn't think it would be so difficult to add letterboxing to a video. Thanks again in advance.

[guns1inger]

The simplest way is FitCD to create an avisynth script that adds the borders, then load the script into vdub and re-encode

In fact, any encoder that accepts avisynth scripts - Xvid4PSP, MeGUI etc will also do it. Whatever you feel comfortable with.

[jagabo]

Can PlayOn or Tversity stream AviSynth sripts? That would be the easiest way.

DirectShowSource("filename.ext")
AddBorders(32,24,32,24)

[thewhiteboy23]

I got it to re-encode just fine with borders using xvid4psp and FITCD to make the avs file. Thanks everyone for your help.