Help with video and FitCD

[C0BRA]

Hi forum,

I just made my account and I've also kinda just started dabbling in this stuff. Basically what I'm trying to do is take a PAL dvd video that is 720x576 with a ratio of 1.25 and is anamorphic widescreen 16:9 and convert it to NTSC 720x480, 16:9, anamorphic widescreen. Now, I've got the audio part done. FitCD though, I'm not understanding. No matter what I do, parts of the video get cut off, usually the top and bottom. I'm not sure what the right settings are that I'm supposed to be using, but what I've been doing so far, even leaving some things as default, just isn't working. Is there anything that can be done? I don't want to lose any video information. I usually do playback in VLC, which is where I'm seeing the cutting-off happening.

I'm using a combination of FitCD and HCenc.

[aedipuss]

if you are only doing this to watch on your computer with vlc don't bother converting. all you'll do is re-encode and lose quality. turn it into a file. iso, the dvd folders, or mpg, and leave it as pal. vlc with play it just fine.

[C0BRA]

if you are only doing this to watch on your computer with vlc don't bother converting. all you'll do is re-encode and lose quality. turn it into a file. iso, the dvd folders, or mpg, and leave it as pal. vlc with play it just fine.

I'm doing it to add it to my iTunes, and I wanted to convert the PAL to NTSC. I have to slow down the original PAL video to 23.967 fps, which is part of what this process is doing. Unfortunately, it's always cropping the top and bottom of the video. As for quality loss, I can't even tell any difference between what HCenc is spitting out vs. the original PAL video, except the framerate and length are different, and that the video keeps getting cut at the top and bottom.

[manono]

Just do a straight resize to 720x480, no cropping or resizing other than the height. I'm assuming the source content is progressive. If it isn't, you'll have to perform an interlace-aware resize. If you don't know, provide a short ten-second sample.

LanczosResize(720,480)###or whatever resizer you like

Slow to 23.976fps, slow the audio, encode in HCEnc and apply the 3:2 pulldown, author in Muxman. Or don't apply pulldown and make an MPG with Imago.

[C0BRA]

Just do a straight resize to 720x480, no cropping or resizing other than the height. I'm assuming the source content is progressive. If it isn't, you'll have to perform an interlace-aware resize. If you don't know, provide a short ten-second sample.

LanczosResize(720,480)###or whatever resizer you like

Slow to 23.976fps, slow the audio, encode in HCEnc and apply the 3:2 pulldown, author in Muxman. Or don't apply pulldown and make an MPG with Imago.

Thank you, I'll try that. What about the AddBorders variable? It's at (8,56,8,56) right now. The video is progressive, by the way. Also, dumb question, but do I add those # after the parentheses too or did you do that to separate "whatever resizer you like"? Just want to be sure, because this takes a little while to encode.

[C0BRA]

Just do a straight resize to 720x480, no cropping or resizing other than the height. I'm assuming the source content is progressive. If it isn't, you'll have to perform an interlace-aware resize. If you don't know, provide a short ten-second sample.

LanczosResize(720,480)###or whatever resizer you like

Slow to 23.976fps, slow the audio, encode in HCEnc and apply the 3:2 pulldown, author in Muxman. Or don't apply pulldown and make an MPG with Imago.

I did everything you said and everything is perfect except that when I try to add the file to iTunes, it says that iTunes is not responding and it leads to iTunes closing itself. What do I do now?

[hech54]

What does PAL or NTSC have to do with iTunes?

[manono]

What about the AddBorders variable?

No AddBorders. Make sure you encode as 16:9 in HCenc. Those maybe are for 4:3 encoding.

Also, dumb question, but do I add those # after the parentheses too or did you do that to separate...

The '#' just tells AviSynth to ignore everything after the crosshatch. Without them the script wouldn't open.

...except that when I try to add the file to iTunes, it says that iTunes is not responding and it leads to iTunes closing itself. What do I do now?

Never used it (and never will). What did you make from your encode? A DVD, an MPG? Does iTunes accept those? If not maybe you're supposed to make something else.

[C0BRA]

What about the AddBorders variable?

No AddBorders. Make sure you encode as 16:9 in HCenc. Those maybe are for 4:3 encoding.

Also, dumb question, but do I add those # after the parentheses too or did you do that to separate...

The '#' just tells AviSynth to ignore everything after the crosshatch. Without them the script wouldn't open.

...except that when I try to add the file to iTunes, it says that iTunes is not responding and it leads to iTunes closing itself. What do I do now?

Never used it (and never will). What did you make from your encode? A DVD, an MPG? Does iTunes accept those? If not maybe you're supposed to make something else.

Thank you for your help and information. I got impatient and decided that AddBorders wasn't necessary on my own, and surprisingly, I didn't use the #'s, but HCenc still accepted the script and it worked like a charm. I also figured out the iTunes problem, apparently it doesn't like videos/movies with really high bitrates (this videos was over 5,000kbps). So what I did was mux it to an MKV, ran it through Handbrake with the best, almost lossless encoding settings to make it an MP4, and then it worked right with iTunes. It also reduced the file size from almost 4GB to around 1.5GB and the quality loss I can't see at all. Everything looks perfect to me. Thank you so much!

[manono]

I also figured out the iTunes problem, apparently it doesn't like videos/movies with really high bitrates (this videos was over 5,000kbps). ... Thank you so much!

You're welcome. For future reference, if the problem really was the too-high bitrate of the video produced by HCEnc, next time just lower the bitrate. That way you save time from not having to do the extra step. Or, if you want an MP4 eventually anyway, just open the same script in an encoder that accepts AviSynth input (not Handbrake or Vidcoder) and encode from there. I use RipBot264 to make MP4s from AviSynth scripts.