the simpsons blu ray aspect ratio makemkv issue

[wonko_insane]

Howdy whomever

i am fulfilling a promise to my younger self to one day have all simpsons episodes not more than a few clicks away and accessible at all times ,

almost there however have hit a snag with the blu ray from season 13 onwards ....using MAKEMKV to just rip as pure as possible and the problem is thus , once the disc is analysed MAKEMKV identifies all of the video streams as having an aspect ratio of 16:9 ....yet when i play the resulting .mkv files they all play in 4:3 with the black bars on the side .....and neither VLC or MPC will adjust the video to force it to be 16:9 ........YET the DVDs that i have ripped , most of them just default automatically to 16:9 upon playback ( i know its kinda not right forcing a 4:3 into 16:9 but i detest the bars on the side even more)

i know i probs should have posted to makemkv forums but for some reason it wont allow my IP address to register and cannot find a contact or any other kind of assistance in forums anywhere ....does anyone have any suggestions at all ? ...id rather not have to convert etc just rip as pure as possible but allowing playback in 16:9 ?

thanks for anyone who took the time to at least give it some thought or not ...hope todays a great one for everyone and all those you know

[hello_hello]

From what I've read here, The Simpsons was 4:3 until sometime during season 20 (2009).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Simpsons_opening_sequence#2009.E2.80.93present

That means MakeMKV would be getting it right. The original 4:3 picture would be encoded on a 16:9 frame, so that'd include black bars down each side for a total aspect ratio of 16:9 (4:3 picture plus black bars).

DVDs generally aren't encoded like that because they come in both 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios, so a 4:3 picture would be encoded at 4:3 for DVD. Still 4:3 though, and a player would have to add black bars on playback to fill a 16:9 screen.

As someone else who prefers to fill the screen, and given you mentioned MPC-HC......

Run the video in fullscreen mode. It'll have the black bars on the sides as usual. Hold down the control key while tapping "2" on the numeric keypad. That'll move the picture down. 8-10 taps on the 2 key is usually about right. Now use the "9" key on the numeric keypad to zoom in (without holding down CTRL). The "1" key zooms out, and "5" resets it if you make a mess. Tap "9" until the picture fills the screen.

The reason for moving the picture down is I find for 4:3, the centre of action is usually a little above the centre of the frame, so when you move it down you're less likely to see people's heads cut off etc, but that's for live action. Animation might be different and you won't need to move it down as much, or you mightn't be able to zoom in all the way without cutting off too much picture. How much you zoom in is up to you.