Problem with Windows Movie Maker 2012 and TCM films

[jastavoss@msn.com]

When I try to edit an SD or HD TCM film, the film does not fill the editing screen, and looks much smaller than films from all other sources. Even a poor quality 200 x 300 film from you tube fills the editing screen, and you can make the resulting edit any size that you want. An HD TCM edit always looks SD, and you can't make it larger. TCM films from more than 3-4 years ago don't create this problem, fill the editing screen, and can be edited to any size you want. TCM films are the only ones that don't work properly in Movie Maker, and this started a few years ago. Any solutions? I have tried Tivo and Firefox on TCM HD films, and they have the same small SD look in the editing screen and the resulting edit.
Thanks

[davexnet]

How did you "capture" this TCM movie?
Open the movie file in mediainfo (text view) and post the info here in the thread

[jastavoss@msn.com]

https://files.videohelp.com/u/289564/Night%20and%20the%20City-TCM-720x1280-Movie%20Maker.jpg
https://files.videohelp.com/u/289564/Night%20and%20the%20City-1950-TCM.txt

[davexnet]

It looks as if the picture has a black border all the way around. If so,
you'll need to crop this out.

The mediainfo shows Night and the City-1950-TCM-checked.mp4
How did you get/create this file?

[davexnet]

See this:
http://forums.tcm.com/topic/182951-too-many-window-box-format-movies-on-demand/

[jastavoss@msn.com]

How do I get rid of that black border? The only time I see it is when I try to edit a TCM film in Movie Maker.

[davexnet]

You have to crop it. Whether Movie Maker can do that I don't know

[johnmeyer]

Your problem is caused by TCM broadcasting an older non-widescreen movie using 4:3. If you then capture that using capture software that is set for 16:9, you will get a border all the way around.

The solution, for capturing future movies, is to change both the aspect ratio of what gets sent to the capture card, as well as the aspect ratio of your capture software. Between those two things, you should be able to get an image that is correct.

I have done quite a bit of this, and there is no single formula that will work in all cases. Years ago, I had one device that where it would output a 4:3 program in 16:9. I captured it that way, which resulted in a stretched picture, but I then set the aspect flag to 4:3.

Without describing all the permutations and combinations, what you need to do is change the settings I just described until you get a capture with no borders. Don't worry about whether it is stretched or not, and take care of that with the aspect ratio flag (your capture format will have to support that feature for this to work).

For your existing capture, you'll have to crop, as others have suggested, but this means that you wasted a LOT Of pixels encoding black, and the result will be much fuzzier than if you had done the capture correctly in the first place.

[Paultx]

For your existing capture, you'll have to crop, as others have suggested, but this means that you wasted a LOT Of pixels encoding black, and the result will be much fuzzier than if you had done the capture correctly in the first place.

Also noob here and I know nothing about the way you capture those TCM films, but never mind.
My suggestion is for the existing captures. Whenever I get some vids with these black borders and want to crop them, I use Format Factory. Hope this helps.

[jastavoss@msn.com]

Thanks!