Aspect Ratio Trickery-An experiment and possible challenge...

[theamzngq]

I was trying to create a DVD that had both Mission Impossible movies on it. Upon doing the re-encoding and trying to bring the m2v files into ReelDVD, I discovered that you can't have two different aspect ratio files in the same DVD: MI-1 is 4:3 and MI-2 is 16:9.

Changing the AR of either results in distortion of the picture, so I was brainstorming a way to 'trick' it...

How about this: I frameserve the vobs with vfapi to Premiere (if this can even be done at all--maybe not), use it to vertically squish the 16:9 movie, and then export it with a normal frame size with the CCE Premiere plug-in. By setting the AR flag to 4:3, it will 're-stretch'it out and look normal on playback! What do you think?

A couple of concerns come to mind:

1. Will this Premiere 'squishing' degrade the picture quality too much?

2. Is there a better way to accomplish what I am proposing? Basically, the movie needs to be vertically squished, but retain a normal frame size; that way, when played back as 4:3, it looks normal.

3. Perhaps all this can be avoided if there is a way to have two different AR movies authored into the same DVD?

Gurus, this one might be a challenge...

[auenf]

you can have two different aspect ratio movies on the one dvd, but they have to be inseparate VTS'

Enf...

[theamzngq]

Great!

Ok, I've been able to get both movies in separate VTS's, but I can't seem to figure out how to link both VTS's to a menu button. See the screenshot of the layout here. (theamazingq.com/images/scenarist screen shot.jpg)

One of the menu buttons is linked already to the 4:3 movie. Do you know how I can link the other button to the 16:9 movie in the other VTS? I'm sorry, but I can't figure it out for the life of me.

[mpucoder]

since one vts cannot reference another, you can do this in one of two ways
1) move your menu into the VMG, or
2) create a dummy PGC in VMG that jumps to vts2

[theamzngq]

That makes sense! Thank you.

Uh...now I just have to figure out how to actually do that....:confused:

I originally created the menu in ReelDVD and then exported it to a Scenarist script, which I then opened in Scenarist. I don't have any idea how to move that menu around and re-link it.

Do you think you could explain how to do it, or refer me to a link or something that might? (the manual is a bit cryptic)

In the meantime, I'm going to keep experimenting; perhaps I'll stumble on the solution.

Thanks for your help!

[lakini18]

I don't know if this will help you, but when I want to change my aspect ratio, I just use Ifoedit, and open the movie .ifo that matches the movie .ifo file I wish to change. I then open the original movie .ifo file which should also match the movie. Click on VMGM_MAT in ifoedit, and on the bottom part scroll down until the address is 200. You should see a value to the right of this, double click on that value and it will open up a little box where you have an option to change your aspect ratio and a few other things. Now all you have to do is compare both .ifo's and match them. Or change it to whatever you want. Then save it and will change the .ifo and .bup. I hope this helps and is not confusing, if you need more help let me know.