16:9 letterboxed

[bairradino]

Starting from a video captured by a Sony camera in 16:9 format, I'm not able to author a DVD that can be played in both 16:9 and 4:3 television sets.
In 16:9 television set everything is ok. When played in a 4:3 television set the image becomes streched up.
Any help?

[markrb]

If you are doing DVD sounds like the DAR is set to 4:3.
If you are encoding in CCE make sure that it's set to 16:9.

Mark

[bairradino]

I encoded with DAR set to 16:9. However the image stretched up in 4:3 format.
Even when I started to make some SVCD's I had the same problem. The only solution I got was editing the .avi files in Premiere with the project settings to 4:3 and streched them vertically by 75%.
This solution has two major problems: Time consuming and quality degrading.
Any help will be apprecciated.

[willie1]

I've had the same problem. The only solution I've found so far is to encode the file using TMPGenc with the bars in a 4:3 aspect ratio. This is not a perfect solution as many pixels are now taken up by the bars rather than using all for the picture in a true 16:9 movie. I tried sonic, spruce up and ulead and none will display the 16:9 correctly on a 4:3 TV.

[bairradino]

Here's how I'm working now:
1 - I edit my captured PAL DV video (in 16:9 anamorphic format)in Premiere
2 - When all edits are made I export the project to a final .avi file.
3 - I encode that .avi file with CCE using the Letterbox hint ticked.
4 - I use DVD Maestro for authoring allways with films selected for "16:9 letterbox".

That's all. Of course you must have your standalone DVD player configured according to the format of your television set. The DVD player do the rest of the job, wich means that if your configuration is 4:3 it adds one top and one bottom bar.
Another trick is made on Premiere. Choose a 4:3 project, import your video into the Timeline and transform the high of your video to 75%.
It will take some time but at the final you will get a video with a 4:3 pixel aspect ratio and with black bars when played on a 4:3 television set.
In authoring you must selet, instead, the format 4:3 for your videos.
The first process takes you less time and a better quality.

bairradino