Widescreen/Letterboxed Sub placement

[kitchy]

Hi!
I've got a problem with my scenarist project.
I have suceccfully reauthored/reencoded the menus, and have now added the video and sound and subs for main movie. But there's one problem that arises when I have compiled the thing. My TV is a widescreen tv, so if I set the dvd player to widescreen, it plays perfect. When I set the player to 4:3, the image is still wide (doesn't add black bars on top and bottom), but the subtitles is shown below display area.
When I played the original on my player set to 4:3, it added black bars and my TV switched to 4:3 mode.
What can this be? have I don't something wrong when I encoded (used DAR 16x9 and all other settings should be correct). The only thing I can thing of is that the menus are 4:3 Pan & Scan, and due to that, I had to create a 4:3 pal project in Scenarist (or should I just use widescreen instead?). But does that mean I should author the main movie (since it's widescreen) in another project?
I have clicked both L and W in the track editor of the subs of the main menu. Can someone enlighten me plz..

Kitchy

[dan]

First off, you can have those 4:3 pan and scan menus in your 16:9 project [though projects aren't defined by aspect ratios, only VTS's]. The language domain [folder, in Scenarist] can have that 4:3 menu, while another title [within that same titleset] has the 16:9 video. This lets the linking between the menus and movie go smoothly.

The rest, well, it sounds confusing. My first guess...did you make subpicture track for both Wide and Letterbox display modes? In a similar thread, I gave the sizes/re-sizing for making the letterbox subpictures [Well, those values could be the problem, being that I'm not used to PAL]. This means that there should be 2 subpicture tracks for every menu. One for each display mode [wide and letterbox...not pan and scan in this case]. I'd assume you've done this though, and being that the the subs show up too low on the screen when in letterbox mode, it sounds like the letterbox subs are either not there, or misidentified. With those two subpicture streams, there should be only one display mode for each, either "W" or "L". [As in, the subpictures that match up in Wide mode, should only have the "W" selected, not the "L".]

This might help a lot to know exactly what you're dealing with...open up the IFO file from the original source that corresponds with the menu [probably vts_*_0.ifo] in IfoEdit or whatever IFO program you prefer, and check to see what it reports the Menu aspect and display mode to be. [If it says 16:9 pan-scan, that's the same as 4:3 pan-scan.] From what you described, it'll probably say "16:9 Letterboxed".

Also, the source probably has subpictures for each display mode. Use SubRip to pull these out of the VOB. Then, you can import the bitmaps into Scenarist.

Another check for the display mode would be to demux one of the VOB IDs corresponding to the menu then load that m2v [if it's a video instead of a still] into Scenarist. If Scenarist reports it as 16:9, it uses both the wide and letterbox subpictures. If it calls is 4:3 Pan and Scan, it uses both wide and pan and scan subpictures.

Sorry for getting repetitive there, but those methods at the end would help to figure out why the display modes aren't matching up.

Oh yeah, did you incorporate an SPRM check in the Scenario to set which subpicture stream to use according to the aspect ratio of the player?

Thanks,
Dan

[kitchy]

Can you enlighten me as to where I should put this SPRM check? I know which it is, and also how the command line should look like (an example?). Should I place it in the pre of the first PGC?

Kitchy

[dan]

duh, I looked back to a project I did a little bit ago....

The player automatically displays the correct subpicture track depending on the setting of aspect ratio and display mode the player. No SPRM check or anything...

IF you wanted both letterbox AND pan and scan display modes, then you'd need an SPRM check to direct the navigation to the correct pgc [etc.] that contains the particular track for the intended display mode. [As the letterbox mode needs a 16:9 video and the pan and scan mode needs a 4:3 PanScan stream. Obviously, these can't both be in the same track.]

Sorry about that,
Dan

[robz]

If you haven't solved this yet... and on the off chance of sounding stupid...

It sound to me like it is your TV that is set to a display mode that expands 4:3 to 16:9? (so even though you DVD player is set to 4:3 your TV would still try to fill the entire screen)

This would also explain the absence of black bars since the TV will crop those off at certain display modes... including the subs.\

Just a thought...

[kitchy]

Well, I haven't actually figured it out yet, but I've thought about it for a while, and has seen that it won't be a problem, cause this problem only occurs on DVD players set to 4:3 when used on a widescreen tv, and people don't do that (general public).
As for the problem, you're saying that it's my tv that screws it up. Well, it might, but with the same settings on my tv/dvd player on the original movie, my tv doesn't go into wide mode (when dvd player is set to 4:3), it simply adds black bars on top and bottom and tv adds black bars on each sides of the screen (not a very good solution, but just to test). On my reauthored thing (reauthored menu), when dvd player is set to 4:3, my tv goes into wide mode (as if it's getting a anamorphic widescreen signal, and it shouldn't receive that since it's actually being letterboxed by the player), but on further inspection, I can see that the picture is actually zoomed, and not real wide mode, this makes the subtitles go below screen area. When I use manual settings and set my tv to 4:3 manually, the subs and black bars are fine and dandy. The problem seems to be that my tv needs a signal to know that it's a letterboxed signal it's getting, and not a anamorphic 16x9.
How I do this in scenarist I don't know, but if you got any other ideas, let me know.

Kitchy

[robz]

The zoom thing is indeed what I meant.

I don't know if it is possible to send such a signal by doing something in Scenarist. (if indeed it is an extra(?) signal and not just the input your tv analyses)

You're probably right in thinking the problem will not affect "the general public"("them").

By the way... I think you should actually do a 16:9 DVD and make the menu's so they will fit both 4:3 and 16:9. I believe there is a guide about that somewhere... or a thread...

[kitchy]

I thought I was doing that by using pan & scan videos...

Kitchy

[robz]

I thought you said you had to create a "4:3 project"?
There is a choice when you create a new project with the Project Wizard (step 4 encoding parameters) where you can choose 16:9 DVD Project.
Although that probably just sets the defaults... So if you set everything in your tracks etc. to 16:9 in your current project it should be working also I guess...

[dan]

Just curious...do you have a correct subpicture stream for the letterbox display mode in Scenarist? "Correct" meaning that it isn't the Pan and Scan or wide subs with the letterbox button selected. Sorry if that sounds like a "duh, I did that already" comment, but it doesn't look like it's come up. If need be, if you want the letterbox display mode, you can set the track corresponding to the menu to be "Both Pan and Scan and Letterbox". Now, you can use the 4:3 Pan and Scan menus in both display modes [as the option would have you believe]. Again, sorry if this sounds obvious, but there's a chance it might end up being helpful [maybe for someone else reading the thread]. Anyway, remember you can use the Scenarist Simulator, and if everything lines up there, you should be good to go. This may be a wild guess, but is there any chance the Letterbox subs don't line up in the letterbox display mode in the simulator?

Yep...setting 4:3 in the new project wizard only sets default values for objects that aren't already defined [as in, an mpeg2 stream which has headers defining the display settings of the video isn't affected by the default value thing, but a still image would be because that information doesn't exist for a still.]

I don't own a widescreen TV, so you guys would know better than I, but if the DVD is authored correctly, and the player is set in a 4:3 mode [LB or PS] the subs should resize with the video when the TV detects a 4:3 signal and stretches it to 16:9 [not the 16:9 resize that the DVD player does internally. Again, sorry if you've already tried this, but see if your letterbox subs line up in the Simulator.

Thanks,
Dan

[robz]

The Scenarist simulator is not 100% proof it will work anyway outside that simulator :) at least where subtitles are concerned.

My experience tells me... (sim of 720x576 subs on 352x288 video is fine but PowerDVD can't handle that... so it is not always guaranteed it works if the simulation is ok...

By the way... both W and L must be on (in 16:9 track) for the subs to work right in 4:3... right? not p&s

[dan]

Yeah, when using a 16:9 video [not 4:3 PanScan], you must have subs selected for each aspect ratio [letterbox and wide]. If you don't have either selected, Scenarist will give you an error about needing to have "at least one wide and letterbox setting". For subtitles [here meaning words on screen for reading as the movie plays], you can usually get away with using the same stream for the wide viewing mode and the letterbox mode, as placement generally isn't as important for subtitles as it would be in a menu, where you'd have a completely different stream for each viewing mode.

Not to start an argument or attempt to validate myself, but, for what it's worth, when using "full" resolution video [as in 720 x 480 or 576], and disregarding the fact that the preview's aspect ratio isn't correct [around 2:1 for NTSC and 1.6:1 for PAL, when it should be 1.77:1....but it's ok because everything is displayed at that ratio...even the subpictures] when in wide or letterbox modes, the Scenarist preview is quite close to the result seen on a set-top. The only reason I said all of this is because for more common [at least "Hollywood" DVDs], the resolutions are the "full" 720 x 480/576 and the Scenarist preview is accurate enough. But, like robz said [and I just learned], when using less common [but still supported] resolutions, your mileage may vary, so be sure to test with RW's before making a disc that "sort of" works, which is, in my opinion, more annoying than an outright coaster.

Anyway...

Thanks,
Dan

see, we (I) learn something everyday