aspect ratio borders question

[BlazeItUp]

I've been making backups of dvd's to svcd's and playing them on my laptop sometimes. The problem is that with the settings set to 16:9 (borders added encoded as 4:3)the video on my screen uses only 1/2 the screen. I was wondering if there was a way to make it so that the video will take up the whole screen without the egghead effect like the paning option that dvd's have.

[manono]

Hi and welcome to the forum-

Unless there's a Full Screen Pan And Scan version of the same movie available, then the answer is no. About all you can do is crop off the left and right in order to create a full screen SVCD. But it won't be Pan And Scan, and when there's action happening away from the very center, then you won't see it, or it'll be partly cut off.

Those 2.35:1 movies look too small on the laptop, do they? :)

[BlazeItUp]

Hey. I got a little lost in what you were saying. So to clear things up did you mean that the DVD would have to be made for full screen and not the "wide screen version" like it says on the back of the DVD cover. I got the movie Hackers and its widescreen format but the pan and scan option gives 2.35:1 and 1.85:1. I'm guessing all DVD's have this option. So if I'm understanding you right then any DVD that says "screen format widescreen version" will and can only be encoded in svcd with the big black borders and cannot be stretched out unless you want to loose some image on the sides or stretch it out the top and have a distorted image? I was also wondering why you can't use the pan&scan option on svcd's when using power dvd? Thanks. Great forum for info BTW.

[manono]

Hi-

My understanding is that the DVD specs allow a widescreen movie to be blown up full screen and panned and scanned through the DVD player, but that no one does it. There's quite a bit of information on that in Section 3.5 of DVD Demystified (http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html#3.5), particularly the paragraph beginning For automatic pan & scan mode.... I just checked out the Pan And Scan option of Power DVD, but as near as I can tell, all it does is crop off the sides, focus on the center of the picture, with no true panning and scanning going on (but I don't have Hackers to check). But I could be wrong, and maybe others know more about it.

So if I'm understanding you right then any DVD that says "screen format widescreen version" will and can only be encoded in svcd with the big black borders...

That's my understanding, unless you're prepared to hack off the sides like I just saw Power DVD doing. So, yes, that's what I'm saying.

I was also wondering why you can't use the pan&scan option on svcd's when using power dvd?

Dunno. :) My guess is that the information needed to do that isn't encoded into the SVCDs.

[BlazeItUp]

Great, thanks for clearing that up. I understand now that all these moveis are just meant to be watched with black borders on bottom and top so that you can see everything on the sides. I checked out my dvd again with power dvd and yes, pan&scan cropped off my sides but alowed me to fill up the screen. (which is useless because all these dvd's were meant to be watched as 16:9 so you will end up focussing on the center and losing information on the sides). Thanks for the info.