Problem: 16:9 movie is recognized as 4:3

[alexVS]

I have a m2v video file (PAL, 720:576), and every frame of this movie is a full frame. I mean a picture is stretched vertically to fill all 720x576 pixels. But really this film is anamorphic, it's a 16:9 movie.

I've demuxed this video from DVD, and that DVD played correctly on standalone DVD and software DVD players (PowerDVD and WinDVD). (I use vStrip for demux). Now I can't compile it back correctly.

This m2v video file is recognized by every DVD-software as plain (non-anamorfic) video 4:3. By software I mean PowerDVD, WinDVD, Windows Media Player, and DVD-authoring programs, such as DVD-lab or ReelDVD. I can not make DVDLab or ReelDVD to recognize this video as 16:9. Of cause they produces incorrect DVD (stretched vertically in full screen)

May be information for DVD player about picture size (16:9 or 4:3) must be not in IFO, but right in M2V. I really don't know.

Could anybody help me with advice how to create 16:9 movie? Where in DVDLab or ReelDVD should I set movie property to 16:9. Or maybe I can somehow change information in m2v video file pointing that this film is 16:9? And I don't want to loose quality by reencoding video.

Thanks in advance for your help!
Alex.

[Matthew]

You can losslessly change the aspect ratio of the m2v using restream (or another app) if you like :)

It's also possible to change the aspect ratio in the ifo from 4:3 to 16:9 post-authoring, using IfoEdit.