Resizing in TMPGEnc

[kevinm]

I wasn't sure if this was the correct forum as it touches on encoding and also authoring, anyway let me explain ..


I have some PAL Hi-8 camcorder footage which I have captured at 720x576 using iuVCR.

I am using DGPulldown to flag to 29.97fps and later I author to 720x480 NTSC DVD.


I have seen guides that tell me I need to resize to 720x480 resolution before I author my NTSC DVD, but I presently I am unable to use my favourite program (AVISynth) to do the resizing (it's a long story).

Anyway, I have been experimenting with resizing in TMPGEnc and discovered by accident that my NTSC DVD standalone player can play a DVD with the following characteristics:


Resolution: 720x576
Aspect ratio: 4:3


In fact, when viewed on my TV I see more of the original picture that if I were to use TMPGEnc and get it to resize to 720x480 with aspect ratio set to 4:3

In TMPGEnc, when set the output size to 720x480, 4.3 aspect ratio it appears to be cropping, not resizing. I have read many guides about resizing in TMPGEnc and I am pretty sure I have the right settings but still it appears to be cropping the image. Although I set the aspect ratio to 4:3 for both source and output in TMPGEnc, it still seems to be cropping the image, or with some settings it actually gives me black bars on the left and right.

Anyway, as I am unable to use AVISynth to do the resizing (bicubic/bilinear) I wonder what are the consequences of creating this NTSC DVD with a resolution of 720x576, presumably this is not 'compliant', and as such might not play in all NTSC DVD standalone players?

It is tempting to go with what I have got, the quality should be better if I avoid the resizing but I am worried I might be creating non-standard DVDs which I wont be able to play later in some different player,


any advice would be appreciated,

thanks,

Kevin

[Kika]

A couple of NTSC-Players are able to do a PAL->NTSC-Conversion o the fly, but that's not realy good.

If your Picture is cropped after resizing in TMPGEnc, your settings are wrong.
Use this:

Setting -> Advanced -> Video arrange methode -> Center (custome size) -> 720x480
Settings -> Video -> Size -> 720x480

That's it...

[Paulcat]

I use Settings; Advanced; Video Arrange Method; Full Screen, Keep Aspect Ratio and have had no problems.

I generally use TMPGEnc first, and then DGPulldown, and MuxMan to author the final results to DVD. I know the standard NTSC DVD template in TMPGEnc sets your DVD to 4:3, you can right-click and unlock the option to set it to 16:9 (I could never get 2.21:1 to work!) to make a 16:9 DVD.

[kevinm]

Paulcat & Kika, thanks for your suggestions.

I used preview in TMPGEnc and went through all the settings and ended up with Full Screen, keep aspect ratio however I still had black lines at the sides.

Then I looked back at the original footage and realized that by capturing at 720x576 my capture card must have been over scanning and the black lines at the sides and the 'noise' at the bottom (sorry, I forget the right terminology) are in the original.

So I set the clip option in the advanced settings, double clicked on it and found a really useful preview type window where I could play about with the clip frame settings. I clipped the black areas at the two sides and the noisy area at the bottom, but did so in a way that the original aspect ratio was preserved. The clip/crop setting with the Full Screen, keep aspect ratio setting this gives me exactly what I want,

Kevin

[Kika]

And as a result now you have a video with a slightly distorted AR...

But your a lucky guy, your capture card if one of those which are able to capture at a correct AR. So always use 704x576, not 720x576. And don't use Full screen as positioning methode because it does unnecessary resizings.

... guess we should get back those old guides from around 2000/2001...

[kevinm]

Kika,

for the size settings for the output, if I capture instead at 704 x 480, should I use 704 x 480 for the output setting ?

Or should I set it to Full-D1, i.e. 720 x 480 ?

My guess is that if I capture at 704 x 576 then I should set the TMPGEnc output to be 704 x 480

what do you think?

Kevin

[Kika]

Both is OK, but i prefer to capture at 704x576, resize to 704x480 and letterbox to 720x480. To do this, you must use the Center and not the Full screen options in TMPGEnc. And you have to do the correct calculations if you ar cropping on top or bottom auf the Video.
Full screen is not the right choice in this case, because it resizes the cropped Video to Full screen and distort the AR.

[Paulcat]

If your source is set to an AR of 4:3 and your destination AR is the same, you should get what you need. You can select the DVD NTSC template but if you want to use DGPulldown to get the required framerate (I recommend this way of doing it) rather than TMPGEnc's frame repetition, you may have to alter the template and some of your settings:

Under SETTING,VIDEO,FRAMERATE set the framerate to the framerate of your source material (right-click to unlock)
Under SETTING,VIDEO,ENCODE MODE set to non-interlaced
Under SETTING,ADVANCED,SOURCE ASPECT RATIO to 4:3 (whichever is most appropriate to your source material, 4:3 Display if you are unsure)
(NOTE: sometimes this value resets back to 1:1 on it's own, check just before you press START!)
Under SETTING,ADVANCED,VIDEO ARRANGE METHOD, select Full Screen, Keep Aspect Ratio

In the main window (bottom right) select ES (video only), this will produce an m2v video only progressive stream that DGPulldown can re-flag.

[kevinm]

Paulcat,
thanks for the info, as it turns out it is exactly the settings I tried last and seemed to work for me.

Yes, I spotted TMPGEnc switching back to 1:1, it is a little annoying.

Recently I have been battling to use AVISynth to frame serve to TMPGEnc, however there is a problem with DirectShowSource that causes my audio to go out of sync. For now the only flow that works is the TMPGEnc-only one.

Kevin

[Paulcat]

AVISynth can do many, many things to your video, however, I have never had the need so far to use it and TMPGEnc together. Maybe if I had a better television I'd see the need!