How do I crop an .avi file?

[Hrungnir]

I was just wondering, how do I do it? Is there an easy way to do it? What software would I need?

Best regards!

[setarip_old]

Hi!

For the sake of clarity (since different people mean different things when they say "crop"), please define what you mean by "cropping" an .AVI file...

[Hrungnir]

Oh yeah, sorry :-/

What I want to crop are the black bars above and beneath the video itself. They serve no purpose and only cause problems when I'm watching the movies on a 16:9 display. Especially when I've got subtitles running along with it.

Should I say I want to crop the video itself, getting rid of the black bars?

I think you get the gist of it.

[MrTroy]

First, determine what the size of the black bars is (in pixels). F.i., with a 1.78:1 letterboxed 768x576, the size of the black bars is 72 px (calculation here (http://www.google.com/search?q=%28576+-+%28%28768%2F16%29%2A9%29%29+%2F2)).

Now make an AviSynth script:
AviSource("C:\your\file.avi")
Crop(0,72,0,-72)

Open the .avs file in mediaplayer and the bars are gone.

[Hrungnir]

Thanks for the suggestion Mr Troy, but what I'm trying to achieve is getting rid of those black bars entirely because I usually play them on a DIVX certified DVD player and those black bars just get on nerves. I guess there's no harm in having them, but they're unneccessary.

What I wanted to achieve was something like is described HERE (http://nickyguides.digital-digest.com/vdub-filters.htm) But I can't use the filters with Direct Stream so I won't lose quality - I have to recompress it.

Any other suggestions, please?

[MrTroy]

Ah right, you want to crop the video without having to recompress. Well, that's simple, because it isn't possible. If you edit the video you have to recompress.

(except for operations which only involve rewriting the header, such as framerate changes)

[Hrungnir]

Haha! Oh well, I guess I'll have to accept it the way it the way it is then :-)

It was worth the shot.