Clever Anamorphic Encoding

[bullet_ballet]

I'm encoding my DVDs via megui and ran across this option. I searched for answers here and on google and thought I understood what it did. But I ran a test on some clips and think I confused myself somewhere.

I took some 1.85 content from a DVD and encoded a clip with and without the option. I figured that the encode with CAE would auto-stretch the displayed video, while the video without CAE would display at 720x480. In playing both files in VLC, both display at 1.85:1. In playing both in MPC, both display at 1.5:1 720x480. Am I confused or are things just as they should be?

On a related note, would it be wise to use this option for ripping 4:3 movies so they play at 640x480, or should I just resize them?

[bullet_ballet]

I found out that MPC had a problem with resizing anamorphic movies so long as I was using the EVR renderer. When using VMR9 renderless, it has the same behavior as VLC, ie, it scales the clip to widescreen whether or not I enable CAE. So the option still confounds me. Doesn't help that the help wiki is down.

[nurbs]

Well, it should only resize correctly when CAE is enabled. If you enable it megui passes the correct sar on to the encoder. For me it works like that.
You could try to do the whole precedure (create AVS, encode, play) on one file with CAE, then close megui and do it again without CAE to see if you found some weird megui bug.

[bullet_ballet]

Thanks for the response. I tried that and the CAE and non CAE encodes kept both resizing correctly which kept confusing me. I touched no options other than those. Odd, but I just accept it since I know how it should work now.

[chet79]

I am lost as to what CAE actually does. I've googled it and searched on here, and I am none the wiser. I am very new to MeGui and am struggling to understand a lot of it. Would love some help understanding it please :)

[saint-francis]

I am lost as to what CAE actually does. I've googled it and searched on here, and I am none the wiser. I am very new to MeGui and am struggling to understand a lot of it. Would love some help understanding it please :)

Here is the answer:

If you enable it megui passes the correct sar on to the encoder.

What this means is that if the source is anamorphic you don't need to resize, just crop and the proper aspect ratio will be set by x264 or xvid. The encoded information is stretched out but it is displayed properly upon playback. This will make a larger file because it's using more pixels to create roughly the same image as resizing does. But it will undoubtedly give a better picture for the same reason.

[Sharktooth]

it will be require more bitrate assuming a 720*xxx non anamorphic resizing...
for pal video the correct res would be 1025*576 or 1050x576 (damn ITU)... in thus case the anamorphic encode will require less bits...