SW Ep II

[Belli]

A newbie here, so please be patient. I did a trial single CD encode of Star Wars Ep II last night, and have the feeling the DVD I used was 4:3 format only. When it's run through a CD player it does have the "This film has been formatted to fit your screen" message.

The DVD2AVI stat window said this was 4:3, NTSC 95%, progressive, but the vts_xx_info.txt shows 16:9 letterboxed. The results were not quite satisfactory. Using Media Player or PowerDVD for viewing, the aspect ratio isn't right. It's squished horizontally or vertically depending on whether you're in widowed or full screen mode.

I also encoded the "From Puppets to Pixels" extra and that came out OK, but DVD2AVI had it pegged as 16:9. Any ideas appreciated. TIA.

[Hiro2k]

try to make 2 avi synth projects, 1 with 4:3 the other 16:9. Then view each one in your media player and decide which is the correct one.

btw there is a thread on ep2 over in the divx5 forum
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=38010

[JohnMK]

I've never known DVD2AVI to be wrong . . .

[manono]

Hi-

You didn't say which region you're in. For R1, there are both 4:3 Full Screen, and 16:9 Anamorphic Widescreen versions available. It should say which you have on the box, and perhaps on the DVD itself. Or open the .d2v in GKnot, hit View-Resized, and flip back and forth between 4:3 and 16:9 to see which looks normal. It should be very easy to tell.

And as JohnMK said, trust DVD2AVI.

When it's run through a CD player it does have the "This film has been formatted to fit your screen" message.

That pretty much proves that it's 4:3 Pan And Scam. That's on the .avi? Then you screwed up the decrypting also. Rerip the vobs using MOVIE Mode in SmartRipper, and not File Mode. But better yet, take it back and get the Widescreen version.

[Belli]

Mystery solved. The DVD my daughter got is indeed a 4:3 "pan and scam", and DVD2AVI was correct per JohnMK and manono. I coded a single and two CD version, with GK set for 4:3, disabled crop, and both came out nicely.

I also ran the VOB's through DVDx and it produced 4 high-quality MPEG2's, each sized for an 80 min CD. I'd like to put these on SVCD's. I checked the SVCD Faq but there doesn't seem to be any mention of building an SVCD if you already have the MPEG2. Any ideas appreciated. TIA.

[manono]

Hi-

I've never done it, so I'm not positive, but I think the bottom of the AVI2SVCD Guide (http://www.doom9.org/mpg/avi2svcd.htm) will show you how to create an SVCD from your MPEG2 files using TMPG and bbmpeg.

You might find the vcdimager Guide (http://www.doom9.org/mpg/vcdimager.htm) useful also.

[Hiro2k]

I just used nero to burn them into SVCD's. You just select the option for SVCD and drag the mpeg into the window. You tell it to burn and it will make you an SVCD playable on DVD players.

This always worked for me.

[TheWEF]

i recommend VCDeasy and ChapterXtractor to create a cue/bin (s)vcd-image with chapters.
mount the image with deamontools.
test with your sw-dvd-player.

then e.g. burn the virtual disk with nero using Copy CD.
svcd-authoring in nero is not recommended, nor is directly burning the cue/bin-image with fireburner or something.

if you don't have it get deamontools anyway - it's great, e.g. for gaming without having to enter the game-cd.

wef.

[Belli]

Thanks to all who posted. Some specifics:

@manono

The vcdimager Guide you pointed to had a link to CDRWin. The faq must be a bit out of date as the version I'm using (5.05) has SVCD burning automated. Just drag and drop the MPEG2 and CDRWin burns the SVCD. Works slick, and handy for a newbie.

@Hiro2k

I tried the same MPEG2 with Nero, but it reported the file was not suitable for a standard ISO format. I test-burnt it anyway and sure enough, PowerDVD would not run it but did run the CDRWin version.