Anamorphic and Interlaced MP4 ... too early

[symonjfox]

Hi, I have just bought a DVB card to capture stuff from Satellite. I noted that there are MANY channels that broadcast in particular resolutions such as 352*576 (also CVD res)and 5xx*576.

Now I tried a little test, using these settings. I made 2 files:

Original: MPEG 2 352*756 Interlaced

1 DivX 5.04 beta, Bframes, Interlaced flag, nothing else.

2 Xvid Koepi 22032003, Bframes, nothing else (I searched for interlaced option but it has been removed since in older versions it creates NON-Standard streams).

Then I tried to play them back. Now, if I leave all settings, the film is played 1:1; if I use FFDshow I can change it to 4:3 and it works with both files.

Then I tried to convert the Interlaced DIVX into MPEG 4 container. The conversion is ok, I start the MP4 file and ... it doesn't go. I see a green screen with some blocks that change color.

So am I sure that if I create an anamorphic and interlaced MPEG 4 file, will be played later or not?
I heard about interlacing problem in Xvid, and the anamorphic flag in MPEG 4 but I think it isn't implemented yet.

Does anybody know something? Thanks :p

[Neo Neko]

The interlace option is there in all of Koepi's builds any more. It was in the last one. And IIRC the problem with the non-ISO interlaced streams has been taken care of and does not happen any more.

The only encoder I know can embed video aspect and play it back unaided is mencoder and mplayer.

It will happen in time and I am all for it. But we will just have to wait. I started a poll on this and we had some interesting discussion but everyone quit responding IIRC. The best I got out of it was that somehow directshow and filters based on it are unable to read the aspect ratio flag and then correct for it. No one would say why. And I can't understand why myself. :(

[symonjfox]

Originally posted by Neo Neko
And I can't understand why myself. :(

Me too ... It's for that I wrote this post. MPEG 2 supports these settings very well, I ask me why doesn't MPEG 4 (I know that REAL MPEG 4, not Avi divx, support both anamorphic and interlaced flags).

My goal is to keep the best resolution as possible with my captures. For example I capture 352x576 interlaced MPEG2 file, I'd like to encode it as 352x576 interlaced MPEG 4, not 352x288 or deinterlaced 352x576.

PS: when I talk about MPEG 4 in this fourm, I want to say the REAL MP4 format, not Xvid in Avi container or others.