How to convert 4:3 Letterbox to true 16:9?

[soxguy80]

I hope this is the right spot for this question.

I have recorded alot of HD Programs using my DVD recorder but the problem is my DVD recorder records them in 4:3 aspect ratio, all of the picture is there but it is letterboxed. (Black bars on top and bottom of picture) Are there any programs out there where I can take that 4:3 letterboxed picture and convert it to true 16:9 aspect ratio. (eliminating the black bars on the top and bottom) Preferably a free program.

Thanks in advance

[soxguy80]

Basically I wanna go

from this



to this

[Aurora]

You'll need to re-encode the entire video after cropping it, and then write it to DVD in widescreen. A fairly advanced video editing program will be able to do this, such as Adobe Premiere Elements. I don't think Windows Movie Maker can do cropping, as it's pretty limited in its video editing abilities. I don't know of any free video editing software--something like GIMP for video instead would be needed--so you might be out of luck there. Maybe one of the open source junkies here knows of one.

Cropping and re-encoding the video will take quite a while, especially if your PC isn't new and fast. You also have the problem of getting the video off of the DVD recorder onto your PC. You can rip the DVD and try from there, but directly editing the .vob files from the disc might not go so well unless you have advanced software (like the full version of Premiere). Does your DVD recorder allow you to write to disc as .mpg, or can you only author DVD Video discs? If you can only author DVD video discs, what you want to do becomes a whole lot more difficult. I think you should be able to find a program that will convert the raw DVD .vob files into something you can work with for free, but this does add more steps to the process.

Basically, what you want to do is simple in theory, yet fairly involved in practice. Most things involving video editing are. If you don't know much about video editing and have never done it, you might find the task fairly daunting, since you do need to know a decent amount about compression codecs and whatnot to make sure that you don't lose tons of quality in this process. (PS: You'll want to use a lossless codec like HuffYUV as your intermediate container, if you can. You'll need tons of space. Uncompressed DVD video at 30 fps progressive and 8-bit sampling takes up about 100GB per hour. Lossless can reduce this by about 2-4x, so you'll still need tons of space to do this, if you want to maintain as much quality as you can.)

Honestly, you're probably better off investing in a DVD player that allows for zooming of letterboxed titles if you have a lot of this content you want to play. You'll spend at least that much for the software, and a whole lot of time encoding and re-encoding video. I'd look at some of the Panasonic players, as the BD30 Blu-ray player does the zoom exactly as you want it to, so I'd imagine that they must have a DVD player that does it as well.

If you know someone who has a Mac, whatever video editing software comes on that might be able to do what you want, once you can get the video onto the PC in a usable format.

[soxguy80]

Thanks for your input. Your right about being simple in theory but in actuality being complicated. My cousin has a Mac which is supposed to have that really good video editing program so I'll have to see what that has to offer. For players I use the PS3 and Xbox 360, I also have an HD-A2 somewhere around here. The recorder I use is a Toshiba, I also use a Polaroid DVD recorder but they only record as .vob . I really don't have a problem with zooming in as I can playback the DVD on the recorder and zoom in with my TV. I just want it to be true anamorphic widescreen. I'll look into this Premier program and see what that has to offer as well.

Thanks for your input hopefully others on here have experienced this and know a workaround.

[Chickengas]

Procoder 3 is very easy to use...I have another program that seems to work good to, I dont remember if its free or not. Its called Allok Video joiner. I think their is a free DL of that. It may not be the best, but its VERY easy to use.

[soxguy80]

I tried Procoder 3 and it works very well!!! It did exactly what I wanted. I just had a minor problem with it. When I burned the finished project to a disc and watched it I noticed that the sound would go out for a split second about every minute or so. It got kinda annoying after awhile. I guess I need to tweak with the audio settings when I make my next video but as far as the video editing goes it is top notch. No real notice in picture quality loss.

Thanks again for the suggestion Chickengas!!

[Chickengas]

No problem! I've never had an audio issue, might be something with your computer when you encoded it. Memory shortage, something running in the background, fragmented disc etc. Depending on how long it took to encode, you might want to try it again to see if it is something with file, or simply a bad encode. Also, you should test play the .vob file on your computer to see if possibly the burn went bad. Maybe your had issues with your burners set-up.

Next try DVD LAB PRO 2. Make menus, chapters, etc. Author your own DVD. I make a DVD with 3 different sound tracks on it, trailers, background music on the menu etc. Never even read the manual. It's great stuff.

Congrats on your success.

[Revolutionary]

Great thread here. I do the same as you Soxguy and maybe even use the same model Toshiba recorder. Only difference I get is a finished dvd that is not letterboxed but squeezed 4:3 of a 16:9 widescreen film.

When I play the dvd back on the Toshiba recorder it plays back perfectly in widescreen. But on any other player, it plays back in standard 1.33:1 with squeezed pic. I'm content with that for myself, but I make copies for family and friends and they get the same squeezed full frame pic.

I'd prefer to re-encode but the only programs I have are DVDFab and Nero. I remember a few years ago I was using separate programs to do this with .avi or mpeg files but the process was very lengthy and results weren't all that good. Audio sync problems were common.

So, I'd be interested in programs that might be able to do this work. The machine I use is an older one ... a top machine when it was new but by today's standards it would be considered average. It has 2 gigs of ram and a P4 processor.

Any advise will be appreciated.

[Chickengas]

try Allok video joiner. I'm not sure if it will completely do the trick for you, but it can convert formats and letterbox for you. It's pretty cheap...I think theres a demo available too.

Don't be fooled by the name, it does more than join. I occasionally use it to convert formats.