Am I thick, or what?

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granfer
Posts: 77
Joined: Wed Sep 02, 2009 11:43 am

Am I thick, or what?

Post by granfer »

I have a DVD purchased from China which is of a CinemaScope film (2.35:1) intended to be shown a 4:3 screen. It therefore fills a 4:3 screen horizontally, with bars top and bottom (letterbox).

So far so good... but, if I show it on a 16:9 screen it has the same bars top and bottom PLUS black bands left and right.... so lots of wasted screen area (and it looks horrible!).

I want to EDIT it by copying to an edit program and then stretching it equally both horizontally and vertically, then making a DVD intended to be shown on a 16:9 screen.

I have Pinnacle Studio 14, Premiere Elements 12 and Cyber Power Director, apart from the obvious`WMM. I've tried doing it with Studio 14... got the correct expansion in the editing program but when I made the disc the result was the same... black all round!

Any suggestions? Should I be using something else for a program? HELP!
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Dave Watterson
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Joined: Sun Jan 28, 2007 11:11 pm
Location: Bath, England
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Re: Am I thick, or what?

Post by Dave Watterson »

PROJECTION


New screen same width ...

If you are projecting onto a forty-eight-inch wide 4:3 screen (with letterboxed image),
keep projecting and swop the screen for one which is 16:9 and also forty-eight-inch wide,
the sides of the picture would still reach the edges of the screen
but the screen would not be so high (the height would change from thirty-six inches to 27 inches)
so some of the black bands at top and bottom would overlap the top and bottom of the screen, and some would still be visible on the screen.


New screen same height...

If the 16:9 screen were the same height as the 4:3 one, (thirty-six inches high)
the width would change to sixty-four inches, but your projected image is still just forty-eight inches.
The black bands top and bottom would appear the same
and you would see eight-inch wide black bands left and right.

If the problem is the second case, just zoom your projector so that the picture fills the width of the screen.

TELEVISION

The same applies if you physically change tv screens.

So I guess you mean that you are changing a setting on the television from 4:3 to 16:9.
If it is for your own viewing that's no problem, just switch back to 4:3.

If you want to take it to people whose televisions are only 16:9 aspect ratio ... then we get into deeper water.

The pixels which make up the picture are different in shape for 16:9 images than for 4:3 images.
Your disc has pixels designed for 4:3.
You need a program which can tell the various DVD players to treat the film as if its pixels were the wide screen type.

On Pinnacle Studio 14 you find commands on the Album menu, which let you set the ratio. These commands also appear on the right-button context menu for video in the Album. What they do is stretch the original frames to the new frame size.

The width will then fill the width of the tv screen. BUT the people will seem short and dumpy. So you need to adjust the height of the image in the editor to make them look right. I do not know if that can be done in Studio 14.

There should still be thin bars top and bottom because your picture is 2.35:1 and not 1.777:1

Phew!
granfer
Posts: 77
Joined: Wed Sep 02, 2009 11:43 am

Re: Am I thick, or what?

Post by granfer »

Thanks, Dave.... it's the "deeper water" scenario!

I'll try your suggestions in Pinnacle 14 in Album and experiment from there. But I MUST remember to use RW discs!
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