Cropping errors in DVD authoring.

November 13, 2005 4:36 PM

Creating my own DVDs vrom AVIs. Everything seems fine, but then...

Ok, here's the situation. I am burning ~25 minute long AVI files of an anime from DVD (data type) to DVD (standard video type) for a friend who got the episodes somehow but whose computer doesn't support DVDs (It's an old ThinkPad) and therefore needs to watch them on his tv.

At first glance, things work fine. The discs play on both PC and TV. However, when playing on TV the image gets cropped around all 4 edges while on PC it does not. This is troubling because it cuts the subtitles in half most of the time, making it nearly impossible to read.

For clarity's sake, I have tested this with 3 different tvs and 3 different pcs always with the results named above. I am burning discs using Nero Vision Express 3, although the results are identical if I burn straight to disc, burn to .iso then to disc with Nero 6, or to .iso then to disc with Roxio 6.

I have also checked the usual suspects (google, yahoo, etc) for those who feel the need to be snarky if I don't explicitly point out that I have Google-f**king-fu.

In the end, there may be no way around this, but I sure as hell hope not since I can't change the formatting of subtitles that have been encoded as part of the video stream.

posted by mystyk to computers & internet (7 comments total)

Most TVs cut off a portion of the image normally. I know that dvd::rip for Linux supports encoding that adds a bit of a border around the edge of the video stream to deal with just this reality. Perhaps you can re-encode the files and add some space?
posted by odinsdream at 5:09 PM on November 13, 2005

I occasionally had this problem, but not that to extent, using VSO's Divx2Dvd utility. A version or two ago, it seems to have ceased. They have a trial version available that will encode with a watermark, so you can give that a test to see if it takes care of it. Can't help with Nero specifically, I'm afraid.
posted by Drastic at 5:31 PM on November 13, 2005

What are you using to encode to MPEG2? My first guess is that you need to make an adjustment in that step so that you output to a TV-safe picture size.
posted by scarabic at 5:32 PM on November 13, 2005

I use TMPGEnc to convert stuff to burn on DVD. You can choose which aspect ratio the input is, and what aspect ratio you want the output to be in.

It's got a nice wizard. Really easy to use. You might also keep in mind whether you're playing on a PAL/NTSC television.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 6:36 PM on November 13, 2005

This tends to happen with anime fansubs. Apparently fansubbers have never heard of title safe, and put everything on one long line right up to the edges, which is highly aggravating. I come across the same issue playing anime Divx files on my DVD player.
posted by neckro23 at 9:08 PM on November 13, 2005

Yeah, welcome to the wonderful world of overscan. Your DVD player may have a zoom or aspect ratio control that will allow you to see the whole picture on your TV.
posted by kindall at 11:16 PM on November 13, 2005

odinsdream & neckro23, spot on.

The issue is definately a cropping due to the action and title zones not getting any attention. My guess is that the fansubbers in question know that their output is meant for consumption on PCs. Therefore they intentionally allow the overlap in order to preserve as much viewing area as possible. In an action oriented anime such as the one I'm trying to convert (Bleach), that viewing area could make all the difference. I had noticed black zones on some dvds played on pc and never really pieced it together.

neckro23, I marked yours best because in addition to properly answering why this was happening, you also found me a beautiful video editing basics guide.

Now all I need is some way to properly compensate...Anyone know of a program for that?
posted by mystyk at 11:32 AM on November 14, 2005