I followed a guide from dvdrhelp and it worked fine except that my widescreen footage got stretched out to 4:3 instead of keeping the original 16:9.

I did it with VirtualDub. Anyone know about this?

you probably just did the resizing wrong. if it was 16:9, you could do a resolution of like 640x352, 512x288, or something like that..


good luck
DJK

How do you do that? Have been looking in the program and no luck. When I load the DV clip and play it it also plays in 4:3 It's stretched.

Plz help it's really important.

Go to Video > Filters...

Click Add..

Click on Resize and click OK.

Then you basically set the Hieght-x-Width, and you should be set. Use the Show Preview option so you can check if the Aspect Ratio is correct.

Hope this helps m8..
DJK

yeah...and remember to set the resize method to Precise BiCubic :)

Nono, set it to lanczos3 :)

to what?

care to elaborate DJK?  

dammit!!

I'm an idiot.  Anyway is that another resize algorithm?

=rez=

The quality is OK. Kinda blocky. It's default bitrate on XviD is like 1368 or something. And I did as you said. Resized to 640x352 and lancos3 or whatever. But I read in a guide that Fast recompress is better quality. Is this true? It's just that the filter area can't be entered when Fast Recompress is on. Does it have to be that?

Anyway thanks for helping me. I'm almost getting it!

yep, you can't use any filters if it's on fast recompress

also i've compared quality of fast compress and full processing and i got no difference at all.

if it is blocky (although shouldnt be when at 1300 bitrate) try resizing it to like 512x288

are you using an avisynth script? If so, after the crop function, put in a line:
BicubicResize(592,320)

(just an example)

you can only use fast recompress if you use avisynth to perform cropping and such

what about Audio? Just PCM?

You should probably go for MP3 audio...PCM is hugely wastefull.

Also make sure you are doing a 2-pass XViD encode as per the instructions on www.doom9.org (not the gordian not guide the other one).  If it keeps coming really blocks maybe ue H263 quantizers rather than mpeg which will make it more blurry but less blocky.

=rez=

I did 1 pass. Maybe that's it. I'm gonna try what you said. Am just downloading Guardian Knot. I'll tell you how it works out. Thank you very much for the help!

Don't use Gordian Knot!!

Sorry thats what I was saying in my post.  Follow the doom9 guide to encoding with virtualdub to xvid.  2 pass with High Quality set is a must for decent results.

GordianKnot only really applies when you have a DVD source, but you have DV source so it won't work.

I'm trying to install the lame MP3 codec but can't figure out how. Feel like a goddamn newb. hehe.

One other thing. Which 2 pass option should I choose?

This is my configuration:

512x288
Full Processing Mode (Video+Audio)
XviD - 2 pass but which?
MP3 codec - But need to install it though

when you're in vdub you need to set it to 2 pass - 1st pass ... then go to save your avi but check the box that says "don't run now, add to job control"

then go back and choose 2-pass, 2nd pass int ... do the same thing when saving, the add to job control thing..

then voila, you're set..

also for the MP3 encoding, use this util..

http://winlame.sourceforge.net/

VERY easy to use if you're not familiar with the standard command-line LAME, and it is very high quality. Use joint-stereo, not stereo as you probably won't tell any difference..

OK I did the two pass thing as you said. But it stops after like 70% and says that my data might be corrupted. And it's not I'm sure of it. Also I exported the audio from Premiere (where I made the video) and compressed it with the lame program so that it became a significantly smaller wav file.

So I added that Wav file to VirtualDub and didn't compress it further. Can this be the problem? I don't know what to do now.....sorry if I'm a little anoying but I'm kind of split between several guides and you guys at least you DJK seem to have it pretty figured out.....

Thx.......

Hmm.. make sure your HD isn't out of space :) But that's probably not the problem.. in your XviD settings are you using VHQ and stuff? Here's what yours should look like (at least it's what I use, and it works perfectly)..

And no, you're not annoying :) At least I don't hafta explain how to use filters and how to set compression and stuff like that :) hehe because I know quite a few ppl who don't know that stuff ;-)

Cheers, good luck :)
DJK

be careful with those settings, better read first.  if u use vhq (and yeah u should), in latest koepi XviD-24062003-1, max bframes should be set to "0" not "-1" to implement new scene detection, else u would be missing important keyframes and may degrade playback quality.  with previous koepi XviD-14052003-1, u have to use vhq with bframes activated or not at all vhq (and i wouldnt recommend bframes).

else stick to the koepi's old stable version.

p.s. after u encode audio to mp3 and use the file to set your video size in xvid settings, encode video on its own in vdub (for avisynth 2.5+ i'd recommend vdubmod, not sure if vdub fixed support for the new colorspacing), aka no audio.  then use nandub to interleave the mp3 with the video, both set to direct stream copy, and audio interleaving by default and u need to add the delay value if besweet or other similar hasnt done so yet, else u dont.

best, follow a simple guide on doom9 or somewhere, easier to learn and then if problems ask questions.

Yeh of course.. don't try to encode the video and mux the audio at the same time :)

And another good thing don said too.. use VDubMod ... because as he said, I had problems with colorspacing when using regular Vdub ... although I think newer versions of vdub work fine now..

DJK

It crashes once again. I have the newest XviD codec installed so I set the Bframes to 0 instead of -1. And set it to no audio in VirtualDub. Is vdubmod a mod for VirtualDub? If you have a link to a guide on doom9 because I can't find it. This XviD business is really complicated. Should I go for DivX instead?

Getting sick of this...... ;-/

mate of mine says same thing bout xvid being hard.

For me it was the easiest ever, much easier than NanDUB.

Install  koepi's latest stable build and then just set it up as per instructions on doom9.org, don't get into all that complexity with b-frames etc.  it'll be fine without it.

=rez=

Can you give me a link for it? Not sure the guide I found is the correct one. Also I went to xvid.org but there's only one XviD codec I think. Where do I find the stable one?

stable koepi build: http://www.roeder.goe.net/cgi-bin/fetch?file=XviD-04102002-1.exe

doom9 seems to have only a gknot guide: http://www.doom9.org/xvid.htm