The aspect ratio of this file is not supported by dvd

[Eric Pautsch]

I guess the obvious question would be: Whats the resolution of the footage your feeding it? Here are the DVD specs:

NTSC (NTSC Film)

Video:
Up to 9.8 Mbps* (9800 kbps*) MPEG2 video
Up to 1.856 Mbps (1856 kbps) MPEG1 video
720 x 480 pixels MPEG2 (Called Full-D1)
704 x 480 pixels MPEG2
352 x 480 pixels MPEG2 (Called Half-D1, same as the CVD Standard)
352 x 240 pixels MPEG2
352 x 240 pixels MPEG1 (Same as the VCD Standard)
29,97 fps*
23,976 fps with 3:2 pulldown = 29,97 playback fps (NTSC Film, this is only supported by MPEG2 video)
16:9 Anamorphic (only supported by 720×480)

PAL

Video:
Up to 9.8 Mbps* (9800 kbps*) MPEG2 video
Up to 1.856 Mbps (1856 kbps) MPEG1 video
720 x 576 pixels MPEG2 (Called Full-D1)
704 x 576 pixels MPEG2
352 x 576 pixels MPEG2 (Called Half-D1, same as the CVD Standard)
352 x 288 pixels MPEG2
352 x 288 pixels MPEG1 (Same as the VCD Standard)
25 fps*
16:9 Anamorphic (only supported by 720×576)

[Jeremy Wiles]

Eric, thanks for the help.

The footage is 1920×1080. We did some troubleshooting and learned that it was the menu that we created in Photoshop that was causing the problem. I used a preset Encore menu and authored just fine.

Our next problem is the quality of the footage. The footage has come out looking very poor when we played the DVD, even though it was shot with a Red camera. Do you have any idea why we are getting such a poor looking quality? The text seems to be aliasing and it looks a bit squeezed. I was thinking the PAR (pixel aspect ratio) might be wrong, but we checked and it was 1.0 square, which is how the footage was shot.

If I render a quicktime file out of premier without any compression, will it be the same quality as a dynamic link from Encore to the Premier timeline? This seems to be an easier solution.

Any suggestions?

Thanks again,

Jeremy

[Eric Pautsch]

I can’t say what the problem might be since you don’t indicate your workflows – bitrates, length of program, ect. Did you just drop a 1920×1080 QT into Encore?

I think John has a very good article on HD to SD conversions you should read:

https://www.precomposed.com/blog/2009/07/hd-to-sd-dvd-best-methods/

Another thing to remember is that dropping a QT into Encore and expecting a professional quality picture just insn’t going to happen. Encoding is much more than setting bitrates. Encoders vary in quality as well. Personally I would get someone with a quality encoder with experience to do this work. You shot RED footage with a professional (yourself?) who knows the camera so why would you not do the same for the end product people will see?

[Jeremy Wiles]

Bitrate: 8mbs 2 pass VBR
Length of video: 18mins

I did not just drop the QT file into encore. We brought the Premier timelines into Encore through the dynamic link feature.

This morning we followed the entire process John had listed for HD to SD conversions, but did not notice any quality difference. I’d hire an expert in DVD authoring to handle this, but we are already past the deadline. This DVD was supposed to be in the mail yesterday for the plant to duplicate 1000 copies.

Thanks for your time and help. If you have any other advice, I would greatly appreciate it.

[Jeremy Wiles]

Has anyone ever used DVD Maestro?

According to Wikipedia it has become the standard for DVD production in Hollywood: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVD_authoring

Jeremy

[Rob Neidig]

Jeremy,

That Wikipedia info is quite old. Maestro was a contender maybe 10 years ago (and you still find a few people still nursing their systems along). Spruce sold it to Apple, who discontinued it and turned it into DVD Studio Pro (sort of). The standard for Standard Def DVD authoring in Hollywood is Sonic’s Scenarist and a few proprietary systems. But it’s not the authoring software that’s your problem. Your problem is the converting from HD and encoding to MPEG-2. There is the Cinemacraft encoder for Premier Pro that works well, but for HD you would need the full version that costs around $1700 -1800. I hope others can provide a lower cost option for you.

Have fun!

Rob

Rob Neidig
R&R Media Productions
Eugene, Oregon

[Jeremy Wiles]

Yeah, I just found that out. Maestro is not an option now.

I’m trying to resize the video using VirtualDub because Encore and Premier do a horrible job at resizing video. The source footage is 1920×1080. DVD footage is always 720×480, then you can determine if it’s widescreen or not by the PAR (pixel aspect ratio). However, how do I go about scaling 1920×1080 down to 720×480? It is not the same aspect ratio. Do I need to make it 853.333 x 480 and crop to 720×480 using the filter resize option inside Virtualdub?

So, what is the simple way to resize HD footage for DVD widescreen inside VirtualDub?

thanks,

jeremy

[Jeff Bellune]

[Jeremy Wiles] “So, what is the simple way to resize HD footage for DVD widescreen inside VirtualDub?”

I have 2 video tutorials that might help:

Using Dan Isaacs’ hd2sd

The Essential Open-Source Toolkit

-Jeff

The Focal Easy Guide to Adobe Encore DVD 2.0

[Eric Pautsch]

Excellent Jeff!

One of the scripts in the zip files allows you to downsize it to SD 16×9 – this is 720×480 Anamorphic.

[Caleb Green]

Hi Friends,

I know this is old, but I had the same problem and found a different solution so I thought I would list it here.

I had this same problem followed by the same righteous anger. I sized down my Photoshop menu’s to a uniform 720×480, but that didn’t give me the fix I needed. I found the issue was with my timeline, the error warned me it was the timeline to (it has my timeline name listed, so the menus are likely irrelevant). In regards to another problem of Encore and the audio being out sync, I put my video into the timeline after a second of nothing. So if the timeline was played straight through, it would play black before coming to my video. Putting a chapter mark on the beginning of my actual video and linking my “play” button to that chapter fixed my out of sync audio. However, this video not completely at the start of my timeline was causing my burn to fail. After I pushed the video all the way over, the burn went fine.

Hope that helps.