Resizing 4:3 video ( avi ) Q.

Factual Questions
1

So we’ve all seen "stretched " episodes of old TV shows, notably Seinfeld.

I know that there was a thread about this some time ago.

My question is this: Is there a simple way of converting old TV shows to 16:9?

I have tried numerous methods and they have all failed miserably.

On various cable stations the promos for old shows are stretched, but the shows themselves are not.

I haven’t tried this yet, but I was thinking that I could convert an old episode ( avi format ) into a VOB file then use something like Cusoft to resize it. Cusoft will rip and resize straight from a DVD but all my old shows have already been avi’ed.

Seems there must be an easier way.

This is purely an exercise in “Ah ha! So that’s how they did it!”.

2

There is no way to do it without distorting the picture. Either you stretch it from 4:3 to 16:9, or you cut the top/bottom off similar to cutting the sides off on widescreen conversions to 4:3.

3

Or you add black bars on the sides, which seems to be the preferred method of cinephiles.

4

You’d have to re-encode everything, which would take a while. I don’t understand why you’re not using a media player that’ll preserve the aspect ratio.

5

Just playing around out of curiosity.

Thanks for the responses.

6

If you want to re-encode, try SUPER ©   Video Converter | Video Encoder | Free 3D Video Converter | Free 3D Video Encoder

Not sure if it suits your purpose, but you’ll know once you try it.

7

VirtualDub easily allows you to change the aspect ratio, and/or to crop pixels off the top and bottom of the picture.

Just open your avi in VirtualDub, then go to Video > Filters > Add and select the Resize filter from the list. It will give you a bunch of options for aspect ratio and cropping.

You will, however, need to re-encode the video.

8

Scratch what I said. That’s for audio only. Go with mhendo

9

I think with Seinfeld, they went back to the original footage, which wasn’t widescreen, but captured a larger field of view than what was eventually broadcast as 4:3, then recropped as widescreen - inevitably losing some height, but gaining a bit of width that was originally cropped out.