Incorrect aspect ratio on certain DVD

[dodge586]

Hi,
I have a weird problem although having searched it seems there are similar things going on. I've been ripping Inbetweeners season 2 just fine with the exception of episode 4. This episode is detected 4:3 when it should be 16x9. All other episodes are detected correctly - weird. I'm not entirely convinced it's a badly mastered disc because if I play the actual DVD in Power DVD it appears as it should 16x9.

Things I have tried so far include manually editing header info from the resulting MKV in MKVMerge, to match the episodes that do play correctly specifically this means changing the 'video display width' from 720 to 1024.

However, this makes no difference and it still plays 4x3.

I have also dumped the entire DVD to the HDD and tried using DVD Patcher to correct the aspect ratio on the VOB. It is detected as 4:3 so I patch the horizontal size to 720. Then push this through makemkv, however the resulting MKV still plays as 4:3!!

Surely there must be an easy way of fixing this? Can anyone help?

Cheers.

[crowfax]

I've heard this come up before (this thread comes to mind). After some investigation by the person posting the issue Mike replied with:

There's nothing one can do - aspect ratio is siored in two places - IFO and mpeg headers, and on DVD IFO settings always overwrites what's stored in mpeg header. MakeMKV puts correct aspect ratio from IFO to MKV header, but many programs ignore it there and use data from mpeg header. Generally one can't patch mpeg header without reencoding.

If you read to the end of the thread, a workaround did seem to be found.

I hope this helps in some way.

[dodge586]

Thanks I had already found that thread. Just not sure how to go about re-encoding if that is the work around.

[Smithcraft]

What about using the Header Editor in mkvtoolnix?

SC

[crowfax]

What about using the Header Editor in mkvtoolnix?

I think what Mike was saying, was that regardless of the header data in the container, most software uses the information from the mpeg stream to decide on the aspect ratio.

[Smithcraft]

That was what I figured, but sometimes in the software world setting a setting after the fact can force said setting to work right. To that end, I figured it would be substantially quicker, compared to running it through Handbrake(or the particular transcoder of choice), to give the header editor a try and see if it works.

SC

[crowfax]

True enough.

[therealjoeblow]

Thanks I had already found that thread. Just not sure how to go about re-encoding if that is the work around.

The workaround is "patching" the MPEG2 stream with DVDPatcher, which does NOT reencode it, it just resets the aspect ratio in the file header. It works perfectly and only takes about 10 seconds, only it's a bit of a pain in the *ss as it has to be done as a separate operation outside of MakeMKV.

In the other thread on this, I have requested if similar functionality as DVDPatcher can be added to MakeMKV so that the user can select to change the aspect ratio, and MakeMKV will do the patching on the fly as it creates the new file. Mike has noted the request and has indicated it is possible. No ETA or firm confirmation on whether it will be added, but here's hoping...

Cheers
The REAL Joe

[naszdom]

Trying to make an MKV from a DVD with an aspect ratio 2.35:1
makemkv produces standard DVD of 720:576. I get the same results if I rip the MPEG to the hard drive.

DVDPatcher will not work directly on the DVD. I can patch the ripped MPEG stream but makemkv will not convert MPEGS. DVDPatcher will not patch MKVs produced by makemkv.

So how can you do it as a done as a separate operation outside of MakeMKV?

[therealjoeblow]

Trying to make an MKV from a DVD with an aspect ratio 2.35:1
makemkv produces standard DVD of 720:576. I get the same results if I rip the MPEG to the hard drive.

DVDPatcher will not work directly on the DVD. I can patch the ripped MPEG stream but makemkv will not convert MPEGS. DVDPatcher will not patch MKVs produced by makemkv.

So how can you do it as a done as a separate operation outside of MakeMKV?

Copy the DVD files to a harddrive (the entire VIDEO_TS folder), and drag each of the .VOB files that contain the video with the bad aspect ratio onto DVDPatcher, adjust the settings correctly and patch them. Then point MakeMKV to the VIDEO_TS folder as its source and convert from there. I've done it a dozen times, it works perfectly.

The REAL Joe

[naszdom]

Thanks REAL Joe

Obvious now you mention it.