W7 DVD maker

[dazco]

I used this for the first time the other day. I took a widescreen video which when played with any player that would play it, defaulted to the proper aspect ratio automatically when opened. But once i burned it i then opened the DVD in a couple players and the aspect ratio was wrong and the picture was squished. In one player i couldn't even make it right, in the other i could but when the DVD was opened it didn't go to the proper widescreen ratio.

Now that said, i don't care about that because they were made for friends and family to play on thier TV's. But my fear was it would do the same on a TV, and when i tried it with my sony DVD player on my TV it indeed did that. granted, i could adjust the screen to wide and it looked good. But is there anyways to make it play like that by default? I mean, when you put a factory DVD movie in a DVD/TV setup they default to the correct size. I am only concerned because i will be making these for various friends and family, a few which are older people like my 90 year old mother who will never be able to figure it out. She has a very hard time understanding the most basic functions of her TV and remote as is. I looked in the app's options and all and i didn't see anything that seemed to do this so i decided maybe someone here would know how i can burn these in a way that will have them play in a DVD player at the default size as they do when opened as an avi in any player from the file itself. Thanks

 

[mitchell65]

Hi Dazco
When you first open WinDVD maker before importing any clips, click on the "Option" button at the bottom right of the screen. In that window you can set the aspect ratio. The default seems to be 4:3 but you need 16:9 for auto widescreen. Also make sure that the Video Format is correctly set. If you are in the USA that will be NTSC which is probably your default. It should match the Time Zone that you set windows 7 to when you first set up your PC. It is alway a good idea to burn DVD at less than the maximum burn rate available to you so set that down a bit too say to medium. Gives far less problems in the finished product.

 

[dazco]

I will give that a try, thank you.

 

[dazco]

Well, i was at work when i read your reply but once i got home i realized i DID look at options and it was on 16:9, ad in fact defaults to that. And it waas NTSC which i noticed right away having worked at a video post house years ago. So i knew NTSC was north america's format. So thats not it. Any other ideas?

 

[Hikertrash]

I had the same problem and the only fix I found online (maybe this forum) was to run it through Windows Live Movie Maker first and then taking that format through Windows DVD Maker. I think that worked on occasion but I ended up buying a DVD player that would play avi's rather than waste a bunch of writable DVD's.

It's too bad too because Windows DVD Maker makes awesome menus.

 

[Hikertrash]

Yeah, here's the thread on the same problem...

http://www.sevenforums.com/software/128232-windows-dvd-maker-widescreen-problems.html

 

[whs]

i burn my videos with DVD Flick. They work fine on the TV.

 

[Hikertrash]

i burn my videos with DVD Flick. They work fine on the TV.

That really doesn't correct the problem but....

On my Windows XP laptop I'd get a bunch that would get errors hours into the encoding and I'd have to abort. I haven't tried with my new Windows 7 laptop. Too bad the DVD Flick menus weren't as nice as Windows DVD maker.

 

[dazco]

Yeah, i used flick and a few other apps like DVD decrypter and one or 2 others to get the entire process done. But this windows DVD maker is so much better as far as ease. A click or 2 and you come back in 30 mutes and your DVD is done. No worry, no thinking about it, just click bang. it's already there and dirt simple, so i really hate to install and deal with 2 or 3 other more complicated apps. All i want is a DVD that plays the correct aspect ratio. If i can get it to do that it would be an A+++ app. I don't need or want menus or any of that.

 

[dazco]

Well, i googled it and found this. Not sure if it works because i deleted the vidoe so i will have to wait till i have another video in widescreen i need to burn. But several people said this worked for them. One didn't but about 3 did.

The solution for this is to import the .avi file into Windows Movie Maker and go into options and select 16:9 and either PAL or NTSC, after doing that save the project file.

Close Windows Movie Maker and then open up Windows DVD Maker and click on 'add files' then add the project file you saved in Windows Movie Maker. This will import the .avi file in 16:9 format.

 

[Hikertrash]

Well, i googled it and found this. Not sure if it works because i deleted the vidoe so i will have to wait till i have another video in widescreen i need to burn. But several people said this worked for them. One didn't but about 3 did.

The solution for this is to import the .avi file into Windows Movie Maker and go into options and select 16:9 and either PAL or NTSC, after doing that save the project file.

Close Windows Movie Maker and then open up Windows DVD Maker and click on 'add files' then add the project file you saved in Windows Movie Maker. This will import the .avi file in 16:9 format.

Except Windows DVD Maker doesn't recognize a Movie Maker project file. You need to encode the entire movie and import that.

 

[Hikertrash]

I don't know what's going on but I just imported a 798MB avi into Windows Live Movie Maker and saved the file, the result, which took quite some time, was 5.6GB wmv file. Too big for a DVD. Stuff like this is why I bought the DVD player that would play most files burnt to CD or DVD. I can even play them from a USB drive.

 

[mitchell65]

What properties did you save the wmv file to? You have obviously re-rendered the avi file to a format that creates very big files. With great respect I think the problem here is that perhaps you are not quite familiar as to what happens when you re-render a video file.
There's quite a good article here that may help:
http://www.brighthub.com/multimedia/video/articles/1416.aspx

Just Google "Render a video file" or similar for a whole host of info.

 

[dazco]

Except Windows DVD Maker doesn't recognize a Movie Maker project file.

I'm not sure what you mean. I took a avi just now and after dragging it into the app i saved the project and was able to open the project after re-opening the app. So i'm unsure about what you meant by this.
Unfortunately i can't try burning this file because it's not wide, so it's not going to tell me if this worked.

EDIT: i think i see what you're saying now....i didn't realize he was talking about two different apps. What is windows movie maker? Or specifically, WHERE is it? I don't see anything like that on my W7 pro 64.

 

[mitchell65]

You seem a little confused between a project file and a video file. A project file can contain a number of video clips together with transitions, titles etc. The project file is particular to the program it was configured in. A video file is a particular video format file like mpg, wmf etc. Be also aware that avi and vob files are more correctly described as container files. They can have files using a huge number of different codecs etc. AVI files can have about 800 different codecs contained in them!
Windows Movie maker is part of Windows Essentials downloadable from here;
Windows Live Essentials - Windows 7 features - Microsoft Windows

 

[dazco]

No, i'm no expert to be sure, but i'm FAR beyond not knowing the difference between those. I understand codecs and all that and have used apps like virtual dub to a fairly deep degree. But you don't have to be a novice to be lost in figuring this one out because obviously no one seems to have so far.

By the way, what is the diff? I assume movie maker is a app to combine videos and phots into a single video, but from what i gathered looking at DVD maker (tho i never really investigated this) it does that too. So whats the difference....movie maker is the same but doesn't burn?

 

[dazco]

i noticed someone in the thread found this at said it didn't work too, and the guy told him this...

Add the movie to the storyboard (drag and drop) and then save the project. When you open it in DVD maker it will work.

I haven't downloaded MM so can't try it. may do so next time have to burn a wisescreen AV.

 

[mitchell65]

Windows Movie Maker is a video editor whereas Windows DVD maker is a video authoring program!

 

[mitchell65]

Just a very personal note on this subject. I don't usually knock Microsoft but I think their effort in creating video software is a bit poor. Earlier versions of Windows Movie Maker were much better than the Win7 versions. They took the timeline feature away to start with. That really doesn't make sense. IMHO a video editing program without a timeline is like having a car (auto) without a steering wheel.Most third party programs work much better and are far easier to understand the workflow required to achieve good consistent results.

 

[whs]

....movie maker is the same but doesn't burn

WLMM has a "burn" option in "save movie"

Earlier versions of Windows Movie Maker were much better than the Windows 7 versions.

I agree with you on the timeline. But in terms of output quality, WLMM is much better than WMM. That is especially apparent with text, e.g. in tutorials.