[mythtv-users] transcoding widescreen recordings

[Shawn Flynn]

From: Peter VanDerWal on July 9, 2008 7:02 AM
>> From: Peter VanDerWal on July 9, 2008 5:33 AM
>>>From: Shawn Flynn on July 9, 2008
>>>> Like you, in the meantime, I've created a workaround that suits me 
>>>> well enough for now. I run a userjob on the letterboxed 4:3 shows 
>>>> which crops the top and bottom 60 lines off the recording and resets 
>>>> the aspect ratio to
>>>> 16:9 leaving all the other video codec parameters the same as the 
>>>> original file. What I end up with is a 720x360 16:9 mpg2 recording 
>>>> that looks almost identical to the original (sans black bars). I 
>>>> then insert the transcoded file in place of the original, run a 
>>>> commflag --rebuild, and mythtranscode
>>>> --mpeg2 for good measure, and set the 'widescreen' flag in the 
>>>> database in place of the 'hdtv' flag (just to satisfy my OCD). The 
>>>> script can be found at 
>>>> http://shawnflynn.com/2008/07/06/removing-letterboxing-in-mythtv/ if 
>>>> anybody is interested in using/improving it.
>>>>
>>>
>>> Wow!  I just hit W a couple times.
>>> But then again, I'm not interested in keeping any TV shows after I've
>> watched them.
>>
>> LOL. I suppose that is an option, but it wouldn't satisfy my 
>> aformentioned OCD ;)
>>
>> I'm not interested in keeping shows after I watch them either. This is 
>> just so that the fill ratio is correct when I sit down to watch a show 
>> without me needing to fiddle with the fill menu (no room for a 'w' key 
>> on my remote of choice). The userjob automatically runs after the show 
>> has been recorded and by the time I sit down to watch it everything 
>> looks right with no intervention from me.
>>
>
>How does Myth know if the show is in letterbox or not?

In my case it doesn't. I just set the userjob as part of the recording rule
for the shows I know are letterboxed, and use the 'adjust fill' menu for the
few I miss.

But as David Engel has pointed out in another response to this thread, it
seems that a dev has already scratched this particular itch and given me
exactly what I originally wished for.