Change video frame size using Windows Media Encoder 9 series

Darwin

I have a .mov video that I want to put on my web site and have it play in a
player sized to 250px X 250px.
I bought a program to convert the .mov to a .wmv that will work with the
Encoder 9. The .wmv is now 640 X 480.
I found an article that showed how they used Encoder 9 to make video about
1/2 inch high and about 3 inches long but it lacked detail that I needed to
make mine 250px X 250px.
Please help me with detailed instructions on how I can change my .wmv 640 X
480 to the 250 X 250 that I need or please refer me to a site that has that
detailed information.

Neil Smith [MVP Digital Media]

On Tue, 24 Jul 2007 09:30:04 -0700, Darwin
<Darwin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

>I have a .mov video that I want to put on my web site and have it play in a
>player sized to 250px X 250px.
>I bought a program to convert the .mov to a .wmv that will work with the

Why not leave it in Quicktime format and embed quicktime player
instead ? I'm not sure I follow the reasoning ...

>Encoder 9. The .wmv is now 640 X 480.


That aspect ratio is 4:3 (normal for TV style content)


>I found an article that showed how they used Encoder 9 to make video about
>1/2 inch high and about 3 inches long but it lacked detail that I needed to
>make mine 250px X 250px.

That is 1:1 aspect ratio.

>Please help me with detailed instructions on how I can change my .wmv 640 X
>480 to the 250 X 250 that I need or please refer me to a site that has that
>detailed information.

What was the original video size, in pixels ? The answer depends on
whether you want to resize it at 4:3 aspect ratio - in which case it'd
be either 333x250 pixels, or 250x190 pixels - or whether you want to
crop it, losing some video from the left and/or right hand sides.

WME9 has Crop settings on the Video Size tab, and Resize settings on
the same tab. Resizing without cropping can lead to some very odd
stretching effects, making your friends look even fatter than normal.

To make it somewhat simpler, this page has visual examples of the
steps needed to crop for a Zune to a particular size :
http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/showthread.php?t=625

Cheers - Neil
------------------------------------------------
Digital Media MVP : 2004-2007
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/mvpfaqs

Darwin

Thank you Neil for your help. I went to the site that you provided the link
to and followed the tutorial. My 250 X 250 turned out very nice.

I have another question for you.
I have an .avi video that is 600 X 462. This is a 1.3:1 ratio.
I would like to make a banner with it by converting it to 600 X 100.

Using the techniques in the tutorial I can't do it.
When I divide my desired width, 600, by the 1.3 I get 462, its original
height.
When I multiply my desired height, 100, by the 1.3 I get a width of only 130.

Is there another tutorial that will help me create the 600 X 100 video banner?

I read the "white paper" of Bill Birney and David Workman of Microsoft Corp.
dated May 2003 and entitled "Determining the Shape of Pixels and Frames"
In that paper they show a long thin video frame embedded in a banner but
they don't give enough details that would help me to duplicate that banner
video.

Thank you again for your help and I would appreciate any other help on this
subject that you can provide.

Darwin



"Neil Smith [MVP Digital Media]" wrote:

> On Tue, 24 Jul 2007 09:30:04 -0700, Darwin
> <Darwin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
>
> >I have a .mov video that I want to put on my web site and have it play in a
> >player sized to 250px X 250px.
> >I bought a program to convert the .mov to a .wmv that will work with the
>
> Why not leave it in Quicktime format and embed quicktime player
> instead ? I'm not sure I follow the reasoning ...
>
> >Encoder 9. The .wmv is now 640 X 480.
>
>
> That aspect ratio is 4:3 (normal for TV style content)
>
>
> >I found an article that showed how they used Encoder 9 to make video about
> >1/2 inch high and about 3 inches long but it lacked detail that I needed to
> >make mine 250px X 250px.
>
> That is 1:1 aspect ratio.
>
> >Please help me with detailed instructions on how I can change my .wmv 640 X
> >480 to the 250 X 250 that I need or please refer me to a site that has that
> >detailed information.
>
> What was the original video size, in pixels ? The answer depends on
> whether you want to resize it at 4:3 aspect ratio - in which case it'd
> be either 333x250 pixels, or 250x190 pixels - or whether you want to
> crop it, losing some video from the left and/or right hand sides.
>
> WME9 has Crop settings on the Video Size tab, and Resize settings on
> the same tab. Resizing without cropping can lead to some very odd
> stretching effects, making your friends look even fatter than normal.
>
> To make it somewhat simpler, this page has visual examples of the
> steps needed to crop for a Zune to a particular size :
> http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/showthread.php?t=625
>
> Cheers - Neil
> ------------------------------------------------
> Digital Media MVP : 2004-2007
> http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/mvpfaqs
>

Neil Smith [MVP Digital Media]

On Wed, 25 Jul 2007 14:48:01 -0700, Darwin
<Darwin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

>Thank you Neil for your help. I went to the site that you provided the link
>to and followed the tutorial. My 250 X 250 turned out very nice.
>
>I have another question for you.
>I have an .avi video that is 600 X 462. This is a 1.3:1 ratio.
>I would like to make a banner with it by converting it to 600 X 100.
>
>Using the techniques in the tutorial I can't do it.
>When I divide my desired width, 600, by the 1.3 I get 462, its original
>height.
>When I multiply my desired height, 100, by the 1.3 I get a width of only 130.
>
>Is there another tutorial that will help me create the 600 X 100 video banner?


As I said in the original post, the only option you have is to crop
the content. It should be obvious there's no way to resize the image
and keep the aspect ratio the same size, so removing pixels is the
only way (unless you like your people very short, and very fat !)

You would want the Crop in the Video Size panel screenshot of that web
page (set Crop method Custom in the dropdown, then choose Top and
Bottom values based on which top position you want to start at, and
where from the bottom you want to come up to)

>I read the "white paper" of Bill Birney and David Workman of Microsoft Corp.
>dated May 2003 and entitled "Determining the Shape of Pixels and Frames"
>In that paper they show a long thin video frame embedded in a banner but
>they don't give enough details that would help me to duplicate that banner
>video.

>> What was the original video size, in pixels ? The answer depends on
>> whether you want to resize it at 4:3 aspect ratio - in which case it'd
>> be either 333x250 pixels, or 250x190 pixels - or whether you want to
>> crop it, losing some video from the left and/or right hand sides.
>>
>> WME9 has Crop settings on the Video Size tab, and Resize settings on
>> the same tab. Resizing without cropping can lead to some very odd
>> stretching effects, making your friends look even fatter than normal.
>>
>> To make it somewhat simpler, this page has visual examples of the
>> steps needed to crop for a Zune to a particular size :
>> http://forums.thoughtsmedia.com/showthread.php?t=625
------------------------------------------------
Digital Media MVP : 2004-2007
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/mvpfaqs