Problems turn Pal to NTSC as 16:9
 

I have some footage I shot on my XHA1 which is in 16:9 PAL and I'm trying to turn it into NTSC 16:9. I've played around with the settings a lot- but no matter how I do it, it seems to come out as 4:3. The only setting I can get it to come out as widescreen is by either making an AVI file (but I need it to be MPEG-2) or making it into a widescreen stream. But the stream has no audio! I could render my audio separately, but then I'd have to find a way to combine them again before I give it to my client.

There doesn't seem to be a suitable preset once you get into make movie and select MPEG-2, surely there must be a way? I've gone through my menus several times and tried different setting not only for the project but also for the individual clips.

Does anyone have any suggestions for where I'm going wrong? Many thanks in advance!

Kathy

I'm using Sony Vegas Studio Platinum 7.0

If I go into advanced render, for some reason I can't access the custom options. I imagine thats where I'd need to be to sort this out. Any ideas how I can get in?

Cathy, which version of vegas are you using ? Pro ?
I'm looking at my pro 8 templates now.
File>render as>mainconcept MPEG-2>template> and i've got 4 NTSC templates for use in dvd-a.

Paul.

I have Sony Vegas Studio Platinum 7.0, do you think this is something to do with it not being the pro version? I don't normally work in NTSC so haven't run into this problem. I'm not trying to put it onto DVD I just want an MPEG-2 file as it will eventually be added to the web by someone else.

The NTSC presets either have no audio (it says in the settings) or there is an SVCD option which is not high enough res for what I need. I've been rendering it on the default setting, hoping that because the project is set to NTSC widescreen it will stay as widescreen, but it doesn't!

Thanks!

That's one of the advantages of the Pro version over the Movie Studio versions - access to the "Custom" screen. As you've seen, the major DVD/MPEG2 presets do not include audio as it's assumed you'll want to render the audio separately to AC3 for building a DVD.

I wouldn't use MPEG2 for a web format anyway. Instead, I generally pick WMV. Many use flash which requires a separate program to create - but that could be created from your AVI which DOES include audio.

I wouldn't use MPG-2 either, but thats what they've asked for in the delivery requirements. I think they possible do a top and tail of my edit and add a few graphics. I might see about giving it as an avi file. If not maybe I have to buy the pro version. But would like to avoid spending money on this!

If it's just a one time thing, you could download the trial version of TMPGEnc 2.5 to do the MPEG-2 encoding (works for 14 days):

http://tmpgenc.pegasys-inc.com/en/download/tp.html

Thanks for that. I will give it a try. I guess make an avi file and then convert. It's for something ongoing so I may buy the program. Works out cheaper than upgrading Vegas.