*Conversion priority. This setting determines how much power of your computer is used for conversions. While not really noticable on multi-core systems, on older computers, this can greatly affect the conversion speed. Setting it higher will enable DVD Catalyst to use more power for the conversion, however, less is available for other computer tasks. If you use your computer for other tasks while a conversion is running, it’s recommended to leave it set to Normal.

*Allow upscaling. By default, DVD Catalyst does not “upscale” video. This means that if you selected a device with a resolution that is bigger than the screen size of the movie you are converting, the resulting movie screen size will not be made bigger (example: converting a DVD to a HD screen resolution). The reason for this is that up -scaling during conversion greatly reduces quality, and it also increases the time it takes to create the video file. Most video player applications automatically scale the video bigger, and do this more efficient and at better quality. By enabling this option, DVD Catalyst will increase the video screen size to the selected resolution.

*Convert only X minutes of each file. If you want to compare quality of a couple of settings, or perform a benchmark of some sorts, you can enable this to have DVD Catalyst create short conversions. All the other functionality (including monitor folders, remember files etc) are still used, so if you set DVD Catalyst up to run fully automatic, you can verify the functionality completely. Remember to disable this option when you are finished with testing though.

*Enable boosterpack. (only visible when the booster pack is is installed). If the DVD Catalyst booster pack is installed, and you run into issues of some kind, you can turn it off with this setting. With this setting disabled, DVD Catalyst will run with it’s original (slightly slower, but more compatible) conversion engine.

*Thread count. (only visible when the booster pack is is installed). The DVD Catalyst Booster pack can run a couple of conversion formats with multiple threads at once. A thread is basically a portion of the conversion, and by adjusting the thread count the conversion engine can make better use of additional cores or processors. The default 8 works fine on even older or limited computers.

*Save conversion status on close. If you use DVD Catalyst’ Auto shutdown feature (General tab) you can enable this option to have DVD Catalyst show you the last conversion status when you run it the next day. The “conversion status”, which is shown when a conversion is running, contains information about start time/stop time and conversion speed information for each individual converted item.

Cropping. Commonly known as black-bar removal. Cropping is used to remove black borders from DVD video content. Because DVDs were invented when Wide screen was not commonplace, the official DVD standard did not account for the different screen size of the video content in this format. To produce wide-screen content that conforms to the official square-screen DVD standard, black padding is added to top and bottom of the video, which effectively makes the movie screen size the proper size. Recent DVD players are capable to detect these black borders, and if they are set up to display content on a wide-screen TV, they can remove these borders to fill the screen.

When you convert a movie, these black borders are, because they are part of the video, actually converted as well. When we remove these black borders, the video section itself ends up smaller, and thus the quality is improved throughout the section that is left. What many people do not realize is that if you have a file that does not have black borders, but you play it on a device that uses a different screen kind (wide screen movie on a square screen device for example) the video player itself actually adds black borders to the video to fill the screen. Because of this, DVD Catalyst offers a couple of different kinds of black bar removal options.

*No cropping. This leaves the video section unmodified. If there are black borders as actual part of the video, they will also end up in the created video file.

*Remove black bars from file. This removes the video padding from the original file during conversion, but leaves the actual video section of the video unmodified. When watched on a device with a different screen kind, it will still have black borders (unless you use the Zoom function on the player itself)

*Remove black bars from device. This removes the video padding from the original file during conversion, but will also cut of parts of the sides of the actual video part based on the selected screen size. This setting makes any kind of movie full screen on the selected screen size in the device profile, regardless of the screen kind. A wide-screen movie on a square-screen device, or a square-screen movie on a wide-screen device, it will always end up full screen.

*Fullscreen stretch. This removes the black borders from the original file during conversion, and then stretches the video to make it full screen on the selected device profile. You will not loose anything from the actual video content, but the video will look different, and depending on the selected device even distorted. A widescreen movie on a square screen device will have people appear longer and thinner, and a square screen movie on a wide screen device will have people look short and stubby. This setting is only recommended if you are converting video content of the same kind as the device screen.

*Add black bars to fit resolution. Required for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable HQ profiles. This setting adds black padding the the video to make it fit the exact selected resolution. Some devices (PS3, PSP) can only play content of a very specific screen size, and will not play it otherwise. The normal PSP profiles work fine with every crop-setting, however the HQ profile can only be played if it is exactly 720×480. anything bigger than 480×272 and different from 720×480 will not play.

Omnia users

by Carlos   from Dublin
on Apr 18, 2009

After testing all different software?s out there for converting movies to be played in Samsung Omnia device I have come to the conclusion that DVD Catalyst 3 is the only one which gives you the Omnia full video screen size 400×240. All the other software even though they are advertised for Omnia device, you never get a full video screen, you always get black stripes on top and on the bottom of the device screen, not matter whether you set screen size to 400×240 or not This is everything you get with Catalyst 3 for a very reasonable price. Give it a try and you won?t regret it

H264/AVC:

Pro:

Offers the best possible quality, format is the same as used in Bluray, as well as movies rented/purchased through iTunes.

Con:

Very processor-demanding to create as well as playback. Many recent devices, including the iPhone/iPods have an accelerator chip build-in to ensure a good performance

MPEG4 SP

Pro:

Fast, does not require much processor power to create/play back

Con:

Quality is not as good, requiring a larger file size for good results.

The iPhone specifications indicate that the device is capable of playback of H264 video at a maximum of 640×480 at 1500Kbps.

In fact, the maximum screen resolution suppored on an iPhone is 720×480, and the quality can exceed 1500Kbps as well.

The iPhone itself has a screen resolution of 480×320, so only when you use the TV-out feature of your iPhone (with a compatible dock) there really is no need to use the maximum settings.

On some community pages, people always mention to use the maximum, but really, if you watch video on your phone, wouldn’t you rather have a bunch of videos that are good quality than only a few that are perfect quality?

On an 8GB iPhone, I can fit almost 2 seasons of 24, or the first 14 James Bond movies at very good quality. If I would use the maximum settings, I might only be able to fit half a season of 24, or 5 movies.

iPhone full screen settings:

DVD Catalyst 3 has the capability to make any movie full screen on any device. Regardless what the resolution is.

To get full screen videos on your iPhone, follow these steps:

Start DVD Catalyst 3

Select Apple > iPhone (Standard) or Apple > iPhone (HQ) from the dropdowns on the left. The HQ profile is a little slower, but provides a slightly better quality.

Click on “Modify” right underneath the dropdowns, and make sure the screen size is set to 480×320.

In Modify, you can increase the audio quality to 160Kbps if you want, however, 128Kbps is good enough for our personal needs

If you desire, you can increase the video quality from 500Kbps to 700Kbps, but again, this is personal taste, going over 700 is barely noticable. If you use the HQ profile, you can use a 5% lower video quality setting to end up with the same quality as the Standard profile

If you are converting a movie with fast action scenes, changing the pass-option from 1 pass to 2 passes might help increasing the quality, but again, this is personal preference.2 passes is a bit slower with conversions, however, it can reduce”blocky” artifacts in most movies to a minimum.

In Global Settings, go to the “Conversion Tab” and make sure that “remove black bars from device” is enabled. This will remove black bars from the video, and adjust the sides of the movie to make it full-screen on your iPhone.

Start a conversion.

The above settings will make any DVD or video file appear in full-screen on your iPhone.

The above settings will make any movie full screen on your iPhone, however, in almost all cases, a small portion on the sides (for wide-screen movies) or from top and bottom (for standard definition movies) will be removed.

If you would like the option to decide during playback if you want full-screen or the full-movie, use the following settings:

Start DVD Catalyst 3

Select Apple > iPhone (Standard) or Apple > iPhone (HQ) from the dropdowns on the left. The HQ profile is a little slower, but provides a slightly better quality.

Click on “Modify” right underneath the dropdowns, and make sure the screen size is set to 720×320.  This is a custom resolution,only found in DVD Catalyst 3, which enables it to create video files of a better quality when you use the Zoom function for video on the iPhone. The resolution height is set to the height of the iPhone screen, and the width is set to the maximum it can accept.

In Modify, you can increase the audio quality to 160Kbps if you want, however, 128Kbps is good enough for our personal needs

For the selected resolution, it is recommended to use a video quality of 700Kbps or higher, going over 1000 is barely noticable. If you use the HQ profile, you can use a 5% lower video quality setting to end up with the same quality as the Standard profile

If you are converting a movie with fast action scenes, changing the pass-option from 1 pass to 2 passes might help increasing the quality, but again, this is personal preference.2 passes is a bit slower with conversions, however, it can reduce”blocky” artifacts in most movies to a minimum.

In Global Settings, go to the “Conversion Tab” and make sure that “remove black bars from file” is enabled. This will remove black bars from the video. This, combined with the custom 720×320 resolution will result in video files that will not have black borders by themselves, however, when you view them on your iPhone, they most likely will have black borders. Tapping on the iPhone screen shows a “Zoom” button (arrows) on the right top side, which will zoom the video to full screen. For widescreen movies, the zoom will scale the video to it’s original size, and while it does not display the sides, zooming out will show the full movie (with black borders at top and bottom)

Start a conversion.

The above settings will make any DVD or video file appear in full-screen on your iPhone, or in full original width if desired.

To get the best results for video files if you use TV-Out on the iPhone, use the following settings:

Start DVD Catalyst 3

Select Apple > iPhone (Standard) or Apple > iPhone (HQ) from the dropdowns on the left. The HQ profile is a little slower, but provides a slightly better quality.

Click on “Modify” right underneath the dropdowns, and make sure the screen size is set to 720×480.  (while the official Apple specification for the iPhone states that the maximum resolution is 640×480, the iPhone actually accepts 720×480 and anything less than that)

In Modify, you can increase the audio quality to 160Kbps if you want, however, 128Kbps is good enough for our personal needs

For video quality, we recommend using 1200Kbps at least, but 1500Kbps is recommended

If you are using 1500Kbps, enabling 2-pass might result in unplayable files.

In Global Settings, go to the “Conversion Tab” and make sure that “remove black bars from file” is enabled. This will remove black bars from the video,enabling you to use the zoom function on the iPhone to make the video full screen or to have it look as the original.

Start a conversion.

Video quality is relative to the person who views the file. Combined with the above information, DVD Catalyst 3 offers many adjustments that can be made to get the best possible quality or the smallest files (more movies). Some people prefer to have the best possible quality, while others rather have enough on the device to ensure they have something to watch on a trip. The default settings for every device in DVD Catalyst 3 are selected based on a good quality vs a reasonable file size. Quality can always be better, but will also result in bigger file sizes.

DVD video has a fixed resolution.  To ensure DVDs play on even the first generation of DVD players, a DVD movie has to be created using the official standard. If it is not created in such a way that it is compliant with the standard, not all DVD players can play the DVD.

Because the DVD standard was initially created when wide-screen at home was still in its early stage, the DVD standard was based on 4:3 video content. An original movie or TV show would fill the screen completely on a classic, standard-definition TV. However, wide-screen became more mainstream, and to stay compliant with the DVD standard, wide-screen movies received black padding to fit within the DVD specifications.

Unlike most conversion utilities, DVD Catalyst automatically removes the embedded borders from the video, which improves the video quality. The black borders are actually part of the video, and when these are not removed, they will take up valuable space.

With the black bars removed, the video portion that is left does not have a common screen resolution anymore, and the actual size depends on the actual movie as well. There are a few different aspect ratios (the width of the actual widescreen movie) which greatly affect this. In addition. the video player screen also affect the amount of video that fills the screen.

This all sounds complicated, but lets use some pictures to see what this looks like.

This shows an example of Apple’s iPod Video (5G) with a widescreen video. The iPod uses a 4:3 screen aspect ratio, which is the same for many other devices, such as the most Zen and Zune devices. The black borders of the actual video have been removed, but when you play the video on your device, it will stillshow black borders.

The reason for this is that the video is scaled to fit within the device screen size, without changing the look of the video.

The next example shows a Sony PSP with a widscreen video. The PSP has an actual widescreen screen, which is similar to Apple’s iPhone and iPod Touch, as well as the newer Blackberry models and many more devices. The video fills the screen a lot more, but it still shows a bit of borders on top and bottom.

OK, so how do we make movies full-screen?

There are a few ways of doing this. The thing to keep in mind is that there will be a loss of something, either quality or part of the video itself.

1. Both video player devices in the screen shots have a “zoom” function (many other players have this as well). This will remove the black borders, by zooming in, and hiding the sides.

This is the recommended option, because you can decide if you want to watch the movie in it’s full glory (and accept the black borders) or watch the movie full screen. You can even switch back and forth.

2. DVD Catalyst 3 has a “remove black bars from device” option in Global Settings. This will remove black bars from the video, and if needed cut off parts of the sides of the video to make it full screen. Using this will make any movie or show full screen on any device, regardless the screen size or the video size. If you convert a widescreen movie for a non-widescreen device, it will cut off the sides, and if you convert a non-wide screen video for a wide-screen device, it will cut off the top and bottom a bit. Depending on the movie you can loose quite a bit of the video. For example using this option with a very wide Star Wars movie on a 4:3 device, you can loose more than half of the actual video. While movies and TV shows almost always keep the main plot in the center of the video, you will loose things that happen on the sides. If you convert for a Square-screen device, you will loose even more video.

3. DVD Catalyst 3 has a”Full screen stretch” option in Global Settings, which will remove the black bars, and stretch the video to make it full screen. The problem with this is that depending on the video size, people might appear to be taller and skinnier than usual.

So, if you are wondering why DVD Catalyst 3 shows it’s converting at a different screensize than the one you selected, the above should give you some insight on this.