Ntsc subtitles pixellated

hey all,
i'm having a major issue with the quality of subtitles that i made within DVD SP. I am working on a feature film and needed to send NTSC copies to some american distribution companies. So i created the dvd files, then did the subtitles in DVD SP and on the simulator everything looked totally fine and dandy...then once the dvd was made i tested it in my laptop again all was fine, though the position of the subtitles had dropped but quality and visibility was still grand. However i have since heard that when the dvd was played in a DVD player over in america that the subtitles had spread out, being cut off at the sides, and that they were massively pixellated and not clear enough to read.
Hope someone out there can help! Anything at all that could even slightly fix this issue would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks a million,
Esther x

he's already gotten the PAL audio files and they are the same duration
and waveform as the NTSC audio files ...
Yes, correct. There should be no difference between the audio files used
for PAL or NTSC vision - sound stays the same & files should be identical
(as long as you haven't changed anything else).
... 25fps. It adjusts by dropping any frames over 25 and setting that
mark to 25 frames or 00.
Assuming you do mean 'setting that mark to 24 frames or 00' (you never
get 25 in PAL), his technique for changing the timecodes of the
subtitles should be OK. Your subtitles will always show within (a
maximum of about) a fifth of a second from where originally placed -
which should be close enough.
Try the following 3 examples:-
NTSC T/C - Your 'appprox' - Actual PAL T/C - difference
01:05:01:00 - 01:05:01:00 - 01:05:01:00 - none
01:05:08:15 - 01:05:08:15 - 01:05:08:12 - 100ms
01:05:12:25 - 01:05:13:00 - 01:05:12:21 - 166ms

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Message was edited by: editgrrl
Message was edited by: editgrrl

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Message was edited by: editgrrl

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Is it best first to transcode all the source material to a single codec, with a common frame rate and pixel aspect ratio?
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Resolution for graphics

Hi everyone,
I have some confusion as far as the proper resolution for graphics...
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4:3 is not 720x480 yet a 4:3 DV video is 720x480.. so I am confused.
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If you want to make a pixel-for-pixel graphics then you should compose it from the ground-up with 720x480. Then there is no scaling involved. You can make Photoshop use the NTSC 4:3 DV aspect ratio 4320:4739 = ~0.912 so you see the correct aspect ratio while making the graphics.
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http://www.sjoki.uta.fi/~shmhav/SVCDon_a_Macintosh.html#aspectratios
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http://www.iki.fi/znark/video/conversion/

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The company I work for has been filming in 16:9 for a while now but has been still editing and exporting in 4:3. We decided recently to change everything to 16:9. We are filming on a XL2 in 24p 16:9. Editing on various machines but using FCP 5.1.4. Having issues exporting. None of us have had training we just learned by doing and I want to check what I've done and see if I'm missing something.
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Perhaps this will help. Here's a brief description of the two output formats:
DV NTSC
720x480 pixels
10:11 (0.9090) pixel aspect ratio
resulting picture size 4:3
DV NTSC anamorphic
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40:33 (1.2121) pixel aspect ratio
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Does the 1280 X 720 indicate that it is definitely hi def?
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how is it possible to still have hi def, if the file is 1/9 the size of the original file?
For a watered down version of compression, some of the information for each pixel's RGB values are thrown out during the compression process. For example, in MPEG-2 compression (commonly used for DVD and broadcast TV), the first frame is an independent or "I" frame, containing all the data for each pixel's RGB value. The next 14 frames only contain the data for each pixel that changed from the I frame or from the previous frame. This group of 15 frames is known as a GOP (group of pictures). The 16th frame is another "I" frame and consequently starts another GOP.
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How to Batch Export Wide Still images

Hello,
I'm currently working on a project that uses Widescreen. I have no problems exporting the movie project to DVDstudio pro file, but when I try to Batch Export the Still Clips I took, it makes it into 4:3 size, rather than 16:9. Because of this, pictures look squished. How would I fix this since I didn't see any options in Batch Export for wide.
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As mentioned above, that is a possibility. You haven't said how you plan to use them. If quality is paramount I would advise against doing a "destructive" stretch on them unless you're moving them to a final definitive size as in web graphics. There's little enough resolution in SD video to start with.
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> I have converted their size to 720 x 540 in photshop
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Ntsc subtitles pixellated

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