I have an MKV file of the movie "Dirty Dancing" in standard definition and unfortunately, plex has misidentified the aspect ratio. It has identified the aspect ratio as 1.33:1 when it is in fact 1.85:1
When I play this file with any other media play such as Cyberlink's "PowerDVD" or Microsoft's "Movies & TV" it plays with the correct aspect ratio. Only Plex plays it with the incorrect 1.33 aspect ratio.
I would like to 1. ask that the plex devs please fix the bug and 2. ask if there is a way to force plex to play files with a particular aspect ratio.
How does the movie appear on the screen? Do you see black bars on the left & right when it should be widescreen, etc.
Based on your post, it appears you are viewing the movie on your PC monitor. Is it a standard 1080p or 4K monitor or something different, such as a 21:9 monitor?
It is possible Plex has analyzed the movie incorrectly. Please post the Plex Server’s XML information for the movie. Save the information as a .txt file or zip it before attaching. The forum does not support .xml attachments.
Please analyze the movie with MediaInfo and post the text output. This is a sanity check versus how Plex analyzes the movie. They should match.
It doesn’t mater which plex client that I use, they all play the movie with the wrong aspect ratio. No, I’m not using my PC monitor, I’m using a standard 16:9 TV. The problem ISN’T with the plex client (or my display device), but with the plex server. Of Course, I see black bars on the side, of the picture, that’s what happens when a 4:3 (1.33:1) image is displayed on a 16:9 (1.78:1)display. I’ve attached a screenshot of the media info page from within the plex server.
From what I can tell, the plex server must must only use the first few seconds of the video to determine the aspect ratio. In this case, the first few seconds of the video displays the logo of the company that released the DVD and the first few seconds of the video are indeed in the 4:3 aspect ratio. However, after that, the aspect ratio is supposed to change to 16:9, but plex doesn’t do that. As I mentioned in my previous post, other media players such as Cyberlink’s “PowerDVD” and Microsoft’s “Movies & TV” it plays correctly. Meaning that (unlike plex) they correctly change the aspect ration after the first few seconds.
P.S. I’ve done the standard Plex dance of deleting the file from my plex server, emptying the trash, cleaning the bundles, and then adding it back to the server. Needless to say, it did no good.
Plex uses the information encoded in the video file, instead of guessing.
Players like PowerDVD make some guesses, as well as dynamic cropping at playback time.
It’s very common for anamorphic or matted widescreen DVDs to have bad (or conflicting) aspect ratio data saved. Sometimes at the factory, often when ripped.
@FordGuy’s suggestion to post the XML and mediainfo output will be helpful.
After the movie starts, do you see bars on top and bottom as well?
Like you’re looking at a widescreen movie through a 4:3 window in the middle of your 16:9 TV?
I’ve an old DVD of The Hunt for Red October that behaves like that.
I ran it through Handbrake. It corrected the aspect ratio and also cleaned up some interlacing artifacts as well (it was a poorly produced DVD).
If I remember correctly, I had to manually tweak the cropping to have things display correctly. The forced Russian translation subtitles were displayed below the picture. If I burned them into the video and used default cropping, some of the subtitles were cut off.
The real fix was I picked up a used blu-ray release. It had a much better transfer quality and no aspect ratio issues.
