Wonderful Tom! A bug has bit me!

**greatflash** · April 10, 2008

Been looking in to this.. Please try to follow me here...

There is an issue with rendering video snaps in user emulation in vertical orientation!!!

Have been having lots of problems with vertically squashed Vectrex video snaps, so i have tried to find a solution to get them to display correctly (I failed.. <sniff>)

I took Emumovies vertical 1943 avi and renamed it to bedlam.avi (still 360x480), and placed it in my Vectrex snap folder. In Gameex it plays Squashed just like all the other vectrex snaps..

I then took my original bedlam.avi file (424x566) renamed it to 1943.avi and placed it in the mame snaps directory - guess what? I renders perfectly?????

Ok, next step.. I then thought i would try another angle.. I recorded an .mng file from bedlam on the vectrex (mess) and checked that in Gameex in the vectrex snap folder, It is still vertically squashed (in the mame snap folder it is again perfect.)

So - Houston we have a problem...

This shows that tom may be using 2 different ways of rendering videos. one for mame and one for all user emulators. the one in mame displays correctly and the other emus try to re-format all clips to 4:3.... (no help when they should be 3:4)

Up untill tonight, I thought i must be doing something wrong - was getting myself all worked up, i stamped my feet a few times and had a little paddy!

This affects all the custom emulators i have tried. (including wmv9, xvid, mng, and various ffdswow). It is not a codec issue otherwise they would also be squashed in the mame snap folder, and they are perfect..

Cant remember ever having this problem before, so i wonder if it has crept into the latest build?

Hope there is an answer.......

your turn now all you 'Gameex ultra guru's'

**greatflash** · April 10, 2008

Can i really be the only one with this problem??

Tom - help me! Save my sanity (what sanity)

**bkenobi** · April 10, 2008

Well, I'm no expert on this problem, but I did just learn something interesting this week. In MAME snaps, GameEx keeps the aspect ratio of the clip the same as the aspect ratio the game plays at. So, if you have a 4:3 game with a 4:3 snap, it will work fine. If you have a 3:4 game and you download the emumovies horizontal version of the clip, it will get all squished up. If you want to avoid this with your clips, you need to use the vertical collection that is recorded without letter boxes in 3:4.

Other emulators don't show this information, so it wouldn't be available to GameEx, so if you have a 3:4 game, it will not know that it should be displayed in 3:4. Thus, it will stretch it to 4:3 as it thinks it should be. This is really only a problem (I think) if you set up any custom emu's that run arcade games. Consoles shouldn't matter since they are essentially all designed to run on 4:3 screens.

One solution would be using the MAME_Loader script that I posted a couple days back. This will allow you to launch multiple custom emulators using the MAME set and they will appear in a single menu. It could still use more extensive testing, but I think it works...

**greatflash** · April 10, 2008

Well, I'm no expert on this problem, but I did just learn something interesting this week. In MAME snaps, GameEx keeps the aspect ratio of the clip the same as the aspect ratio the game plays at. So, if you have a 4:3 game with a 4:3 snap, it will work fine. If you have a 3:4 game and you download the emumovies horizontal version of the clip, it will get all squished up. If you want to avoid this with your clips, you need to use the vertical collection that is recorded without letter boxes in 3:4.
Other emulators don't show this information, so it wouldn't be available to GameEx, so if you have a 3:4 game, it will not know that it should be displayed in 3:4. Thus, it will stretch it to 4:3 as it thinks it should be. This is really only a problem (I think) if you set up any custom emu's that run arcade games. Consoles shouldn't matter since they are essentially all designed to run on 4:3 screens.
One solution would be using the MAME_Loader script that I posted a couple days back. This will allow you to launch multiple custom emulators using the MAME set and they will appear in a single menu. It could still use more extensive testing, but I think it works...

It does seam like a lot of trouble for what is essentially only one emulator.. It would be ideal to have an option (default to Horizontal) that you could change to vertical on an emulator by emulator basis, or failing that - just to have the video preview maintain the original aspect ratio when scaled. This really should not be a difficult task as it only needs to check the x y dimensions and scale accordingly.

This must also affect the other arcade based emulators that use the vertical orientation. It would make GameEx a more complete package it ratio was maintained by default.

Can you please add a link to your script and i will investigate that option...

Quick note to Tom - Donation on the way if you can sort this minor (but frustrating) problem

It is a shame that this happens as it detracts from the overal presentation of the complete front end. As i'm sure all agree, it is so rewarding when you have all your emu's set up with video pre's and flick between them. Also great when you use the search function to look for a game (manic miner for example) and then look through the video snaps of the changes in the various formats - oh! that reminds me of another thing, if you then go to run a game from a search, your custom backgrounds are not shown, as in - it shows the same custom background in all emulators selected from the search results (this has prob. been mentioned before i'm sure)

**bkenobi** · April 10, 2008

MAME_Loader script

**Tom Speirs** · April 11, 2008

Quick note to Tom - Donation on the way if you can sort this minor (but frustrating) problem

Aha, bribes! That helps I must be getting old though, id finding it harder to read long posts. Eventually Ill have to start priting them out first

Seriously Bkenobi is right, for MAME GameEx knows if the system is horizontal and vertical, and gameex displays it accordingly. At the timeof implenting all MAME snaps and vidoes available where encoded in the right aspect ratio.

For emulators GameEx displays them proportionaly. Maybe thats not working right. Are you saying your using GameEx with the screen rotated? Like I said I might be getting old but I dont entirely follow what you said. Perhaps if you post or send me the video it might help?

**greatflash** · April 11, 2008

Aha, bribes! That helps I must be getting old though, id finding it harder to read long posts. Eventually Ill have to start priting them out first
Seriously Bkenobi is right, for MAME GameEx knows if the system is horizontal and vertical, and gameex displays it accordingly. At the timeof implenting all MAME snaps and vidoes available where encoded in the right aspect ratio.
For emulators GameEx displays them proportionaly. Maybe thats not working right. Are you saying your using GameEx with the screen rotated? Like I said I might be getting old but I dont entirely follow what you said. Perhaps if you post or send me the video it might help?

Nice to hear from you tom..

I am using a horizontal screen, but the video snaps i need to display are vertical. These are video''s of the Vectrex system (remember that?). What happens is that the videos are quashed vertically. It makes no difference what resolution they are in, as long as the Y resolution is larger than the X. If this is the case then the Y resolution is reduced it is less than the X. If hope you follow.

A really quick way to show this is to take a vertical mame snap from mame (1943.avi) and rename it to ANY existion snap in any emultor and place it in that emulators snap folder, when then viewed in Gameex the origonaly perfect snap is squashed.

All the emus do this by default (as you stated)

I would like the video snaps to retain the original ratio (or have a way of telling gameex what ratio they are in)

The bribe is still on offer!

Hope you followed all that - tried to make it shorter and i believe i failed

Go Tom Go!

**bkenobi** · April 11, 2008

Ahhhh, I see the problem. There is at least one console that WAS vertical!

**greatflash** · April 11, 2008

Ahhhh, I see the problem. There is at least one console that WAS vertical!

And other arcade emulators you may wish to add...

And, and, and, there are others, um, um, that one that came out that no-one has ever heard of and that i did not make up! i think it was called the 'toshy fiction zx+ 6'.. Ah-ha, see - that's got ya!

anyway.. The vectrex is such a lovelly machine and it WOULD be really nice to have the snaps displayed in the correct aspect.. honest..

I have found a work around. all i did was rotate all my snaps 90 degrees, and then all i have to do is to lay on the floor when browsing the front end, and just stand up when i wish to play a game... Works a treat!

Oh well - PLEASE TOM, let me have my snaps correctly displayed, poor me is getting back ache from all this sitting/standing.

Cheers!

**bkenobi** · April 11, 2008

I have found a work around. all i did was rotate all my snaps 90 degrees, and then all i have to do is to lay on the floor when browsing the front end, and just stand up when i wish to play a game... Works a treat!

See, you didn't really need Tom's help after all! You were just wasting his time...

**greatflash** · April 11, 2008

Ahhhh, I see the problem. There is at least one console that WAS vertical!

See - It's lovely!!!

Excellent version of Scramble on it BTW

**bkenobi** · April 12, 2008

Just a thought about your aspect ratio problem. Have you considered re encoding the videos to include vertical letterboxes? I consider this a temporary fix and it might be a bit of work, but it could make things look better in the short term (until Tom fixes it).

This thread talks about a way to go the opposite direction, but I bet it would work for you. I don't know how many Vectrex games there are, so this might be daunting to accomplish...

**greatflash** · April 12, 2008

Just a thought about your aspect ratio problem. Have you considered re encoding the videos to include vertical letterboxes? I consider this a temporary fix and it might be a bit of work, but it could make things look better in the short term (until Tom fixes it).
This thread talks about a way to go the opposite direction, but I bet it would work for you. I don't know how many Vectrex games there are, so this might be daunting to accomplish...

Yes, that would be easy to do, and it would be a workaround of sorts, but it is not really what i want. I really want the Snaps to work as in Mame.. that would be perfection..

Thanks for the note though..

This is GameEx and this is the greatest front end, and i have faith in Tom, also the $1000 donation would help i'm sure (hold on, my decimal point is not working - oh well)

I think i will just wait. (the dot is working again - hurrah)

Cheers

**greatflash** · April 12, 2008

This does not just affect my beloved vectrex, it also affects multi screen games, ie. Darius 2 and Darius (and a few others) in mame. At the moment you have to have black borders on the top and bottom to put it back to 4:3. Without them Darius2 vid snap becomes squashed horizontally to correct the ratio to 4:3..

With true ratio corrected snaps it would alway retain the original aspect regardless of whether borders were added or not.. It would no longer matter.

It would be ideal to have an option in the display config to enable/disable aspect correct snaps.. I would not think it would make an impact on frontend performance as direct x would handle it the same as it does now. All is needed it a snap dimension check before playback to check the relationship between x and y resolutions and set a x/y scale accordingly..

**bkenobi** · April 12, 2008

In order to do that, I suspect Tom would have to poll the metadata from the video to determine the aspect ratio prior to displaying it. Maybe it's simpler than that and he can just take the video size and shrink it so that it fits in the 4:3 region of the theme. I don't know, but I agree that displaying the video in it's original ratio would be good.

**emphatic** · April 12, 2008

In "MAME mode", when creating the gamelist, GameEx lifts the vertical/horizontal info from mameinfo.dat I think. Perphaps the emulator listfiles should be expanded to include this info as well. Or like I suggested in the 'feature requests' thread, with a checkbox Vertical Yes|No in emulator setup.

Emph

**bkenobi** · April 12, 2008

Interesting. I hadn't considered that the whole emu could be set up as vertical or horizontal. That would work I suppose.

**greatflash** · April 12, 2008

Interesting. I hadn't considered that the whole emu could be set up as vertical or horizontal. That would work I suppose.

I still think a ratio corrected option offers the best flexibility. This way snaps in mame would all be perfect (bearing in mind the various system boards use quite different resoulutions, including the multi-screen games. what happens when tx-1 emulates all 3 screens - BIG borders!)

As an ex-programmer myself, it is not a hard thing to do. If needs just three resolution compares. X>Y Y>X X=Y, and modifying output ratio in relation to the themes snap window resolution. Direct x can happily do the rest!

**greatflash** · April 14, 2008

Tom, another (sort-of) request posted http://www.gameex.info/forums/index.php?showtopic=5336

I have to keep trying as it is my only gripe with gameex :)

**Tom Speirs** · April 14, 2008

Your request in this thread was actually fixed yesterday by me. It will be in the next release.

**Tempest** · April 14, 2008

Quick note to Tom - Donation on the way if you can sort this minor (but frustrating) problem

**Tom Speirs** · April 14, 2008

Yeah too right. Show me the money

**greatflash** · April 14, 2008

Your request in this thread was actually fixed yesterday by me. It will be in the next release.

You little bag of cuddly puppies... Well done tom! you are a star!! (Me got big grin on me face now!!)

Just sent ('A gift for Tom') via paypal - Please don't waste it all on women and fast cars, It's a nasty slope to ruin.. What I suggest is to open a high interest savings account and invest it.. Who knows, in ten or twenty years - it may have earnt a pound..

Cheers!

**Tom Speirs** · April 14, 2008

You little bag of cuddly puppies... Well done tom! you are a star!! (Me got big grin on me face now!!)
Just sent ('A gift for Tom') via paypal - Please don't waste it all on women and fast cars, It's a nasty slope to ruin.. What I suggest is to open a high interest savings account and invest it.. Who knows, in ten or twenty years - it may have earnt a pound..
Cheers!

Cheers!

Im off down the pub then

**Brian Hoffman** · April 14, 2008

Cheers!
Im off down the pub then

Hahaha great work Tom.. Enjoy that beer

Wonderful Tom! A bug has bit me!

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