Moth3r said:
From the screenshots posted above, it looks like it's only the bottom that has been cropped. It probably wouldn't be that obvious if it weren't for the subtitles, which is disappointing. Not knowing much about 16mm film - is this just a badly cropped print or do you often find 16mm transfers that are over-cropped?

Well, this is the first time I've worked with a feature film. All of the other films I've worked with were the myriads of small, instructional, or special films. So I can't say if this is normal. But it's pretty clear that at least these 16mm prints of SW were done very sloppily. Besides the cropping at the bottom, there are missing frames, audio glitches ("thank the maker" is "nk the maker" and had to be fixed).

Moth3r said:
That's because the DV codec only supports resolutions of 720x576 for PAL and 720x480 for NTSC - however, I assume your final resolution will be 720x480 anyway for DVD authoring.

If you are going the AviSynth processing route, just add the following to the end of the script:

Spline36Resize(720, 362)
AddBorders(0, 59, 0, 59)

This will give you a 2.35:1 image letterboxed for a 16:9 anamorphic NTSC DVD. Adjust to suit your source, but note that the final resolution must remain 720 by 480 (= (2 x 59) + 362).

Wow, thank you so much! I will be taking primarily the AviSynth route. I didn't know that DV only supported 720x480, but that explains everything. This is honestly the first time I will have worked with something widescreen, so I hope you'll understand my periodically asking remedial questions.