Question / Help [Problem solved] OBS Studio captures a small window instead of fullscreen

N

Notpopular

New Member
Hello everyone,

I'm just getting started with OBS Studio 20.1.3 and with video capturing software in general. I'd like to capture and post video game longplays on Youtube. After I had some difficulties to get OBS working on my Lenovo Laptop because of the black screen issue due do nvidia graphic settings, I solved the problem thanks to a lot of help from this forum as well as other sources on the web.

Unfortunately, even though the video capturing works right now, it doesn't really work when capturing a video game. OBS just captures a small window on the upper left side instead of a fullscreen. The window shows the full screen of the video game but it's very small and not in the center of the file. When I capture my desktop, it just works fine. I tried to upload a video here, but its size is too big to be uploaded here.

Does anyone have some tips for me how to solve this problem? It doesn't matter if its a game which runs on Dosbox, steam, or via a separate installation.

I really appreciate your help. Thanks a lot.
 
N

Notpopular

New Member
Because I can't upload a video itself I upload a screenshot instead which shows what I mean with "small window instead of fullscreen". Hopefully someone has an idea what to do about it?
 

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  • Small Screen Problem.jpg
    Small Screen Problem.jpg
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Bugfragged

Bugfragged

New Member
Go to settings->video, where you can set your base (canvas) resolution and output (scaled) resolution. Do these values match your game's resolution? If not, try setting the base (canvas) resolution to match your game's resolution. The output (scaled) resolution should be set to match the game's resolution too, or at least have the same aspect ratio.

If that doesn't work, there are programs like Avidemux that can crop out the black part and leave only the small window.
 
N

Notpopular

New Member
Hi Bugfragged,

thx a lot. It helped and now it works (of course I had to change some settings in the config file of Dosbox specifically for Eye of the Beholder 1) but now I know why this problem occurs and how to fix it.

Again, thanks!
 
M

malko

New Member
Have exactly the same question...
Unfortunately did not find any settings allowing the 600x500 window to be outputted as is (600x500) without fitting the screen.
It is only outputted at 1920x1080 (screen resolution) with huge black borders :(

And did not find any help on the net, nor on the documentation (did I miss the page ?).

So I removed the huge black borders with "ffmpeg" :
check if the crop is correct with : ffplay -i <filename.mp4> -vf "crop=W:H:X:Y"
when you are ok, crop with : ffmpeg -i <filename.mp4> -filter:v "crop=W:H:X:Y" -c:a copy <output.mp4>

Any help is welcome to save directly from OBS at 600x500 (or any custom size).
Thanks in advance.
 
koala

koala

Active Member
Set the desired resolution as Base (Canvas) Resolution as well as Output Resolution in Settings->Video and make sure that you don't rescale the output in Settings->Output. After setting the Base Resolution, fit your source into the preview, so it all has the same resolution.
 
M

malko

New Member
Thank you koala for your answer.
This is what I did and understood from the various reading I have made.
OBS is great tool. What I don't understand is : why do we have to " fit " the source to a wider screen (the source windows is 600x500) in order to record it ?
The "Base (canvas)" has only two entries : 1920x1080 & 1280x720.
The Output (scaled)" has 10 entries but none correspond to my source window's size (the closest is 960x540).
And even if I " fit " my source to this output, I still have black borders of ~400 pixels on the right...
Don't know... So until I find a clue, ffmpeg will be of good help :)
 
koala

koala

Active Member
The Base and Output resolution entries are not limited to the values in the drop down lists. Click into the fields and manually type any resolution you want. The drop down list entries are only proposals and contain the most used standard resolutions.
 
M

malko

New Member
I am just an over warmed noodle. Ha ha ha :)

How did I miss it from the documentation, p 145 :
Output (Scaled) Resolution : defines main output resolution. Settings at Output (Scaled) Resolution will be used as input for Rescale Output operations. Custom resolution supported. Type new resolution in Width x Height format.
If you not sure, set Base (Canvas) Resolution = main input resolution (game resolution) = Output (Scaled) Resolution.
OBS Studio requires that the Output (Scaled) Resolution width is a multiple of 4 and Output (Scaled) Resolution height is a multiple of 2 in order to correctly process video data using SSE optimizations. Special encoding functions of FFmpeg itself, sometimes require width multiply of 32 to correctly process the videos.

Thank you koala. Will play around with this now :)
 
A

alcazar

New Member
Sorry to ask the same question yet again :(
Me is also new to OBS (have used other SW before) and its working as desired but the output video is too small as the other 2 here asked too
(although the screen to capture was fullscreen).
Me did change the resolution parameters as said above, the output is not rescaled and the preview "fit" - but no effect, the video still too small.
Dont know what to do to "fix" this.
Thanks.
 
A

alcazar

New Member
Windows Setting is normal (100%)
Heres the log (s. attachment)
 

Attachments

  • 2019-01-06 15-16-59.txt
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Suslik V

Suslik V

Active Member
@alcazar , Your video is 640x480 and you fit the selected Source to the screen which is running 1280x960. So, what do you mean by "...output video is too small..."? It should has similar proportions as source itself. Maybe you can make screenshot of the issue itself, when the source is selected for example?
 
A

alcazar

New Member
When recording its fullscreen but the video looks like then screenshot in #2.
As said above selected "Transform -> Fit to Screen" in the preview (and base scale 640x480 is checked in the preview scale menue).
 
Suslik V

Suslik V

Active Member
@alcazar set Preview Scale to Scale to Window thus you'll see whole canvas and the space that is occupied by your source. If your game running fullscreen, then it can change the resolution of the display device while on top.

Make screenshot of the OBS Studio and post it here.
 
C

ControlSphere

New Member
Advanced apologies for the newbie question. I've spent hours on this extremely simple problem and thought I'd post a question before trying some other screen capture software. I have my screen resolution set for 1980x1020. I have a full-screen application I want to capture. I have the OBS Base and Canvas resolution set for 1980x1020. I add a Window Capture source for my full-screen application and it only shows up in the upper left two-thirds of the preview screen.
1552295923110.png


I right-click on the Window Capture in the Source and select Fit to Screen and it moves the red box down a few pixels. Stretch to screen moves the right side of the red box a few pixels. Edit Transform shows Size of 1920x1051, if I change it to 1902x1080 nothing changes. I've tried all the permutations of "Bounding Box Type". If I switch to Preview Scaling To Canvas, then the image overflows the screen (and after transition, it still only fills the upper-left 2/3). I can alt-drag the red box to crop, but my mouse movement skills aren't accurate enough to get an exact fit (without loosing a few pixels on the side or having a few pixels of black on an edge). Its seems like this should be so simple ... capture an HD window to an HD screen video. What am I missing???? Thanks in advance.
 
Suslik V

Suslik V

Active Member
@ControlSphere Right-click over the application you trying to capture and open Compatibility tab. Disable display scaling on high DPI settings option is your key to solve the problem. You running old application for high DPI display.

You may try this test build instead and tell if it works any way better for you (it was just an experimental feature, so no tests were performed - use it on your own risk!): https://www.mediafire.com/file/nk6ja6snp1fjhy9/obs-studio-feb-10-2019.zip/file md5 of the zip:FA91432E0048E819E85F0FC631CDE670
 
I

ilovefwc

New Member
1590121815088.png



i don't get why it does that. the only way i'm able to fix it is if i make the window smaller like this.
1590121876252.png


i want it to look like that but fullscreen
 
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