Logo removal results. Opinions welcome

[Matt D]

I have been using DeLogo lately and have gotten some pretty good results. Here is the same frame before and after removing the sci-fi channels logo.





Is this the best it can do? It works incredibly well, but does leave some noise where the logo was, so there is some slight remnant that I can't seem to get rid of. At least the picture remains undistorted by blurring. Delogo is able to actually reveal what is covered by the logo!
Post some of your own results if you have some pics, and give advice on how to maximize results if you have any.

[yoda313]

Hello,

WOW! I'll have to try that on some of my videos. I knew you could add your own logo but I had no idea you could remove a logo THAT clearly! Thanks for the post. I'll do some tv captures and test it out.

Kevin

[cd090580]

Superb restoration.

I'll all try with a tv channel displaying a logo (MTV or MCM).

PS: Does this filter slows down a lot the process ????

[Matt D]

Thanks for the kind words so far. DeLogo does indeed get the job done. To answer your question cd090580, the removal process adds nearly nothing to the time needed to encode the video. Maybe 5 minutes for a 45 minute video.

All is not perfect though. Most of the video looks like above, but there is some noise left over that I can't get rid of and in some scenes this is the result.




As you can see the logo has been removed and the obscured bits restored, but depending on the color of the area the noise becomes pretty evident. Still better than the full-on logo, but not nearly as good as the rest of the video.
I'm hoping that this is due to something I'm not doing, and that someone might have some ideas, but if not I am still happy with the results. Even if the ghost of the logo pops up once in awhile I still prefer it to having the logo blotting out some of my screen all the time.

[babyboo]

Is Delogo a VD filter or an Avisynth?

[cd090580]

It's a Virtualdub Filter.

Here is my results (it's a letterboxed video at svcd resolution 480*576)



A 10 seconds video is processed by delogo in +/- 9 minutes. So it's a very slow filter.

I will try with an alpha blended logo to see how it can remove it.

[lgh529]

I have gotten some of the same results, but you have to keep in mind that on a moving video, the noise left by the filter is often pretty distracting. In most cases, I have left the logo on because it was less noticeable.

But that's just me.

[lordsmurf]

That's what I was going to say. I'd rather have a less distrracting logo than something that looks like growing life on screen.

[Cyrax9]

Matt D--

I'd like to see your settings! I can;'t stand the way stations have decided to "burn" thier logos into all shows now and if they don't "burn" them in, they make them "Dance" (These are more annoying, try atching Children' TV or any show when they fel the need to bug it with an ad, then go insane waiting for the DVD Release!) so if you could take a screen cap of the settings I'd like to try them out on some older videos and stuff from ABC where the Logo is obnoxius. I can handle a circle of pixelation much more than I can take the letters ABC over my screen, and ABC Family and Toon Disney need thier logos to DIE! >< I don't even nt to mentrion SpikeTV or UPN's "Lok at me! I Dance!!" Logos but I have too the FCC Should mandatea time limit on Logos, I knwo what station I'm watching and if it's a theft-detterant device, then it's a badf one. They say they can invisibly mark Video now (To the human eye anyway) and if that's the case DO IT! But stop uglying up my screen! ARGH! I swear, Stations ID's are mandated for every hour or half hour I eblieve. if that's the case start the show with you're watching (Channel here) followed by the station's tagline and then thorw up a ratings screen (A la HBO) and make the ONLY watermark on the video the same one on my Star Trek: Voyager DVD's! The Little "CC" Logo that's always been there! I don't mind that, I mind almost needing a sign that says "Youre show is bakc here" and having a quarter of a screen covered by a ratings bug, well that's another rant... ANy good work Matt! I REALLY want to see your settings!

[HillJack]

All is not perfect though. Most of the video looks like above, but there is some noise left over that I can't get rid of and in some scenes this is the result.

I'm hoping that this is due to something I'm not doing, and that someone might have some ideas, but if not I am still happy with the results. Even if the ghost of the logo pops up once in awhile I still prefer it to having the logo blotting out some of my screen all the time.

I doubt it's anything you're not/doing, I've seen it too -- especially on red or backgrounds that have slight hints of red in them. I've never been able to overcome it, and I've learned to live with it too, since I prefer no logo/some artifacts versus the original logo.

And some of today's logo's are getting so big, I enjoy removing the station logo's almost as much as selecting the commercials in VirtualDub and hitting the DEL key

Here's an old screenshot of how mine was working...



Not great, there is some noise leftover, but that was about a year ago, and I've since updated/refined my mask's The best thing with DeLogo is being able to save your mask files... Once you catch your show with a good selection of pure-black and pure-white (or as close as possible) backgrounds and get a good mask, save them and just use them over and over.

[yoda313]

Hello,
I have to admit I don't use virtual dub much if at all. I've been trying this delogo stuff and it looks promising. My question is how do you process with the filter on??? (I know that must be obvious but my capture card records in mpeg so I don't use virtualdub).

Also, can virtualdub-mpeg2 save the output file in .mpg? That would save me extra conversion time. Thanks for any help.
Kevin
P.S. Sorry for the dumb question, it didn't seem obvious in the guide I used (though I was able to see the preview with the removed logo, it just didn't save it in the divx file I made).

[adam]

I used to use a VDub filter called Logo Remover that worked pretty well. Unless DeLogo is just the updated name for it, give Logo Remover a shot. Maybe you'll get better results.

The thing with these filters is that it can't possibly be really effective over long periods of time unless you filter each scene independantly. The filters give you the option of using different algorithms, like blending horizontally, vertically, etc... On some scenes one way will work best and on others it will be different. For tv captures, I'd personally just keep the logo. Your eye filters it out after a while, whereas you tend to notice that little (Predator-like) camoflauged area poping in and out in the filtered version.

[yoda313]

Hello,
Well I was finally able to get the filter to work (not sure how, it's 1:30am Eastern time now, lucky to be typing correctly ). It looks interesting on my first test.


The shots are from a Canadian comedy called Red Green. Sorry the shots aren't identical, that's tricky. The logo for the pbs station is difficult to trace so I might do better with another solid color logo. I'll keep trying, this looks interesting.

Also, is there a way to save in .mpg in virtualdub-mpeg2???
Kevin

[Matt D]

I'm glad that a few more people are trying this, we might get some good ideas on how to maximize results.

Kevin- No way for V-dub MPEG2 to save as an MPG. It will work on an MPG, but the only way to get the output is to frameserve to your encoder or save as AVI. Sorry bout that! Also, the filter is FAST if all you do is alpha blending. A TV episode usually takes 2:45min to encode without the filter and with the filter it took 2:53min.
Your result on the Red show is decent, but you need to work on getting the masks better. Use the auto analyzer to sample only the frames which contain the logo. If it's from frame 100-30000 make sure that those are the ONLY frames the filter analyzes. Also you may want to just cover the entire logo with a red box in your analyze BMP. DeLogo should be able to pick out what is logo and what is video.

Adam- I hear where you are coming from, but disagree. Sure there are times when the faint outline of the logo is visible, but 95% of the time it's just gone and the obscured video restored. If you are watching the actors faces or the action happening onscreen you won't see it at all. A friend of mine was watching some of my DeLogo'd Trek episodes and after about 10 minutes I said "can you see that logo?" He says "what logo?"

Lordsmurf- Gotta agree that replacing a logo with a patch of warping, shifting blur is not cool. Thankfully when you get the logo blended away there is no distortion. You can look right at the area repaired and barely see the logo, or not see it at all. Either way the screen is not shifting and warping. It's basically invisible on a TV from 6-8 feet away like most people view TV, but even from 8 inches away on a monitor it looks fantastic. Personally I find logo's pretty distracting, and would rather not see it at all if I had a choice.

Cyrax9- My settings aren't really all that exotic, I just worked on my masks until I got them right and now I can just load those up and they will work on any show with the same logo. One option I do NOT use is the "Alpha to Repair". This just blurs out a spot that looks like your logo, and IMO that's not good. Leave this off and just alpha blend your logo away. Takes some time, but once your masks work you are golden.

[yoda313]

Hello,

Matt D-Kevin- No way for V-dub MPEG2 to save as an MPG. It will work on an MPG, but the only way to get the output is to frameserve to your encoder or save as AVI. Sorry bout that! Also, the filter is FAST if all you do is alpha blending. A TV episode usually takes 2:45min to encode without the filter and with the filter it took 2:53min.
Your result on the Red show is decent, but you need to work on getting the masks better. Use the auto analyzer to sample only the frames which contain the logo. If it's from frame 100-30000 make sure that those are the ONLY frames the filter analyzes. Also you may want to just cover the entire logo with a red box in your analyze BMP. DeLogo should be able to pick out what is logo and what is video.

Thanks for writing. I think part of my problem on the pbs logo is its VERY faint. If I can get a screen capture of it over a completely black background than I should be able to trace it much more clearly. I'll give your suggestions a try.

I'm interested in capturing a movie that I have off tv that has those weather storm warning boxes on it. It's on the whole movie. If I can remove that I'll post my results. Its a pretty large graphic so I may not get a clean removal.

Oh well, it's a shame I can't preserve the mpg file as is. I'll just have to reencode it (a long process on a sub 1ghz pc). Thanks for starting this thread
Kevin

[fritzi93]

Also, can virtualdub-mpeg2 save the output file in .mpg? That would save me extra conversion time. Thanks for any help.

Well, you can, kind of, with YMPEG. It's promising but needs more work, although when I tried it some time ago, it was quite fast. Going by recent comments on this tool, the latest version is not quite satisfactory yet. After you install it, it's in your VDub video compression list, configurable. As a practical matter, though, no, you can't, not yet.

[yoda313]

Hello,
fritzi93- Thanks for the suggestion. However, if it's still essentially a prototype I'll stick with the tried and true divx - dvd method. Have a nice day.
Kevin

[yoda313]

Hello,
I tried the delogo again. I'm starting to get the hang of it. I redid my logo map. This time I blotted out the entire block of logo instead of individual letters. The filtered screen shot is a little blurry, I guess I should have set the bitrate higher on the divx dub .

Kevin

EDIT - I shrunk the resolution this time. I should have done that to make it easier to see on my other post, sorry.

[richdvd]

Not to hijack but....Red Green..lol
Americans think he is funny?

[Tommyknocker]

Anyone care to write a user manual, or is the purpose of this is to blow one's own horn?

[yoda313]

Hello,
Here's the manual:
http://neuron2.net/delogo132/delogomanual/delogo.htm

richdvd-Not to hijack but....Red Green..lol
Americans think he is funny?

Are you being sarcastic or serious? I love him. He's just got a great offbeat humor. I live in Plymouth, Michigan which is west of Detroit (which is next door to Windsor, Canada).

I like the physical comedy and many of the outdoor jokes. It's just a zany show. I don't know if all Americans like him but many do. In fact, on the Red Green Duct Tape Forever dvd (the movie - which, by the way, my family and I drove to Windsor to see) shows American PBS viewers supporting and acting as extras in the movie!

So there, many Americans do like Red Green.
Kevin

[Tommyknocker]

Thank you very much, Yoda313, and no, you are not sp old to young eyes.

[yoda313]

Hello,

Tommyknocker-Thank you very much, Yoda313, and no, you are not sp old to young eyes.

Glad to help. If you need some clarification on the procedure, just ask. By the way, what is sp?? I'm still relatively new to forum speak so if this is some abbreviation I should know please pass it on
Kevin

[Tommyknocker]

Hello,

Tommyknocker-Thank you very much, Yoda313, and no, you are not sp old to young eyes.

Glad to help. If you need some clarification on the procedure, just ask. By the way, what is sp?? I'm still relatively new to forum speak so if this is some abbreviation I should know please pass it on
Kevin

A misspelling, I'm afraid, and one too many Star Wars to boot:
"Am I so old to young eyes?"

[yoda313]

Hello,
Tommyknocker- Got it! Actually, wasn't it "Am I so old to young eyes?" Or were you just making fun of it?

No problem either way. Enjoy delogo. It's tricky but can produce good results.
Kevin

EDIT -- IGNORE THE BOLD! I reread your post, sorry!

[deckard8]

Here's another virtualdub filter that looks promising >

http://www.compression.ru/video/subtitles_removal/index_en.html

[dphirschler]

Not to hijack but....Red Green..lol
Americans think he is funny?

Not this one. But to each his own.


Darryl

[dphirschler]

Back on the subject of logo removal...

I once had to patch the ending of one of my favorite shows, The PJs, from another tape. The problem was that the whole episode I had on tape was aired on FOX. The second tape was a WB airing. No automatic filters would do the job on the WB logo, so I exported the last ten seconds to bmp files. Then I used the grayscale mask of the WB logo (taken from a dark scene) and manually removed the logo frame by frame. Each frame used the same mask, but had different saturation and transparency settings. The removeal was near perfect. Then to complete the transformation, I applied the FOX logo where the WB one had been (this I did automatically. I even faded the FOX logo out right before the end credits. I don't remember what I did for credits. I think I had a crummy tape from a FOX airing that I used for that after heavy use of filters (OK for credits, not the main program).

It was a lot of work, but it turned out great. What a pain though!


Darryl

[Garibaldi]

I have tried to use some logo removal programs a bit. This is a little off topic but I see some of you like Trek. I like all the variations of Trek too. I was wondering if you have watched some other scifi shows like Babylon 5, Stargate Sg-1, Stargate Atlantis, Sliders, Farscape. I reccomend them if you haven't. You probably already know this but for filters for virtual dub, go to:
http://neuron2.net/
You can make your own picture in picture with virtual dub and movie maker too which is really cool! This guide shows you how:
http://www.eicsoftware.com/PapaJohn/MM2/MM2-DoAmazingThings-Chapter2-EffectsAndTransitions.html

[stilettoFUS]

I've been working on various methods for removing this logo, with some success - anyone have any good suggestions? My biggest problem is with the "O."