Advice on converting and improving SD video to HD

[wyclef]

Hey, I had taken a video of a relative on 8mm years ago, and then copied that source material to DVD... standard definition 4:3... now I'd like to improve the quality of the video and somehow bring it to HD and 16:9 and am just wondering where to begin. Can I use Adobe After Effects for this? That's the program I'm most comfortable using but also have Final Cut and other Creative Suite applications. Advice would be appreciated. Unfortunately I don't have my 8mm camera so I'd like to just work with the DVD material. The video could use some color correction and improvements... I've never done anything like this before so go easy on me. Thanks.

[edDV]

By 8mm do you mean Video8, Hi8 or Digital8 ?

First you are not going to be able to improve resolution to HD. Best you can do is remaster a better DVD from the original tape. You can color correct the DVD source but at a quality loss through the recode process. Any crop of 4:3 to 16:9 will significantly lower resolution.

Best to start with a pro dub of the original tape to DV format.

Also see this thread
https://forum.videohelp.com/threads/330459-Few-questions-Upscale-SD-to-HD

[poisondeathray]

AE doesn't include a native upscaler, you can purchase 3rd party ones .e.g. red giant instant hd advaced, topaz enhance

You can look to other programs as well e.g. avisynth (free) , video enhancer, or even single frame upscalers (photozoom, genuine fractals)

I have tried all of them at one point or another, and honestly, you won't get much benefit upscaling (you cannot create more details, just reduce aliasing artifacts from simple scaling algorithms)

However, if you have other issues (e.g. color correction, noise etc...) there may be other approaches. You have to be more specific about what's wrong or provide a sample and others will provide suggestions

As edDV suggests above, the better the starting source, the better your final results. If you can start with the original source it would be ideal

[wyclef]

Hi8. I checked out Red Giant Instant HD Advanced site but they said that they discontinued it because there is better software like Compressor which I have but can't figure out how to use. So you're point is that it might be better to try and just remaster an SD DVD again and let the players do the upscaling?

[poisondeathray]

It would depend on the quality of your hardware upscaler, and how much effort you want to put in

If you have a poor upscaler, then software might be better. Slow software algorithms are often better (in terms of reducing aliasing) than cheap hardware upscalers

It depends on the content too. For things like live action (if this is of a family member), the poor upscaling aliasing can actually add false detail and can sometimes look better. For things like smooth animation, the aliasing artifacts can look very distracting

[jagabo]

Infognition's web site has some useful examples of different upscalers:

http://www.infognition.com/articles/video_resize_shootout.html

Obviously, they've chosen shots which show their software in the best light. But it will give you some idea of what can be achieved. MPEG compressed video will be less amenable to upscaling. Also be aware that many algorithms that look good with still images will give annoying buzzing edges with motion video.

One really good thing about that comparison is they start with real high definition video, downscale it, then upscale the downscaled intermediate. So you can see both how the different upscaling algorithms compare to each other, and how they compare to real high definition video. You'll see that none of the algorithms comes close to real HD.

[wyclef]

i could provide some sample video but would prefer to do so privately as it's of a relative of mine.

[edDV]

Hi8. I checked out Red Giant Instant HD Advanced site but they said that they discontinued it because there is better software like Compressor which I have but can't figure out how to use. So you're point is that it might be better to try and just remaster an SD DVD again and let the players do the upscaling?

If you want to re-filter (e.g. color correct) it is better to work from a fresh DV or HUFFYUV transfer from the source tape. I'd save it as DV or HUFFYUV (uncorrected) as your archive. You may want to revisit the archive in future years when software improves.

From there you can color correct and/or apply other filters, then encode a 480i DVD and experiment with upscale software. Then compare your upscale results to your DVD player and HDTV upscale. Play your encoded DVD on the DVD player, play the DV archive or MPeg2 file to the TV as 480i, and your upscale as 1280x720p/59.94 or 1920x1080i/29.97. Compare the results for motion, edge artifacts and overall sharpness. Pay particular attention to motion behavior.

This will be a long term experiment as software improves and when you buy new players and HDTV sets with improved hardware upscalers.

[PuzZLeR]

I agree with edDV in that it's really a project that will benefit in the future.

Current upscalers (SD->HD) at the encoding level aren't very effective, only really cosmetic, and the "decent" ones are very slooooooooooooowwwwwwwww.... and will produce an HD result that won't really fool many into thinking it's real HD from real HD source. (Kind of like alot of those phony "HD" videos on YouTube...)

Fractals look promising for the future, but again, it's still a developing art, and our current processors are just too slow for what we have today anyway.

Also keep in mind, going from true 4:3 -> true 16:9, without adding any black banding, will introduce distortion.

I say stick with DvD for SD today, but keep the Source.

[wyclef]

sounds like a plan. so, does anyone have any tips for improving SD video?

[poisondeathray]

Yes, definitely archive the original digital copy



It would be better if you could provide "safe sample" publically e.g. a section that doesn't have your relative if you want to keep that private

The reason is more heads are better than 1. There are a few people who visit here that do professional restorations , so if you can provide a "safe sample", you may get better suggestions

Also, most people here use PC based workflows and applications, but you appear to be on a MAC. You may get better input in the MAC subforum on specific workflow



Another potential benefit, if you plan to go to HD on blu-ray is that you can use higher bitrates and better compression technology (AVC).

This , of course, will depend on the quality and nature original source content . Often DVD-video will be pixellated because of MPEG2 restrictions on bitrate @ <9.8Mb/s . So even if you decide to stay SD but use blu-ray media you can use higher bitrates than DVD-video will allow (i.e SD blu-ray vs. DVD-video). You would need a blu-ray player , HTPC, or PS3 to play this. But if you are starting from the DVD source, you will gain little to no benefit, the damage is already done

If you decide to upscale to progressive HD, this will require deinterlacing. So if you're going to a pillarboxed 1280x720p60 , you would need to bob deinterlace and upscale. And for this avisynth is hands down the best for this. If you're on a mac, you're out of luck unless you use a virtualization or another computer

[PuzZLeR]

sounds like a plan. so, does anyone have any tips for improving SD video?

I would say the best for this is AviSynth like I know PDR would say too. But if you're on a Mac, I can't help you much, since I don't think AviSynth is there (yet).

But if you do indeed want to experiment with AviSynth, or get suggestions, keep in mind much of it will be subjective. But if you want my recommendations, find your sweet spot of deblocking, grain, sharpening, tweaking, etc.

If you want to deinterlace, use QTGMC. If that's too slow for you, then use YadifMod and Nnedi3 for something quite decent.

[budwzr]

I just shot a funeral yesterday with mixed SD and HD. I let the SD material play in its own space and at its native resolution, and put some flowers on the side to balance it out, or you could put some text to sort of narrate the show too.

There are other "off-label" ways to do things too, depending on how much creative license you want to use.

[PuzZLeR]

I let the SD material play in its own space and at its native resolution, and put some flowers on the side to balance it out, or you could put some text to sort of narrate the show too.

Just curious. Are you referring to the fact that you are creatively making a native 4:3 aspect ratio into a 16:9 aspect ratio without distortion (and to match with 16:9 HD content)? And if so, I commend you for a good idea.

[budwzr]

Like this:


[Attachment 5132 - Click to enlarge]

I play out the SD stuff this way, and the HD plays out full screen. It gets stretched a little, but no zoom or crop.

[PuzZLeR]

Hey, I never thought of doing something like that when editing different aspect ratios and/or resolutions in the same timeline. Neat.

[Gavino]

Hey, I never thought of doing something like that when editing different aspect ratios and/or resolutions in the same timeline.

Don't you watch TV?
Broadcasters do this all the time (at least here in Europe).

[PuzZLeR]

Don't you watch TV?
Broadcasters do this all the time (at least here in Europe).

Not much these days other than music video programs.

It's just that I never noticed these effects were done, at least in some cases, because of differing rez and A/R among several sources until now.

[zoobie]

You can't do much with your Hi8...perhaps a small amount
It may have been capped DV then re-encoded to mpeg
Hi8 to DV to mpeg to HD?
water to wine comes to mind