Need Help Finding Anti-artifact Virtual Dub Filter

[lordy88]

Hey guys!

I apologize if I'm missing something very obvious here, though hours of Google searching and scouring this forum haven't come up with anything.

I've been using Virtual Dub for a while, and I wanted a filter that removed annoying artifacts in deep blacks inside my videos. Here's an example:

GFYcat link.

I've tried a bunch of filters so far, but none have done anything to remove the background noise while keeping everything else the same.

Does anyone have any ideas? Thanks in advance!

[DB83]

I am no expert on game-capture but I would look more at that AND your own video card/PC setup.

Something there is pretty much screwed up which can not be fixed by mere filtering.

[manono]

I agree. I thought I was going to see something completely different when clicking on the link. Something's wrong, I think, in the capture process. Maybe if you detailed what you're using someone with a similar setup can help.

Also, it's 948x468, your video. So you have already reencoded it? Did it have those artifacts before hand? Did you capture it like that? If so, try capping at the original resolution.

[lordy88]

Thanks for the responses.

The reason for the odd resolution is because I'm using DVDSoft's Free Screen Video Recorder, which allows a free-form rectangle grab.

I've experimented with a lot of other screen recorders (Camtasia, CamStudio, MovAVI, etc.) , but the ease of use and surprisingly solid high quality nature of the output videos compared to the rest have me still using the program. Is there a different program I should be using instead?

Thing is, these artifacts in the example aren't consistent, and only appear in 10% or so of the videos at hand. I was hoping there was a filter in Virtual Dub that would have a way to remove these, but if that's not an option I understand.

Thanks again for all your help!

[jagabo]

I don't think you'll find any filters in VirtualDub. But you can try something like this in AviSynth:

ffVideoSource("SatisfiedJadedHornet.mp4") 
bmask=mt_binarize(28).mt_inpand().mt_expand().Blur(1.0).Blur(1.0).GreyScale().Invert()
Overlay(last, ColorYUV(gain_y=-256), mask=bmask)

That gets rid of most of it without damaging the rest of the picture too much. Original on top, fixed on bottom:



But you'd be much better off figuring out why this is happening in the first place and avoiding it.

[lordy88]

I don't think you'll find any filters in VirtualDub. But you can try something like this in AviSynth:

ffVideoSource("SatisfiedJadedHornet.mp4") 
bmask=mt_binarize(28).mt_inpand().mt_expand().Blur(1.0).Blur(1.0).GreyScale().Invert()
Overlay(last, ColorYUV(gain_y=-256), mask=bmask)

That gets rid of most of it without damaging the rest of the picture too much. Original on top, fixed on bottom:


[Attachment 35298 - Click to enlarge]

But you'd be much better off figuring out why this is happening in the first place and avoiding it.

Just went through the hoops and it worked perfectly. Incredible! I know it's just a band-aid for a bigger problem, but since this doesn't happen very frequently, this is a life saver.

Thank you so much for your help!

[DB83]

Most screen-capture programs allow for a free-form rectangle.

Does the same happen with the other programs you mention ?

Have you actually tried proper game-capture software ?

Your current issue, as I said, appears to be system related and as we know zilch about that we can hardly help.

[jagabo]

Just went through the hoops and it worked perfectly.

You should probably add off_y=16 to the ColorYUV filter to eliminate super blacks:

ColorYUV(gain_y=-256, off_y=16)

Beware that other small bright dots in black areas will be lost too. Like stars in a night sky, etc.