is it really possible to upgrade the quality of a video?

[kenny1999]

I've got a couple of very old videos in WMV format , probably shot in early 2000 , they are in very poor quality. I would like to remaster them and upgrade their quality a little bit. Is it really possible? and how to?

[sophisticles]

No.

[jagabo]

You can fix some problems. You can fix brightness, contrast, and colors. You can sharpen a little, though that may enhance compression artifacts already in video. You can reduce blockiness (but in exchange you'll get blurriness). You can reduce some types of noise but that may cause posterization and motion artifacts. It all depends on exactly what's wrong and how wrong.

[johnmeyer]

A lot depends on the problems with your old video. I worked on a video from the very first days of digital video, around 1992. It was only 12 frames per second and 160x120. I was able to make it look much better by smoothing out the block noise and increasing the frame rate using motion interpolation. The result was much more watchable. You can read this old thread about it:

Restoring Early Digital Video

The actor featured in the clip, Goeffrey Lewis, died last year.

[SaurusX]

This may be helpful
https://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=134078

[jagabo]

Cartoons and Anime are a bit of an exception. They have large flat shaded areas and simple black outlines. Those are more easily repaired.