SD to HD Up-Res?
 

What's the best way to upconvert my old SD footage to HD?
How much does it cost?

There really is no true "upconversion".

Even the best interpolation looks like interpolation.

Don't do it, especially if you're selling content. Because the purchaser will probably re-encode it, edit it, add watermarks etc. If it's 480p leave it that way, same for 720p.

If you upscale it and then it's run through ffmpeg for say upload to a CMS then it's going to look worse than if you left it as is.

Reggie, I've had this debate with colleagues many times now and it's really simple
You can't ever make SD look HD. Ever. Period!
AdultKing above has it right.

The *best* you can do, is to run a subtle sharpening filter (unsharp mask in premiere does a pretty good job) over the top of it in post to help crisp it up a bit- but that's only really increasing contrast. It works and you get a more 'contrasty', less washy image> but still SD and you'll never fool anyone otherwise! 8)

I wrote a script that up scales to HD video, obviously it doesn't make it true HD, but it applies filters, upscales & crops. Makes it look a hell of a lot better.

hit me up

billyheiman at gmail

Try Red Giant INSTANT 4K or for better quality get a Teranex 2D Processor.

How do I get my chewed up bubble gum to look brand new and unchewed? :winkwink:

You guys suggesting upscaling your content, please tell me if you are on Adult Centro or sell through other marketplaces so I can avoid buying from you. :2 cents:

The re:Vision Denoise plugin is pretty good. I use it to clean up noise in my CG renders.

RE:Vision Effects, Inc. : Products: DE:Noise

Target quality can only be as good as the original source -- it can never exceed, or even be the same as, the original source quality.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh


Just Dave

There's no best way--it won't look good. Don't waste your money.

If an egg can be unboiled, that should be easy. :upsidedow

But I don't want to sell the content to others, I simply want to display/stream it on my own sites...

bumpity.

You can ask the same question many times, no point expecting a different answer.

If content is SD then it is SD. You can't make SD content HD content just as you can't make a 640x480 photograph 1280 x 960. You can resize it, filter it, sharpen it, do whatever - you'll probably make it look a little bit better, however in the process introduce new artefacts. Regardless it's still only as good as the source content. :2 cents:

I've been encoding for more than 5 years. Whoever gave you that idea only intends to extract money from you. Video quality will never improve when you re-encode... only the file extension will change :D

Unfortunately, the only way to get HD is to use a really good HD camera right from the start.

Hi.

This thread has not been updated since 2015, and things have improved significantly.

Using artificial intelligence (AI) programs that themselves continue to improve, I have been able to convert SD videos into what most certainly resemble HD videos. It should be very exciting to a collector of older adult DVDs to realize that you could significantly improve the visual quality to a much more intimate level by upscaling from 480 to 960.

Beyond the 960, the visual improvements have generally been less dramatic compared to the initial upscale. But the 960 is also a kind of hybrid intermediate between HD and Full HD, and I have found it to be an almost magical and most watchable improvement. Your favorite models have come back for your viewing pleasure more intimately than ever before!

I think there is an overemphasis on whether the video you have upscaled is true HD. Obviously, unless originally filmed in HD, the result cannot be true HD. But in my view the key question is: Does the resulting video give you the HD experience? If you can answer yes to that question, then I think you have what you really want!

It is true that you don't want to overdo the parameter settings you use to help with the video enhancement, but it is fun to tinker. Also, one video may require a different set of parameter settings than another video. But that can be part of the fun, too.

I won't name which programs to try, but the one I purchased was a holiday special sale at $99.99 instead of the usual $299.99. It was for Win10. I have used a 16 GB RAM desktop with a Ryzen chip that uses 2 GB VRAM. So there was not a true graphics card, but the results have been quite impressive. If you have an old favorite SD scene, you often see things you really did not appreciate were there in the 480 version.

Remember, too, that there can be a tremendous difference in the quality of DVD source files themselves (the VOBs). Most of us have probably already seen this. I have one DVD (Area 69 by Synister) that already looks like an HD at times, because the bit rate of about 7.5 Mbps is much higher than the standard DVD bit rate of about 4.5 Mbps. The duration of the DVD is less than 90 min.

In fact, a DVD's video stream can get close to the basic DVD limit of about 10 Mbps, if one chooses to encode it that way. Of course, one has to allow some room for the audio stream, too. In practical terms, it has been found that an SD DVD video maxes out in quality at about 7.5 Mbps.

Another area where AI can shine is to take very low-res videos and improve them significantly. This has been true especially for videos at 240 that are upscaled to 480. I had one obscure (and almost obscured!) video of a favorite model at 180 that looked quite watchable when upscaled to 360.

What about the speed of conversion and the new file size? This is going to depend on many things, including the source file resolution, the duration, the frames per second, the power of your computer, and the chosen quality of your output file. By chosen quality, I mean the adjustable RF (constant rate factor) value associated with x264 or x265 encoders. You can see this parameter in a free program like HandBrake.

My standard finding is that for an SD video file from an NTFS DVD, the conversion rate from 480 to 960 takes about 10x as long as the duration of the original video itself, if one has set the conversion factor to a value of 10 units, which is a very high quality setting. (The two 10's are not working in tandem.) So yes it takes some time to do a conversion. And this is also reported by those who have true graphics cards.

The nice thing about the AI program I have used is that you can do highly detailed previews of segments before you encode, and even zoom in and move the screen around. It is a very thorough preview. You can also choose the segments of the video to encode. The output file size is going to be very large compared to the original. Don't be too surprised if it is 5x or greater.

It really is an exciting technology that continues to improve. It is a bit like the good old days as we watched laptop screens grow from 10.4" to 15.1."

One thing to note is if the footage was on DV tape, sometimes it is best to re-scan it, as it may have not been scanned too well years ago because software and so on has improved.

I keep my old SD scenes at the original 720x480 on my pay site. But I convert them to 1080P HD for PornHub and other sites like ManyVids and Clips4Sale and they do sell. It helps a lot if you letter box them rather than stretch to fit the screen. I use Vegas Pro 17 to enhance the color and sound and then render to MP4. They were all shot on Mini DV's and captured in raw AVI. Here's a sample: https://www.pornhub.com/view_video.p...=63f6e3531d308

Thanks, DVTimes. Sorry, I am not sure what you mean by re-scanning, because I thought that a miniDV tape, as opposed to VHS, was digital video data that could be copied losslessly through a firewire cable from a camcorder to a computer. I have used the free program WinDV to do that. The program places the data in an avi file which can be viewed using a standard video player.

Are you saying that one needs to do more work with the copied video once it is on the hard drive? I was pretty sure I had done all that was necessary. The original video was from 2005. Thank you for your input.

We're all seeking that

Digital Transmutation
 

It is actually more like How do I turn my Silver into Gold?
Without ending up with Bronze!

I am getting Topaz results that are about halfway between Silver and Gold.

Fitz, this is your Julie archiver from the once Great White North.

This guy always was an idiot. It's amazing that anyone followed along with anything he said or did.

WE upres DVD files to HD file and it looks good... the key is that even the SD content must be in 16:9 or at least 16:9 safe...Got a bunch of old shit on Tubi and other streaming platforms which only accept HD..

AI has really changed things, but even when this was being discussed…it was still possible to upres.

nice!!!!

I am more interested in converting HD to 4K. Is there like some AI software or an online site that can do this now?

Various AI Upscalers
 

Here is a reference page.

https://www.guru99.com/video-quality-enhancer.html

There is also this free AI upscaler that I have had some success with.
Video Enhancer 2.2

Video Enhancer: resize video with Super Resolution method from SD to HD

I use Topaz Video AI

https://www.topazlabs.com/topaz-video-ai