madVR - high quality video renderer (GPU assisted)

[truexfan81]

Alright, but no guarantees whatsoever:

http://madshi.net/madVRdeband.rar

You can toggle it by pressing Ctrl+Alt+D, or by using the file name tag "deband=low/high". Not available in the settings dialog yet.

FWIW, this test build also has a nice improvement for FSE mode, where rendering times don't decrease, anymore, when the backbuffer queue is full. In older versions a full backbuffer queue somewhat slowed rendering down. Not anymore (only Vista+).

ctrl+alt+D toggles display mode switcher, so how do i toggle deband?

[huhn]

Originally Posted by Coldblackice

In MPC, what variables and measures within madVR's information printout should we watch to determine what might be causing "laggy" playback? For example, I gather that "dropped" (28) and "delayed" (20) frame readouts are important. However, those two counts seem to be staying fairly static.

What else should I look to, to determine what might be the culprit?

make sure your refresh rate match's the content you play. or try smooth motion.

as long as dropped frames repeated fraes and delayed frames don't increase madvr should work fine.

you can press control + r to reset the stats

[ryrynz]

Originally Posted by truexfan81

ctrl+alt+D toggles display mode switcher, so how do i toggle deband?

Change your key bindings for the switcher so it's not using CTRL Alt D..

Originally Posted by DarkSpace

Uhm, just for your information, dropping down to 8 bit is not necessary

I use Avisynth via ffdshow, it converts 10 bit content down to 8 bit.

Originally Posted by 6233638

Low seemed to help with banding, but not so much with macroblocking. I was mostly just going through all my bad sources where I remembered banding/macroblocking being a problem than testing with higher quality sources.

Not only helps with banding but flattens anime content out beautifully without harming line detail. I've used a video for testing that was also used in the flash3k thread (below) and the low setting shows a bit of shadow detail loss in comparison to my conservative f3kdb settings, so I too would like to see a slightly lighter option in madvr.

Originally Posted by Werewolfy

I think that even at its low setting, it blows away too many details in dark areas.

It's not "blowing away details" it's actually quite conservative, but it does ever so slightly smooth almost the entire picture. It's not limited to dark areas which is interesting as it's
basically acting like a light to almost medium strength denoiser at it's current settings.

Originally Posted by Werewolfy

I would like a very low setting that doesn't blow away any (or almost any) details even if the debanding is a little less effective.

It would seem the low setting may be a little excessive for some content, with any luck Madshi will release a build that has a lower setting.
I would like to see a setting that could be enabled be default without impacting the image quality, it would seem the current low setting for high definition content only just crosses that line.

Originally Posted by Werewolfy

4 or 5 levels would be a good choice .

Maybe three or four might be the go.

Madshi, could madDeband have configuration options? Or does it have to be hard coded?

Originally Posted by madshi

Is the whole image softer? Or just certain areas?

Certain areas, but these areas comprise most of the image. Line detail is beautifully kept (which is why it's so great for anime) but there's a lot of detail that is being considered as banding
which is not obviously visible as such. As a result this small scale banding removal does result in a somewhat noticeably but only slightly softer image.

I'd like to see the same strength debanding but perhaps more of a threshold before it's triggered.. in saying that, part of this code would be great as a denoising filter which could be a separate thing altogether...

A few screenshots showing MadVR's deband in action vs my settings with f3kdb, this is one of the videos used to test f3kdb in SAPikachu's first post. Particular attention should be paid to the bikes on the left in the shadows.
I've brightened this up to show more of what's happening, the f3kdb frame may not be the exact same frame as used in the other screenshots but it's identical enough for a comparison IMO.

I chucked the 7 bit result in there as I was curious as to how it would compare. Madshi said he removed the dithering step from f3kdb and dropping to 7 bit output essentially created the same effect.

Original


f3kdb (GrainY=8, GrainC=8, keep_tv_range=true, Y=48, Cb=48, Cr=48)


MadVR deband active (low setting)


MadVR deband active (low setting) 7 bit output.


Ideally I'm looking for a deband quality improvement over my f3kdb result whilst maintaining that same level of detail. I think most would be happy with having that enabled by default.

[Coldblackice]

Originally Posted by huhn

make sure your refresh rate match's the content you play. or try smooth motion.

as long as dropped frames repeated fraes and delayed frames don't increase madvr should work fine.

you can press control + r to reset the stats

Thanks, good to know.

If system resources happened to be an issue, like memory or CPU, would that manifest itself in the form of delayed/repeated/dropped frames? Or could those affect performance while not bearing on those counts?

[madshi]

Originally Posted by dansrfe

What should we look for in providing samples of banding due to 8bit encoding?

Look for Blu-Rays which look clean, but have very slight banding artifacts which are removed when you activate madVR's debanding in "low" setting.

Originally Posted by huhn

the eva 3 bd has 40 mbit vbr and a sceen like this

http://picload.org/image/olpdcil/00002.m2ts_snaps.png

Does the madVR debanding take care of this?

Originally Posted by clsid

madshi, have you considered running post-processing algorithms such as Deband in software using the CPU before copying the data to the GPU?

GPU resources are very scarce, while most here will have plenty of CPU resources to spare. Playing a 1080p video uses less than 10% on a decent CPU.
I know it wouldn't work with DXVA native, but that is hardly a necessity on modern systems. Plus you could offer a Shader implementation as well.

Of course the optimal solution would be to have every algorithm available on both CPU and GPU and then do a dynamic load balancing. The problem for me is that writing every algorithm for GPU and CPU means not only twice the amount of work, but actually more than that, because optimizing algorithms like this for CPU is much more difficult than optimizing GPU pixel shaders. SSE2 can do a lot of tricks, but writing really well optimized SSE2 code takes hours.

Another problem is that on the CPU side I have the decoded frames in the format the decoder sent. There are dozens of different pixels formats that the decoder could send. 8bit, 9bit, 10bit, 11bit, 12bit, 16bit. 4:2:0, 4:2:2, 4:4:4. YCbCr or RGB. Planar or interleaved etc etc. I've routines for all those formats to upload them to the GPU with matching texture formats. Once they're on the GPU and after deinterlacing and color conversion I only have one format and pixels shaders are written without caring about whether the texture buffers are 8bit or 16bit or whatever. On the CPU side I would either have to write separate SSE2 routines for every possible pixel format, or I'd have to convert every format to one common "processing" format. But then in order to be able to handle all formats, I'd also have to support chroma upsampling on the CPU, maybe even video mode deinterlacing. And I'd have to do all processing in 16bit instead of 8bit.

I hope you can understand now why I'm currently only writing GPU processing algorithms. Maybe some day far away I could also make some processing steps available on the CPU, but I don't have the resources to do that anytime soon.

Originally Posted by Coldblackice

If system resources happened to be an issue, like memory or CPU, would that manifest itself in the form of delayed/repeated/dropped frames? Or could those affect performance while not bearing on those counts?

If the CPU or system RAM is too slow/small, probably the decoder queue will go empty in the madVR OSD (Ctrl+J). If the GPU is too slow, the other queues might go empty. As long as there are no frame drops, presentations glitches and delayed frames, everything should be fine. If you still have laggy playback, something else is probably causing it. E.g. maybe your refresh rate doesn't match the movie framerate or something like that...

Originally Posted by Werewolfy

Hi, this is my first post here. I've tested the new deband function and I think that even at its low setting, it blows away too many details in dark areas.

Here some examples :

deband off http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/5824/jyf5.png

Originally Posted by 6233638

Originally Posted by 6233638

Originally Posted by 6233638

Originally Posted by ryrynz

Can I have a 5 second (or so) sample from these movie files, which contains the frames you've been testing with?

I've found that the debanding algorithm produces slightly different results when testing with real movie files, compared to PNG files. Might have to do with levels, chroma subsampling or whatever. So in order to really reproduce your results, I need access to a (very small) sample.

Thanks!

[ryrynz]

As requested.
The particular frame I was using is near the end. Clip is about 30 seconds long.

[Werewolfy]

Here the sample requested http://www.mediafire.com/download/ya...D)_-_Copie.mp4

[huhn]

Does the madVR debanding take care of this?

the top part yes but the rest is not really affected:

http://abload.de/img/eva3s1off93ado.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1lowlxzfy.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1highc1z64.png

high really eats details in dark scenes:
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2off3tay8.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2lowwxl9j.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2high4fa8f.png

[truexfan81]

Originally Posted by huhn

the top part yes but the rest is not really affected:

http://abload.de/img/eva3s1off93ado.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1lowlxzfy.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1highc1z64.png

high really eats details in dark scenes:
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2off3tay8.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2lowwxl9j.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2high4fa8f.png

can someone please make a deband build where pressing F2 to save actually works? i'd like to set it on light one time and forget about it.

thanks

[ryrynz]

Originally Posted by truexfan81

can someone please make a deband build where pressing F2 to save actually works? i'd like to set it on light one time and forget about it.

thanks

Do remember that this was a test build for evaluating this feature only, and also what you've asked for has already been requested and I'm sure Madshi is aware of it.

If you have some videos you want it deband to be active on edit the filename of the videos with deband=low, hopefully a new test build will surface with the ability to save the state.

[madshi]

Originally Posted by ryrynz

As requested.
The particular frame I was using is near the end. Clip is about 30 seconds long.

Originally Posted by Werewolfy

Here the sample requested http://www.mediafire.com/download/ya...D)_-_Copie.mp4

Thx.

Originally Posted by huhn

the top part yes but the rest is not really affected:

http://abload.de/img/eva3s1off93ado.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1lowlxzfy.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1highc1z64.png

Is that the same image you posted the last time? I don't remember this one. Anyway. I don't see much (if any) banding in the original image? Might be my lacking computer monitor, though.

Originally Posted by truexfan81

can someone please make a deband build where pressing F2 to save actually works?

There's only one who can do that, and I won't, because this is just a test build I didn't even plan to release. I just released it because some guys wanted to play with it. It's not meant to be used for actual playback yet. You'll need to have a bit of patience and wait for the official version, which is still some time away...

-------

Do you guys happen to have some images/scenes with typical blocking artifacts (I mean those 8x8 MPEG2 blocks)?

If so, I'd appreciate some screenshots. No samples needed for this, screenshots will do fine, but please use PNG and not JPG. Both (1) images with rather light blocking and (2) images with very heavy blocking would be useful. Thanks!

[romulous]

Hi madshi,

I have a DVD that has some menus that madVR does not work correctly with (it doesn't correctly highlight the menu options when you mouse over them - EVR works fine). I'm happy to log it into the tracker, but how would I get you a sample of the menus for you to check with?

Thanks!

[Werewolfy]

Originally Posted by madshi

Do you guys happen to have some images/scenes with typical blocking artifacts (I mean those 8x8 MPEG2 blocks)?

If so, I'd appreciate some screenshots. No samples needed for this, screenshots will do fine, but please use PNG and not JPG. Both (1) images with rather light blocking and (2) images with very heavy blocking would be useful. Thanks!

Is that what you want? The last one is the picture I use to test deblock filters because when this kind of filter is too high, it blurs the details on the ground.

[GCRaistlin]

1. [up] Is there a way to force madVR to switch the monitor to 60 Hz when playing a 29.97 fps video? "1280x1024p60" setting doesn't work.
2. Is black screen expected when playing a BluRay (1920x1080i, MPEG-4 AVC, 29.97 fps) through LAV Video with deinterlacing enabled in Video mode (50p/60p)?

[Skankee]

Originally Posted by madshi

...(2) images with very heavy blocking

I think this is a sample with a lot of blocking:

http://s14.directupload.net/images/user/131006/3ocxo7er.png


( if 16:9 is more useful:
http://s1.directupload.net/images/user/131006/dirfozb6.png )

[huhn]

Originally Posted by madshi

Is that the same image you posted the last time? I don't remember this one. Anyway. I don't see much (if any) banding in the original image? Might be my lacking computer monitor, though.

i just mixed them up this is debanded
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2off3tay8.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2lowwxl9j.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s2high4fa8f.png


and this lost detail or get really dark when deband is enabled

http://abload.de/img/eva3s1off93ado.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1lowlxzfy.png
http://abload.de/img/eva3s1highc1z64.png

[michkrol]

Originally Posted by GCRaistlin

1. [up] Is there a way to force madVR to switch the monitor to 60 Hz when playing a 29.97 fps video? "1280x1024p60" setting doesn't work.

It should be "1024p60" or perhaps "1024p59" to get ~59,93Hz. Anyway you only enter vertical resolution.

Originally Posted by GCRaistlin

2. Is black screen expected when playing a BluRay (1920x1080i, MPEG-4 AVC, 29.97 fps) through LAV Video with deinterlacing enabled in Video mode (50p/60p)?

Are you using LAV's deinterlacing or madVR's? if LAV's, try disabling it
Are you using hardware acceleration? if yes, try disabling it.
Also a screen with OSD (CTRL+J) might help identify the problem.

[StephaneM]

Originally Posted by madshi

You'll need to have D3D9 installed and updated to the latest version. IIRC it's not installed by default, at least not with all helper dlls etc.

A quick follow up on this for those who may be concerned in the future.

For shaders to work when using madVR with a C# application (WinForm or WPF) and using a managed interop like Directshow Lib, you'll need to either :

* have DirectX 9c installed
* or have D3DCompiler_43.dll located in the same folder as your executable.

Otherwise you'll receive an E_FAIL error code when applying the shaders through the madVR interface (you'll also receive this error when your shader cannot be compiled).

So for instance on Windows 8, all you need to do is to include D3DCompiler_43.dll for shaders to work (no need to install DirectX runtime)

I'm wondering if this should be specified in the IMadVRExternalPixelShaders / mvrinterfaces.h file as a quick notice to prevent future developers having to lookup for this information.

Regards,
--
Stéphane.

[tp4tissue]

Question guys... If I am playing a 1080p video at 1080p native res... Is madvr doing anything "more" than other renderers? /excluding smoothmotion, deinterlace

[Acetyl]

Originally Posted by madshi

Do you guys happen to have some images/scenes with typical blocking artifacts (I mean those 8x8 MPEG2 blocks)?

If so, I'd appreciate some screenshots. No samples needed for this, screenshots will do fine, but please use PNG and not JPG. Both (1) images with rather light blocking and (2) images with very heavy blocking would be useful. Thanks!

Starting from the heaviest.

http://i3.minus.com/ibwRaQWV9q3dPA.png

http://i3.minus.com/itwirQgJUOJJ9.png

http://i6.minus.com/ibrwJ5znJFerut.png