Sharpening: FFT3DFilter vs LSFmod

[MysteryX]

I'm currently upscaling videos with a sequence that looks like this (https://github.com/mysteryx93/NaturalGroundingPlayer/wiki/Convert-Videos-to-60fps)

First I use FFT3DFilter to denoise, then after Frame Doubling, I sharpen, and after doubling and processing, I sharpen again.

For now I'm using FFT3DFilter's sharpener. How does it compare to LSFmod or other sharpeners? Would LSFmod do a better job?

[Reel.Deel]

For now I'm using FFT3DFilter's sharpener. How does it compare to LSFmod or other sharpeners? Would LSFmod do a better job?

That's a very subjective question that only you can really answer according to your taste. Also it depends on the type of content. Best thing you can do is try and experiment and come up with your own conclusion.

[MysteryX]

I'm trying both side-by-side. While LSFmod appears to do a better job at sharpening (slow preset), it also alters the colors. Some colors get darker. Why does it alter my colors in such a way?

[MysteryX]

I see that FF3DFilter's sharpening is designed to be applied while denoising to cancel the anti-aliasing and avoid recreating noise, while LSFmod is a more in-depth sharpener for general use.

I'm seeing good result with FF3DFilter's sharpening of 0.2 while denoising, then LSFmod 50 after NNEDI3, then LSFmod 50 after EEDI3.

What I don't like is how LSFmod alters the colors. It seems to increase contrasts. Some colors get darker.

[manono]

What I don't like is how LSFmod alters the colors. It seems to increase contrasts. Some colors get darker.
Are you sure it's not resulting from you going from standard-def to hi-def? That is, are you changing the color matrix from Rec.601 to Rec.709? If not, you're pretty much guaranteed to get different colors. I know nothing about that program you're using although I assume it uses AviSynth scripts. Can you post what's being used.

[MysteryX]

I would use ColorMatrix, but not in the Windows Media Player preview window, so no it's not being used. And in either case, it should be the same with FF3DFilter as for LSFmod.

I'm also seeing something else that is strange. Before, the script was running at 100% CPU. By adding 2x LSFmod, CPU usage went down to 14%. I'm using AviSynth 2.6 MT with 4 threads currently I believe. When it began encoding, it was 80-100%, but later on (right now), only 1 of the 8 cores of the CPU is running. Any idea why?

[MysteryX]

Now that's weird LSFmod ran for a big while on a single CPU, and now it's back between 70-100%. How do you use LSFmod properly with multi-threading?

[MysteryX]

I've done further testing and reading. LSFmod works better for clean sources, so it adds more distortion for low-quality sources. More importantly, I got stability issues and severe performance issues with LSFmod.

So I'll go back to what I had with a tweak.

For a very noisy low-quality video
FF3DFilter Sharpen 0.2 after denoise
FF3DFilter Sharpen 0.1 after EEDI3
FF3DFilter Sharpen 0.25 after NNEDI3

[mawen1250]

I think FFT3DFilter sharpening should only be considered as a sharpening kernel.
LSFmod is a complex sharpening procedure with various pre-processes and post-processes, while it's based on a simple unsharp mask as kernel.
Thus, FFT3DFilter sharpening should be compared to the unsharp mask kernel rather than the whole LSFmod script IMO.

[MysteryX]

Thanks. Here's what I'm trying to accomplish. I'm following Madshi's idea in madVR of refining (sharpening) the image after every frame double to compensate for the loss of sharpening. I'd love to do it with SuperRes but we don't have that in AviSynth so I can either do it with FF3DFilter or LSFmod. By applying sharpening in various stages, it allows me to apply more sharpening while still keeping the image natural.

Does it make sense to repeat LSFmod's pre-processing and post-processing twice? What filters and settings would make the most sense for this purpose? I'm mostly working with noisy material, but it's not so noisy after Denoise+EEDI3.