Help, Sujestion to clean up noise in video

[goden99]

Help, Can you please help suggest how to clean up noise on video ?

The video was captured from old tapes (some Betamex and some VHS) at resolution of 352X240 Average bit rate at 1048kbps. Sound at 44kHz Stereo, 224Kbps layer II.

I am doing a project to restore these to an acceptable quality and putting them on DVDs. Used an ATI All Wonder 8500 to capture them and used highest quality cables and cleaned all the tapes and the heads of the VHS and Betamex players to get the maximum quality.

This is the last episode of the anime i am trying to edit; I chose this part because it shows the type of stuff I am going to have problems with. When you see the video you'll understand that some filters might mess up the video a little. Here's the clip

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/smallpart.mpg

Don't worry about the noise on the sides and on the bottom because it doesn't appear on the TV but does on the PC for some reason.

I read all over the site and read the FAQ what was suggested before was.
"1. "normal" clips with snow like noise
temporal smoother (by default) on the 2nd tick
2d cleaner optimized (by Jim Casaburi) using the default settings

2. Anime
Only 2d cleaner optimized
If you have noise you can also use temporal smoother, but even better is Warpsharp (by Avery Lee) "

But it think this needs something else.


When I capture clips from it I can use a program called Neat Image 2.2 and it fixes it pretty well. If I can use a video filter that would do the same thing. Here’s an example.

(when it says filtered is after I used the program) some are very impressive.
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa42.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa42_filtered.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa38.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa38_filtered.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa35.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa35_filtered.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa10.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa10_filtered.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa11.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa11_filtered.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa24.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa24_filtered.jpg


For the audio I could strip it from the video and use sound forge to remove the high frequencies to remove the hissing but is there a way give the sound more life again?


I put up a part of the video for you to take a look.

Any suggestion is appreciated. Thanks in advance

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

first of all,the resolution is too low....
only very few capture devices can capture acceptable
quality on such lo-res....
ati is not one of those....

on filtering;folks over at avisynth forum have developed
some filters having in mind only anime.....
so dig into donald graft's web...(find the link in FAQ
here....)


>Neat Image 2.2

this filtering looks blurred as hell...
pretty unwatchable...


during my vdub days i had pretty decent results with
temporal smoother (but on higher setings..like 5 or even
more) and "smartsmootherhiq"......
this will produce some ghosting on fast scenes,but will completely clear still scenes
for cartoons i used smsmootherhiq with "averaged" setting (as this is reccomended
for this source and gives better results....)
some of my "simpsons" episodes look pretty fine to me....

2 solutions u used will clean nothing or next to nothing....
if you capture at hires and resize than that alone will do as a
denoiser.....(as resizing blurs....and every denoiser blurs...)

/ivo

[kaitsuburi]

I too think the resolution is a bit low. As far as filtering is concerned, frameserve with avisynth and use some of the filters that have been developed for it. There have been many many threads at the avisynth forum about noise removal (use search). Here's a recent one:

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=50473

Good luck!

-kaitsuburi

[goden99]

thanks both for the promt reply.

^^-+I4004+-^^ > You said
"only very few capture devices can capture acceptable
quality on such lo-res....
ati is not one of those.... "

Which capture devices are you refering too ? I might buy one and recapture. (Unfortunatly I already have captured all the Videos 25 episodes X 24minutes X 2 seasons)

Like which capture device is the best for capturing from BAD quality source like Betamex and VHS tapes where there is lots of noise and distortion of picture (just look at video and that's a pretty good part too)

kaitsuburi> Thanks but I have never used avisynth but i will give it a shot first I am gona try the recapturing.

[Valky]

Try to capture at least full vertical resolution like 384x480(576), 352x480(576) or 360x480(576. This method gives you much more detail to work with.

and resize it afterwards to something like 360x240(288) when you have filtered it. If you are not familiar with Avisynth use virtualdub and it's filters. After de-noisers put the filter 'reduce vertical 2:1' to the end of your filters.

[Ookami]

Originally posted by goden99
thanks both for the promt reply.

^^-+I4004+-^^ > You said
"only very few capture devices can capture acceptable
quality on such lo-res....
ati is not one of those.... "

Which capture devices are you refering too ? I might buy one and recapture. (Unfortunatly I already have captured all the Videos 25 episodes X 24minutes X 2 seasons)

IMO, no capture devices can capture in acceptable quality in low resolution. But, again, quality is subjective.

Before buying ANY new device be sure that it will be better than yours (the one you already own)! Test it in the hardware store, go to a friend wich owns the same/similar card, buy it with a "return back warranty" etc.

BTW, the first series of the ATI All in Wonder 8500 has a good reputation, sadly, ATI started to build in LQ parts after that.

And a last question, did you even read the FAQ?

I mean, capturing at 352x240 avg bitrate at 1048 for putting on a DVD?

Capture at full PAL/NTSC (depends where you live) with Huffyuv/MJPEG (depends on your hardware), use NR of your choice (Avisynth/VirtualDub is probably easier for newbies) and then encode to MPEG2 with the encoder of your choice. This has been suggested hundreds of times...

Cheers,

Mijo.

[goden99]

The captures were done at my uncle he's got the DVD Burner and the 120G drive and ATI card. He used the ati software to capture for making them on VCDs.(Reason he is doing it not me is because he has all the tapes and he is a good 8 hour drive to my place).

I am going to ask him to send me the Tapes or drive up there and get the tapes.

And then capture at highest resolution probably 704*480 (double 352X240) and work with that to fix the Video.

Everyone I ask which capture card to get identical quality from a VHS or Betamex source tells me to get an ANALOG Capture card or a professional card but never give me any names.
Can you please sujest one ? (preferably one that's 3 Digits not 4 Digits)



What filter can I use that would make results like you see here (filtered is after using neat image) it's a little blured but it removes all the noise and it's still sharp.
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa24.jpg
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/new_pa24_filtered.jpg



UPDATE:

Here i tried to fix it my self tell me what you guys think :) run both beside each other and see the major difference only bad thing is see is during the lightning i don't know why that happens maybe it's the temperal smoother ? Any good plugins for anime on Virtual Dub ? any good HOW TO USE AVisync cuz i have no idea.
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/123456.mpg

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

first of all,352x288 (or x240) CANNOT
look as good as 720x480...no way!
i have erazor3 card i use for lores capture,and
on 352x288 it looks pretty good
it looks better than;
a) bt8x8 or ati (or,or..) capturing at this
lo-res...(better than them with vertical reduce by 2 trick too)
b) hires capture resized to this lores..(by the time
the image is 352x288,it's blurred as hell...)

but it'll look worse than;
a)hires capture not downsized
b)hires capture moderately downsized
(like 768x576-> 576x432)

but i'm not reccomending this card to anyone,as it drops
frames randomly (typical. cca. 0.7%)
for some things,i can live with this ;for some others i can't
so i have bt8x8 device too (i bought it to get 0 drops..and i got
0 drops and it's cool thing)

i think i have some samples to illustrate
(same vhs captured by erazor3 and bt8x8)
and while hires looks better it's not THAT different
(erazor3 has extraordinary capture chip that has
unparalleled hardware resizer...)
i'll try to provide samples and put them on the web...
(as it's hard to believe that 352x288 is not very blurry and shitty...with erazor it isn't....this is making it ideal for space saving of real9 etc._no,i don't encourage use of rm9_i SAID
space saving!... )

i reccomend the following;if you don't have capture device,buy some simple bt8x8 card.....(cheap as dirt)
capture at highest you can (720x480 for ntsc),and do some filtering
(if necesarry...some people capture video8 to DV,make dvd mpeg2 and burn dvd ,and claim that they can't see the difference ,they did no filtering obviously depends on the source too.. ),make
mpeg2 out of it and burn...
if you aim for video on PC,you have to deinterlace and that way you'll destroy :
1-image quality
2-smoothness of the motion...
(although i see that you don't have dvd burner but your uncle...)

do not aim for VCD as this is shit*y lil format that i hope time
will forget as soon as possible!
don't aim for svcd too if you have so much chroma noise (and you do)
chroma noise removal filters are only that good,and anime is tough...
it's best if you can do dvd for this kind of source....
(and as i see,you are geared up to make it dvd compliant ,so take that extra step (towards hi-res) and make it proper...)

>professional card

?
i think this doesn't exist!
(no,i'm not kidding)
"pro capture card" i have still to run into one
(and i mean on the web..)
why?
it's so simple;
pro mastering studios DON'T use these sources (we discuss)
for mastering purposes!
who would make dvd out of vhs,hi8,svhs or so?
(yes,yes some do,but i mean people in their right mind..hehe)
and if they captured to digital format with digital camera (more and more)
why would they wanted to convert it first to analog,and then capture it.......no way!
hardware mpjeg and DV capture solutions are not PRO at all!
they offer semi-pro quality for the most of the time...
(and for home user this is enough)

[goden99]

^^-+I4004+-^^> thanks for the prompt reply.

You keep saying "bt8x8 card" card I am guessing you mean it has the bt8x8 chip.

I "MIGHT" (I emphysis the Might) be able to borrow a Matrox RT2500 for a week which if i use it 24x7 i would be able to capture all the videos. But is that good ? I heard it's amazing if the source is digital but it doesn't like Analog sources and change the color a bit sometimes.

Does the "bt8x8" Support PAL ? I belive some of the tapes are PAL. (He had to get the tapes from all over the place to get the complete set)


How can i tell if the card has the bt8x8 chipset (I belive it's made by Conexant )

Here are the cards i can get from my local store please tell me which you'd recommend.
HAUPPAUGE 401 WIN-TV-DBX 125$CND MB
http://www.hauppauge.com/html/wc_data.htm (No Details)
HAUPPAUGE 702 WIN-TV THEATRE 196$CND MB

TRIDENT T1116-1161220 POWER TV BOX 100$CND PN

MicroStar [8876] TV Anywhere TV-Tuner PCI w/Remote 93$CND SL
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/per/per/pro_per_detail.php?UID=342&MODEL=MS-8876 (Silicon Tuner & Conexant CX23881/883 audio/video decoder)

LeadtekVC100XP 70$CND SL
Leadtek TV TU2000XP TV-Tuner 100$CND SL
http://www.leadtek.com.tw/www/Web_Leadtek/multimedia/TV2000_XP/TV2000-
XP.asp (Doesn't tell me which chip)

Creative Labs Video Blaster Digital VCR 154$ SL
http://www.americas.creative.com/products/product.asp?product=222&category=5&maincategory=5&nav=spec (Doesn't tell me which chip)

Asus TV Tuner 80$CND SL
Asus TV Tuner + *FM Radio* 105$CND SL
http://www.asus.com/vga/tvtuner/overview.htm (No chip info)


Or a Videocard with a Video-IN ? or those aren't good ?


MSI GF4 8894-060 TI4200-VTD8X 128M DDR 260$CND MB
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/vga/vga/pro_vga_detail.php?UID=380&MODEL=MS-8894 (No info about video in execept it has it)

NVIDIA G4 TITANIUM4200 128MB AGP8X TV+DVI+VIVO AGP (RB) 241$ PN

Leadtek WinFast GeForce4 TI4200 128Mb [TV Out + VIVO] *AGP 8X* 280$ SL
http://www.leadtek.com.tw/www/Web_Leadtek/vga/A280_DDRTH_myvivo.asp (No info about video in execept it has it)


Note: Don't worry about price and letters after those are just referance to me to know where I can get em from (lots of stores)

[cweb]

I recently got an MSI Geforce4 with video in and I'm very happy with the high quality of the captures I've experimented with so far...

[Ookami]

Go fot he Matrox if you can. It seems it's a decend semi-pro card and it should be more than enough for what you want. Or go to one of those upper class cards that don't exist, if you can :D . If you can't get the Matrox (for starters) go for a cheap solution so you don't loose much money!

It's always best if you can borrow your card :) .

BTW, PAL support should be standard.

BT or no, just look in the specs PDF or similar.

Cheers,

Mijo.

[goden99]

What about this card ? I'll just have to build the db44 which he lost.
http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3017868926

[Ookami]

Originally posted by goden99
What about this card ? I'll just have to build the db44 which he lost.
http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3017868926

For that price? Go for it!

BTW, good sources for user reviews:

http://www.dvdrhelp.com/capturecards

http://www.dvdrhelp.com/capturecards.php?CaptureCardRead=Dazzle%20DVC%20II&Search=Search

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

i'm uploading some interesting tests;
hold your horses,coming your way soon....
should make some things clearer;

[goden99]

Ookami> Thanks for the review site :)

Wish some people would talk about Picture QUALITY.



Check my latest playing around with

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/1234567.mpg

What I am doing is when i apply filters i make it use M-Jpeg V3 at highest quality compression but ends up being 150megs for the 1 minute and i don't think anyone wants to download 150megs for 1 minute :P So i use TMPGEnc to make it Smaller (VCD quality) just so you can compair it with what I had before.


Let me get this right.
I should Capture at 352x480 (from FAQ) Apply Filters (Temperal Smoother, Temperal Cleaner, 2d Cleaner, Sharpener) Then shrink to Half 352X240 and it should look nice?

Those # i've goten from the FAq but shouldn't i capture at highest resolution then shrink ?

[^^-+I4004+-^^]

>Wish some people would talk about Picture QUALITY

are you following this thread only or what?
screenshots of mine didn't told you anything?

why do you want to stick to such lo-res?
you should capture at highest res you can (
but without droppign frames...when you start to
drop frames obviuosy system can't take it....majority
of new systems should do it with ease!)
and then try different techniques fo filtering
and resizing if you still want to go for
VCD resolution........

also,all recent threads were questions simillar to yours,so
try reading them too....

btw. 11MB of mpeg1 are not for us modem folks,right?
(hehe)
you can just load mjpeg video to vdub,paste to
some image viewer,and save as jpeg....no need for
long mjpeg or mpeg1 sections......
there's discussion and suggestions on ntsc resolution
in "capture guide suggestions" too...

i could post some mpeg2 "on-the-fly" screenshots,but in my opinion
they don't come close to these .avi's i have and made screenshots from them....

[goden99]

When I looked at the compairson posted, the quality of all are more than acceptable but the main thing I care about is how the cards handle bad quality sources like VHS or Betamex with lots of noise from degradation.

Here's the way I am thinking of it.
There would be no point in putting a resolution of 720x480 on the DVD if the source it self is VHS (which is around 3XX x 2XX).

But your right I should Capture at MAXIMUM the capture card will allow me with out dropping frames first (uncompressed).

Then I should apply filters (i am guessing temperal smoothers and other filters will do a better job when it's a higher res but take more time) THEN Should I shrink it or leave it at high res ? Since I don't think I will be gaining anything by keeping it at hi-res since the source is lo-res. ( I have no experiance I am just speaking what seems logical) I would probably make it MPG2 with high VBR but low-res to take less space so I can fit more episodes per DVD. Please correct my logical by your experiance :)


I had them done at 2X Zoom so you can see the details I chose certain parts to show you the differences. (tried making them as small as possible with out losing quality)

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame200before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame200after.JPG

I think I put up the saturation by too much but you can see all the macroblocks are gone but a bit blured. Could it be sharpened again ?

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame238before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame238after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame351before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame351after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame435before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame435after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame498before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame498after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame542before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame542after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame724before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame724after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1444before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1444after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1729before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1729after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1955before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame1955after.JPG

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame2159before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame2159after.JPG

Here it shows obviously how I changed the color by saturation a little too much.

http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame2184before.JPG
http://home.golden.net/~charleyso/frame2184after.JPG

Anyoneknow of a filter to remove the top part (it's the video degradation :( and a good sharpener tool.

[fellaw]

is VHS (which is around 3XX x 2XX).

this is simply wrong! VHS hasn't a resolution at all, that's an old bad rumor. Capturing VHS at full res is better than capturing at 3xx*2xx, simply because there's more data which any filters can work with! You can reduce the resolution afterwards.

I'd suggest you to capture at full res, and then split your fields for further image processing. after having all filters you wanted, weave the splitted fields. E.g.:

seperatefields()
peachsmoother()
hue/sat/lum
.
.
.
weave()
(deinterlace if you want)


You could try this. This method gives me far good results, just have a look of older posts of me.

[goden99]

"split your fields" What do you mean by that ?
I don't have lines from up and down and I only go for intelchipset :) (read your posts) I love this thread thou i am gona try some stuff.
http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42041


I went to a compture store with my friend to upgrade his pc (more ram, new HD) And I asked the tech which seemed very knowlegeable which card he's sujest for capturing which isn't astronimically priced (4 Digit price) he said
Matrox Marvel are amazing then AVerTV DBX (He this they use Connexant 878A chips but isn't 100% sure.)
http://www.aver.com/products/tvtuner_AVerTV_stereo.shtml#3

I have been offered a Matrox G200 with RainbowRunner Upgrade which makes it a capture card "Full resolution video capture and playback with hardware MJPEG compression (704 x 576 PAL and 704 x 480 NTSC)"
Is that any good ? he said it's the best card for noise and clairty.

Also been offered Pinnacle DC10+ for a good price is that card good ?

[goden99]

I am curiouse of one thing which is not answered in any of the forms I read threw.

I will capture the Video from VHS at Max quality that the Capture card will alow me (720x480) then I will fix it using filters. But then what ? I would have a 2.6G per episode (M-JPEG). What should I convert it to to put on DVD ? Either MPG or MPG2.

MPG2 will take a LONG time to encode and is it worth it ?
What resolution should I put it as and what Bitrate should i set it at ? Or should I use TMpeg and put Variable.
What is the max MPG-1 Birtate a DVD player could handle I heard it was 1150kbits is that true ?? or just for VCD players.

[jggimi]

..."split your fields" What do you mean by that ? ... I believe that means using the AviSynth SeparateFields() command, which, for example, will take 29.97 720x480 as input and produce 59.94 720x240 as output. If a set of single fields, top or bottom, need to be selected, you can then do SelectEven() or SelectOdd() as desired....What should I convert it to to put on DVD ? Either MPG or MPG2. ... As far as I know, the video stream for NTSC DVD is 720x480 MPEG-2, SVCD is 480x480 MPEG-2, and VCD is 352x240 MPEG-1. Each of these also has maximum video and maximum combined bitrates. See www.vcdhelp.com for more info on the different formats.

As to encoding from AVI to DVD, SVCD, or VCD, I recommend Doom9's guides.

For DVD, you may want to start with http://www.doom9.org/mpg/dvdr-guides.htm

For VCD/SVCD, you may want to start with http://www.doom9.org/mpg/svcd-guides.htm

[goden99]

Thanks but what's the Max combined bitrates for MPG1 ?

[jggimi]

Had you looked at www.vcdhelp.com, as recommended, you would have seen the following information for VCD:

Resolution: NTSC 352x240 PAL 352x288
Video Compression: MPEG-1
Video Bitrate: 1150 kb/s
Audio Compression: MPEG
Audio Bitrate: 224 kb/s
Size/Min: 10MB
Minutes/650MB CD: 74

I'll leave the exercise of adding 1150 and 224 to you. :rolleyes:

[goden99]

Key Word "recommended" not Maximum.

Can someone please explain to me General Covolution 3d by Gunnar Thalin. I see squares with Zeros all over. I have no idea what to do. I search on the web for how-tos and turned up with nothing :(
Here's the link
http://home.bip.net/gunnart/video/
it's 5x5 not a 3x3 for Virtual Dub.
here's all the info he has there

General convolution 3D
This filter is a general 5x5 convolution filter with an extra dimension - time. It applies one matrix to the current frame, another matrix to the previous and yet another one to the frame prior to that. This filter was suggested by Neil Lee.
Settings
Use output instead of input for previous frame: Determines which previous frame to use. If checked, it uses the previous frame as it looked AFTER this filter processed it. Otherwise, it uses the unfiltered previous frame.
Version history:
Version 1.1: Went from matrix size 3x3 to 5x5 and from two to three matrixes (suggested by Roger Kamben). It's also faster when you don't use all the matrixes or matrixes smaller than 5x5.

[jggimi]

...Can someone please explain to me General Covolution 3d... It's a noise reduction filter. If you search for C3D or Convolution3D in the AviSynth forum alone, you'll find 8 pages worth of hits. The filter comes with documentation, and with some preset settings for anime and non-anime content.

You might find the best explanation of how it works and what it does in this (http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=32762) thread.

[Wilbert]

Maybe this is a bit clearer: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25908&highlight=general+convolution

[jggimi]

That's a good one, too.

I've found that you need to experiment with filter settings, especially noise reduction filters.

The nice thing about AviSynth filters -- you can test a script with your favorite AVI player, and conduct many tests in a very short period of time.

[begu]

"Here's the way I am thinking of it.
There would be no point in putting a resolution of 720x480 on the DVD if the source it self is VHS (which is around 3XX x 2XX). "

Well, You consider this:
- in VHS, there is no resolution, like somone already said here
- VHS picture is consisted of lines
- those lines are captured typically as interlaced material
- there are 480 (NTSC) and 576 (PAL) lines to be captured for full smooth motion
- so to get good quality all those lines need to be captured, which means, that resolution must have 480(576) "lines" too
- so resolution must be xxx X 480(576)
- because old tapes (if not S-VHS) do not cantain high frequencies the vertical resolution is not needed to be full (720 or 768)
- so You can capture for example in 384 X 480(576) for very bad quality tapes (and eg. 480 X 480(576) for better tapes)

I also personally thought that the VHS resolution is 3xx X 2xx, but if You really think it, the VCR records all lines, and thus the vertical resolution must be 480(576) for capturing.

I prefer keeping the full vertical resolution for smooth motion. But if the source is deinterlaced like some movies are, I can use deinterlacing afterwards. I live in PAL 25 fps world, so usually movies are not 'telecined' so they are played back accelerated by 4 %. (24 fps -> 25 fps). But if the material to be captured is interlaced, I usually don't deinterlace, ecause I watch them on TV, not monitor.

[goden99]

Thanks everyone.

I am getting the tapes a new VCR and some expensive cables with a Matrox RT2500 to capture the first cartoon.

But there is one which was on Betamax and the tapes have been lost only thing still not lost is the VCDs that were made a long time ago. I was able to get all the episodes but the quality isn't to great and they were captured at 356x240. Can I attempt to fix this ? or it's hopeless case ?