Real World experience of "Neat Video" denoiser?

Grazie wrote on 12/29/2007, 10:44 PM

Title says it all, but . ..

Q1: What has this over and above the freebie Smart Smoother plugin we have?

Q2: Have you noticed a reduction in file size? And has this helped DVD creation and playing?

Q3: Does it leave a "pancake-makeup" look/feel to the talent's face?

Q4: Anybody used this AFTER DeShaker?

TIA,

Grazie

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fausseplanete wrote on 1/5/2008, 9:01 AM

John,

I have also compared a number of denoisers including NeatVideo. I wonder, may I please take you up on your (presumably open) offer to have a look at some short footage? It is PAL 50i 1080 HDV (m2t) footage of a Can-Can dancer taken by a Sony Z1 in extremely low-light conditions (at a folk music party) by a friend who let's say adheres to the "dynamic camera movement" school of thought. Though poor technical quality footage, it captures a precious memory which he'd like to preserve.

The light levels vary greatly in the scene, and of course a camera tends to emphasize the levels differences more than the (adaptive and brain-processed) eye. For that reason I first apply HDRAGC, the AviSynth filter. This evens out the levels but at the same time it brings up the grain, both static (dark field) and dynamic (noise).

As you will no doubt appreciate, denoising this footage presents quite a challenge. Having performed many hours of experiments with various denoisers, including MSU, AlparySoft and NeatVideo, I think that for this footage, the best balance between signal/noise and subjective appeal (no clay-face etc) was obtained (in VirtualDub reading a vfapi file onto an avs file applying HDRAGC to Mpeg2Source directed to an m2t file) by applying Levels then AlparySoft (in that order). Wish it were simpler but at least it works! For AlparySoft, the Fuzzy option had to be disabled in order to avoid the "clay face" effect.

If you can possibly increase the knowledge or wisdom going into this process, that would be great. And at the end we would both have a nice clip of a Can-Can dancer! If you would like a copy, please let me know and also please tell me how many frames you'd like and by what route you would like me to send it.

Cheers,
Dave

johnmeyer wrote on 1/5/2008, 1:53 PM

If you would like a copy, please let me know and also please tell me how many frames you'd like and by what route you would like me to send it.

I can deal with just about any type of video. What I would suggest is that you find a few seconds of video that has been the toughest for you to obtain good results. The length of video to send is up to you, but I would suggest limiting it to under 100 MBytes. Since m2t is about 200M/min, this suggests something in the 15-30 second range. Send me the original footage, if possible. Also, send about one second from somewhere in this 15-30 second clip that represents the results of all your modifications (levels adjustments, color correction, noise reduction, etc.) so that I have some idea of what how you want the result to look. I will then try to achieve the same thing, but with hopefully better noise reduction.

You will need to find an ftp site that will let you transfer this file. I use Yousendit.com, but I think there are lots of others that let you upload 100MB files.

Finally, since I don't have a PAL monitor, my levels adjustments will have to be done from the computer screen. It is calibrated using a Spyder, but of course that won't help me match the correct monitor levels. However, the main purpose of this exercise is to demonstrate the noise reduction.

fausseplanete wrote on 1/6/2008, 3:43 AM

I have sent you an email, via this website, with a link to a password-protected webpage from where the files you request can be downloaded. I have not sent an email in this way before, so if you don't receive it, please let me know.

johnmeyer wrote on 1/6/2008, 10:46 PM

I have received the files and am working on them. You have done an excellent job and clearly are very advanced in what you are doing. I think I can perhaps do a little better, but unlike similar jobs I've done for others, I don't think I can make a night/day difference from what you have already done.You are very good at this.

I'll work on this tomorrow and send you the results, and you can post your opinions here.

fausseplanete wrote on 1/7/2008, 4:56 PM

Great to receive a compliment like that coming from yourself - I had no way to know to what extent I was doing it properly, so if nothing else, being able now to feel good on that score is a definite benefit (I can stop panicking!). If you can improve it further, or even achieve the same level by using a faster denoiser, then so much the better, but whatever. Good luck, and thanks again.