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How do you make SD look HD?

7K views 36 replies 20 participants last post by  mgavsf 
#1 ·
What is a broadcast studio doing to convert NTSC video into HD? It may not look as good as HD camera video, but it looks much better than SD. How do they do it and is there some way I can do it to my NTSC video via my PC?


VP's clean up a signal, but not to the extent that I see when studios convert NTSC to HD ATSC.


Am I looking for something I can never afford?
 
#2 ·
I would guess that they have access to the material in a much higher quality than what you have available, i.e. no (or less) MPEG noise, or no analogue noise. Broadcast quality NTSC is a lot different than what you're seeing. Add to that some high-performance scaling, and you don't have a chance. Baiscally, perhaps they aren't really cleaning anything up - they just have access to the stuff before it got dirty...
 
#3 ·
If the original material was film based, then the studios could start with the original and convert to HD with easily more detail. But, most of the studios are starting with video tape (or disk) of NTSC camera source material. I don't believe most TV programs start with film. Their schedules don't permit the time and expense to process and convert film to video.


Therefore someone is converting NTSC video from 480i to 1080i and it looks better than simple scaling. Does someone know what it is they do to achieve this?
 
#7 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Neuland /forum/post/0


If the original material was film based, then the studios could start with the original and convert to HD with easily more detail. But, most of the studios are starting with video tape (or disk) of NTSC camera source material. I don't believe most TV programs start with film. Their schedules don't permit the time and expense to process and convert film to video.


Therefore someone is converting NTSC video from 480i to 1080i and it looks better than simple scaling. Does someone know what it is they do to achieve this?

Still, the NTSC video material that they have available directly from the master tapes are of much higher quality than the NTSC video you're looking at. If you think what you're seeing on your telly is the same quality as the broadcasters have available in their studios, think again...


That said, they often do a bit more than simple scaling, it probably often involves some level of noise reduction and sharpness enhancement, of a quality similar to what is available in Silicon Optix Realta-based processors (if you are to believe S.O.'s advertising, at least - my guess is the pro world is still in front). Were you to have noise reduction and sharpness algorithms of the same quality on your PC, _and_ access to broadcast-quality material, you probably could do just as well on your PC. But basically, you probably have neither.


I actually just did a comparison today, just for fun, of a DVD played back at 480i, and an HD-DVD version of the same film downscaled to 480i. The difference is _massive_, mostly due to the higher compression of the DVD version. You could _never_ upscale the DVD version to a quality anything similar to downscaling the HD-DVD version and upscaling again. It's basically the same thing with your comparison, you're comparing a degraded NTSC upscaled to HD, to a broadcast-quality NTSC upscaled to HD and then delivered to you with minimal degration. The degration in quality from the studio to your display is basically less - or at least less visible - in HD than in digital. So, what you're seeing is probably not as much about a difference in the quality of upscaling, as a difference in the degration of picture quality from the studio to your display.


What I'm trying to say is: Very few people have actually seen the full potential of the NTSC system, what you see is mostly whatever is left of the NTSC picture quality after the quality degration the picture suffers on its way to your house. A lot of people would say that DVD shows the maximum potential of the NTSC system - this is not at all true. If you want to see the full actual potential of NTSC pictures in a perfect world, try downscaling HD to 480i. That's basically what a good, broadcast grade mastertape in the studio's should look like (probably rarely does, but anyway...) Imagine upscaling that _back_ to HD, and it will surely look a whole lot better than upscaling your regular NTSC material?
 
#9 ·
By the way, I don't know much about what is transmitted on the US HD channels, but a lot of the material that's sent out in NTSC, is actually shot in HD. In this case, it's of course just a matter of using the original HD masters, not upscaling. But I guess your question implies that some of the material is infact upscaled?
 
#13 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Neuland /forum/post/0


Because they have to produce an hour every week and film digitization takes too much time. I'm guessing, I don't know. Are you saying you do know that most TV shows use film and convert?

Most prime time eposidic television is film origionated. Reality shows, game shows and multicamera sitcoms are tape based for the most part. The transfer procees is real time for HD video (not counting the human decision time in the color correction process). Only film scanning for theatrical release is less than real time and in fact state of the art scanners can do 2048x1556 12bit RGB in real time 24fps provided you have a disk array fast enough to capture it.


You can't make HD from SD. You can get real close depending on the SD source material. The best sources are component digital masters. Once material is converted to NTSC it has the tell tail NTSC footprint known as "dot crawl" and this can never be totally eleminated. Furthermore NTSC severely limits the chroma bandwidth.


As for used pro gear, there are many sources but it's not "plug and play stuff". These devices use professional interfaces and may require additional equipment to function in a system. I do have some broadcast stuff in my HT but I work in the business as well. Some of this older 1990s vintage SD processing equipment can be had for free from the E-Waste pile at many Hollywood facilities these days.
 
#14 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Otto J /forum/post/0



I actually just did a comparison today, just for fun, of a DVD played back at 480i, and an HD-DVD version of the same film downscaled to 480i. The difference is _massive_, mostly due to the higher compression of the DVD version. You could _never_ upscale the DVD version to a quality anything similar to downscaling the HD-DVD version and upscaling again. It's basically the same thing with your comparison, you're comparing a degraded NTSC upscaled to HD, to a broadcast-quality NTSC upscaled to HD and then delivered to you with minimal degration. The degration in quality from the studio to your display is basically less - or at least less visible - in HD than in digital. So, what you're seeing is probably not as much about a difference in the quality of upscaling, as a difference in the degration of picture quality from the studio to your display.

I don't think that was a fair comparision since on a digital display DVDs look much better at 480p than 480i. A good DVD player usually does a better job of processing than the display. I know that is certainly true in my case (actually with an ED plasma, not even HD). But I agree with you, HD downconverted looks far better than SD upconverted. I can copy a high quality HD cable program (such as HBO) to my Panasonic E80H HDD recorder in the 2 hour SP mode (second highest resolution) at 480i and dub it to a DVD-R and it looks very very good, almost as good as a pre-recorded DVD. GIGO.
 
#15 ·
I looked it up in my bartender's handbook, A Snell and Wilcox is a double shot of Tanqueray, a dash of bitters, one crushed juniper berry, and a splash of soda. No ice.


Seriously, it is a professional grade brand of deinterlacer/scaler. It was first introduced to the consumer market around the time of the first Faroudjas. It was very very expensive then. Th company is famous also for a moving plate test pattern found on many video test discs.
 
#22 ·
Let this poor useless thread die ...


Everybody's input was appreciated. I am curious how much a Quassar Ph.C would cost, but no matter what, I couldn't afford it.


I officially yeild. SD cannot be made to look as good as HD by the average Joe (err, Tim). End of story.


Ultimately, you would expect it is all a software exercise. If you don't care how long it takes, then some kind of image enlargement and enhancement software should be able to take my daughter's old softball VHS tapes and make them look better on my big screen.
 
#23 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Neuland /forum/post/0



Ultimately, you would expect it is all a software exercise. If you don't care how long it takes, then some kind of image enlargement and enhancement software should be able to take my daughter's old softball VHS tapes and make them look better on my big screen.

Definately! That IS possible, it's just that it will never be possible to do it _as good_ as when you have the original master tape to do it from. That doesn't mean you should give up on improving whatever SD you want to look at, there's definately improvements to be had - just not as much as you were asking for.
 
#24 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tim Neuland /forum/post/0



Ultimately, you would expect it is all a software exercise. If you don't care how long it takes, then some kind of image enlargement and enhancement software should be able to take my daughter's old softball VHS tapes and make them look better on my big screen.


Search for HiCon³² made by Fraunhofer Institute. But it will only really work on clean source material
 
#25 ·
Stacey,


Are mojitos still that trendy?


Tim Neuland,


1. S&W, Teranex 6U and other devices currently used by broadcasting companies (in the past, I owned a Key digital upscaler that was in use originally by a broadcaster in NY to upscale their stuff a few years ago) usually costs between $10K and $100K... If you have that kind of money to spend, you probably have someone technical do the comparisons for you...


2. Many shows are shot in film today. This is just practical, since film can be converted to more formats (if shows were shot in 60hz video, it becomes harder to sell overseas to a 60hz crowd - but 24fps is universally accepted).


if you look at how long it takes to edit a show, you would understand that the telecine process is not necessarily significant in how long it takes to make a particular show (post-production takes a tremendous amount of time and effort, in audio, video, sfx, editing, music, etc.).
 
#26 ·
I am a video editor with 2 HD edit suites.


The SD material you see on your set looks nothing like the material when it starts out with.


Your average SD broadcast material can be found in a few formats

DVCAM, BETACAMSP, Digital BETACAM, ect. (HDCAM and Digital Betacam can support True HDTV using an interface called SDI.. or Serial Digital Interface.)


There is an industrial, or consumer/prosumer version of HD called HDV.. it follows the same resolution(up to 1080i), however it is DV based, and has a much smaller colourspace and heavy compression.


In any case.. if you were to walk into an edit suite, editing SD material off of Digital Betacam.. you'd see detail and colour that *almost* comes close to HDTV in terms of general PQ (It's not of course, but visual.. compared to the end result on YOUR TV.. the source tapes or edit master are miles ahead, even on SD)


In fact, one of my first reactions.. seeing an HDTV off air broadcast on a consumer TV was:

" Wow.. that looks almost like the Edit Master!"


I'm convinced, if I hooked up a Digi Beta machine playing NTSC SD footage shot 16:9 into an HDTV set with a good scaler.. that even with the 480 upconversion, I could fool more than a few people into thinking it was HDTV.



What's my point?


Well, I guess SD can never, ever look like HD.. but, given the right circumstances.. you'd be really surprised how close it can actually get.
 
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