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Star Trek Deep Space Nine HD Enhanced (video sample)

ALF

ALF

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YouTube user SCAR 90's GT ran 8.5 minutes of DS9 clips through professional enhancement video software and was able to create an upscaled version and posted it here:

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Thoughts on the quality of something like this? Being completely ignorant about the kind of work that goes into this kind of industrial-grade enhancement, does it not suggest taking a more serious look at some kind of combined hardware+software solution to upgrade DS9 / VOY? I know the idea has been tossed around in the few HD DS9 discussions on this board - or at least a process that could be largely automated as opposed to a frame-by-frame reconstruction.

It's not a perfect solution by any means but it looks good. Quark would wanna profit on this.
 
It looks like the DVD only with some edge enhancement in some places and smoothing in others. Overall it's a decent result but nothing like as good as TNG-R.
 
I got better results from just turning on my HDR+ setting on my 40" Samsung. I wasn't impressed by the above, at all.
 
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I'm certainly not against the idea of theoretically using tech to upscale the show if a true HD remaster doesn't happen, but I've yet to see an example that (in my eyes) doesn't actually look worse. They always have a semblance of improvement, but once you look closer the ugliness of smoothing/sharpening becomes apparent. Not to mention weird anomalies that pop up. (Like the seam in the front of Odo's uniform in one of the videos uploaded recently, where it appears and disappears throughout the shot. The AI can't make up its mind as to whether to smooth the line away or to sharpen it.)
 
Savage Dragon said:
I'm getting Video unavailable. Can everyone else still see it?
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Oh snap, YouTube link's gone dry.

I can't say for absolute confidence that this is the same project, but here's a blog post that went live yesterday from a captrobau, can't imagine it would be a coincidence. These videos look to still be live and healthy and they have side-by-side comparison:
https://captrobau.blogspot.com/2019/03/remastering-star-trek-deep-space-nine.html

So I tried my hand at frame or two, to see what it could do. The results were great. AI Gigapixel uses neural networks trained on real photos. So while it did okay with upscaling the video game renders of Final Fantasy, it did amazing upscaling real-life footage and the bigger budget CGI effects of DS9.​

Software used is called AI Gigapixel, a product for still images that claims to enlarge originals up to 600%.

tomswift2002 said:
It doesn’t look as good as the DVD’s look being upscale by my PS3 to 1080p. Of course, with DS9 and Voyager as they currently exist, you are starting with NTSC Composite video, as there masters are stored on D2 Composite Digital Videotape, and DS9 was transferred in interlace 3:2 pulldown, not progressive.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-2_(video)
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Tried watching Voyager DVD last night on my Xbox One and I was delighted to see how much better it looked than broadcast which is very smudgy at times.

Tosk said:
I'm certainly not against the idea of theoretically using tech to upscale the show if a true HD remaster doesn't happen, but I've yet to see an example that (in my eyes) doesn't actually look worse. They always have a semblance of improvement, but once you look closer the ugliness of smoothing/sharpening becomes apparent. Not to mention weird anomalies that pop up. (Like the seam in the front of Odo's uniform in one of the videos uploaded recently, where it appears and disappears throughout the shot. The AI can't make up its mind as to whether to smooth the line away or to sharpen it.)
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Yes, it looks like sometimes the AI isn't sure if it should sharpen shadows in the background or not. The whole thing could look quite trippy and weird if not supervised with a human eye that can distinguish what's worth enhancing and what should be ignored.

BillJ said:
Personally, I'm not paying for the show unless it is a true HD remaster.
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Completely agree.
However, I think these kinds of 'grassroots' based fan projects will go on endlessly until CBS caves to do the full HD remaster.

And Voyager, too.
 
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I watched the video in the blog, they're different to the ones posted the other day.

And they look worse?

I honestly couldn't see a difference, except for some edge sharpening and contrast boosting. Nice try, but it ain't HD.
 
There is an improvement in the videos posted in the blog, but its not HD, not even close. Some improvement is better than nothing though.

Samsung have started implementing AI upscaling, so expect to see this tech to become more common and hopefully better. You dont need to buy remastered content though. You just pop your existing DVD/blu-ray in it's player and the TV does the upscaling. Same with streamed content.

It will take a few years before this kinda tech finds its way into most homes and the AI won't be performing miracles. 480 DS9 content will probably look on par with 720 content. Still it's a big enough of an improvement to make me wanna rewatch it all.
 
Well I have a Samsung blu ray player and I will say DS9 does look better when I watch it off Netflix downloaded on it than when I watch it on my Amazon Firestick. I think it also works best when you have both brightness and color on your tv both set on 80 and contrast at 50. I do need to get some more dvd's though because I lost them when I moved and I bet those will even be more improvements. My player you can play both blu rays and dvd's on them.


Jason
 
Tomalak said:
I watched the video in the blog, they're different to the ones posted the other day.
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Very odd. The day I posted this - March 12, there were a number of similar posts touting improved SD Trek video - I counted two of DS9 and one of VOY. I wonder what sparked this, was there a release of some enhancement software around that time, and like-minded Trek fans thought the same thought all at once?

I wish I could repost the original video from the OP, SCAR 90s. I can offer at least this text from the beginning of that video, explaining part of the enhancement process:

"I have no idea how the software works, all I really know is that it has something to do with a new form of motion compensation and line detection that requires a cluster of computers working together that I happen to have some limited access to."​

That doesn't sound like your typical, consumer-end software/hardware combo, which is what captrobau is likely using.
 
ALF said:
Very odd. The day I posted this - March 12, there were a number of similar posts touting improved SD Trek video - I counted two of DS9 and one of VOY. I wonder what sparked this, was there a release of some enhancement software around that time, and like-minded Trek fans thought the same thought all at once?

I wish I could repost the original video from the OP, SCAR 90s. I can offer at least this text from the beginning of that video, explaining part of the enhancement process:

"I have no idea how the software works, all I really know is that it has something to do with a new form of motion compensation and line detection that requires a cluster of computers working together that I happen to have some limited access to."​

That doesn't sound like your typical, consumer-end software/hardware combo, which is what captrobau is likely using.
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Really without knowing what he was using, it sounds like he just managed to get the stuff working and was lucky. I watched his examples, and quite frankly my $25 DVD player from Walmart was doing a better job upscaling and deinterlacing over HDMI than his AI.

But in a professional editing suite, for the best conversion, SD video would be sent through a hardware upscaler and de-interlaced, such as a Teranex, before being sent on to software. Hardware always does the best upconversion and deinterlacing over software.
 
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