I used Premiere to produce an .mp4 video, starting with an .mp4 video captured via AVerMedia ReCentral 4 from a website. In scenes that are very dark, there is blotchiness in the dark areas. How can I get rid of the blotchiness? Details:Premiere Pro v 25.x running on Windows11. Source video: .mp4, codec avc1, 3840 x 2160 pixels, 60 fps, frame rate mode variable, color space YUV, 8 bit depth, progressive scan, 16:9 aspect ratio. Output video: .mp4, codec avc1, 3840 x 2160 pixels, 60 fps, frame rate mode constant, color space YUV, 8 bit depth, progressive scan, 16:9 aspect ratio, format profile Main@L5.2.

Inspiring

Answered

how to get rid of blotchiness in a dark scene

Forum|Forum|27 days ago
July 17, 2026
12 replies
84 views

I used Premiere to produce an .mp4 video, starting with an .mp4 video captured via AVerMedia ReCentral 4 from a website. In scenes that are very dark, there is blotchiness in the dark areas. How can I get rid of the blotchiness?

Details:

Premiere Pro v 25.x running on Windows11.
Source video: .mp4, codec avc1, 3840 x 2160 pixels, 60 fps, frame rate mode variable, color space YUV, 8 bit depth, progressive scan, 16:9 aspect ratio.
Output video: .mp4, codec avc1, 3840 x 2160 pixels, 60 fps, frame rate mode constant, color space YUV, 8 bit depth, progressive scan, 16:9 aspect ratio, format profile Main@L5.2.

Correct answer R Neil Haugen

The “blotchiness” is probably macro blocking and/or video noise.

Macro-blocking is naturally occuring in any long-GOP media on medium to heavy compression … as one of the compression tools that format uses is to lump “similar” groups of pixels to one set of RGB data numbers. So you get small but visible blocks of identical pixels.

Say a group of four has RGB numbers of 42/31/27 … 44/30/29 … 41/30/28 … 40/31/29 … what you’re going to get after compression to any long-GOP format, will be a block of four pixels all at something like 41/31/28.

Video noise is something where the signal was low enough that you don’t get ‘real’ data, just electronic noise … so a colored or black spot. That takes either raising blacks a bit to simple drop it below the black point as Kevin suggested, or use of a video noise removal process. Like Neat Video.

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

By the way, the blotchiness doesn’t appear in editing, only in an exported file.

JA Redmond WA

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

I used both Main10 (for 10 bits) and Lumetri blacks. Neither is satisfactory; in fact, the blacks are badly crushed (I tried 15%, 30% and 50%), and I see blotchiness in other colors. I’ve not found anything that produces a smooth background.

JA Redmond WA

R Neil Haugen

Legend

“Blotchiness” appearing on export but not in the sequence view at 100% in Program monitor is definitely macro-blocking caused by the standard method used by long-GOP encoding, both H.264 and H.265/HEVC.

To get away from it you need to up the bitrate data rate substantially … which of course, also dramatically increases the resultant file size.

Everyone's mileage always varies ...

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

I set Bitrate Settings to Target Bitrate to 160, the highest offered. The resulting .mp4 file didn’t look better in terms of blotchiness (is there a more suitable technical term for that?).

Curiously, the file (as shown by MediaInfo) has a bitrate of 44.3 Mb/s, whilst the original file has a bitrate of 106 Mb/s. Why would the latest file be less, much less, than the original in terms of bitrate? (Codecs are hvc1 and avc1, respectively.)

JA Redmond WA

R Neil HaugenCorrect answer

Legend

The “blotchiness” is probably macro blocking and/or video noise.

Macro-blocking is naturally occuring in any long-GOP media on medium to heavy compression … as one of the compression tools that format uses is to lump “similar” groups of pixels to one set of RGB data numbers. So you get small but visible blocks of identical pixels.

Say a group of four has RGB numbers of 42/31/27 … 44/30/29 … 41/30/28 … 40/31/29 … what you’re going to get after compression to any long-GOP format, will be a block of four pixels all at something like 41/31/28.

Video noise is something where the signal was low enough that you don’t get ‘real’ data, just electronic noise … so a colored or black spot. That takes either raising blacks a bit to simple drop it below the black point as Kevin suggested, or use of a video noise removal process. Like Neat Video.

Everyone's mileage always varies ...

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

Thanks for the various responses. I seem to be stuck with blotchiness.

JA Redmond WA

R Neil Haugen

Legend

If it is only on export, then often one can minimize depending on where it’s coming in.

Sometimes with H.264/5 originals, doing almost any color correction can induce this and it isn’t often visible until you get to 100% view on the Program monitor. So … you haven’t said if you’ve taken the Program Monitor to 100% and checked the worse areas … if not, do.

As if so, then … there are maybe ways to get the color correction done with less induced image issue.

If the 100% view of the macro blocking is fine, how does it look on export if you use an export of ProRes 422 for the codec? If that is clean, then … use something like Handbrake or ShutterEncoder to take the ProRes to H.264/5 with various settings. They are user-friendly front ends for the open-source ffmpeg encoding system. And you have more granular controls over the H/264/5 encoding there than in Premiere or Resolve.

Everyone's mileage always varies ...

John T Smith

Community Expert

Is it possible to ask the website owner for a copy of the original video?

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

Very doubtful.

JA Redmond WA

J

JARedmondWAAuthor

Inspiring

I got an .mp4 file from the website. Playing that file, there is only a bit of blotchiness. I am producing my own file (adding supertitlles).

JA Redmond WA

K

Kevin-Monahan

Community Manager

Hi JA,

Thanks for the message. The issue is appearing onscreen as you edit or just in the export? In 8 bit, you can get compression artifacts like this. A higher 10-bit quality can hold up much better in scenes like this. You may want to try the Lumetri Color effect, and use the Blacks controls to crush them aggressively, Let me know if that helps.

Thanks,
Kevin

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