AI Video Enhancement

[John Ellenberger]

I am on the search for a decent AI tool to clean up some old (town history) videos.  I gave up on Topaz a year ago because it didn't seem to really accomplish much and the price has gone way up.   I haven't seen anything like an Adobe Plug-in which is a little surprising.  Has anybody found something that works, Premiere related or standalone, to clean-up some older VHS era videos?

[Peru Bob]

I use Neat Video as a plugin for Premiere Pro:

https://www.neatvideo.com/

[Warren Heaton]

@Peru Bob 

+1 for NeatVideo.  It's saved countless shots for me over the years.

[John Ellenberger]

I did actually did try the NeatVideo plug-in. I didn't care for it
because:'

- Very Pricey
- Complex interface which I found hard to figure out
- Not clear what impact it was having on the output. For something like
cleaning up old VHS video it didn't seem to do much (which was true of all
the tools).

I think this tool is meant for folks that shoot video for a living. I am
an occasional user and shoot about 1 project / mo. as a volunteer producer
for the local access channel.

...which begs the question of why I pay $700+/yr. for CC. (but that's a
different topic)

[Warren Heaton]

@John Ellenberger 

I think I paid $89 for NeatVideo?  But that was back in... 2013.  I think that I've purchased one upgrade as well.  For video noise and flicker, it's been excellent.

VHS can be very challenging to improve.  As I'm sure you're aware, everything that's usually hidden by overscan on a 4-by-3 analog SDTV screen (skew at the bottom, black vertical bars along the sides, closed captioning signals, Macrovision, etc.) becomes visible.  And it also needs to be deinterlaced and up-converted.

I think Topaz Video Ai is your best option if you can figure out a way to make purchasing it work within your budget.

On the After Effects side, you can crop for overscan, reduce noise, and do Detail-preserving Upscale.  I did that for Holly du Rivage's documentary that's been on PBS for a little over a year now (PERFECT HOUSE, MAGIC CITY), but we've gone back and redone the upconversion for any source that wasn't already i1080 or p1080 with Topaz Video Ai for the screenings at colleges and events.  It's made a huge difference for the archival content.

Are you associated with a non-profit?  Adobe offers a good discount on Creative Cloud for non-profits.  Or does the public access have editing bays with Creative Cloud installed?  That's not the same as having it on your personal computer, but at least it's access.

[John T Smith]

I don't know if this will do what you want, but I saw mention of it somewhere (can't remember where)

https://www.winxdvd.com/winxvideo-ai/

[John Ellenberger]

I looked at that but didn't try it because the claims they were making seemed exaggerated (to put it politely).  I tried Nero AI Upscaler.  It was slow and didn't really make any improvements (plus the trial version puts a big logo in the middle of the output making it unusuable).  I may return to Topaz.  When it was released it was affordable but it became very expensive, slow and didn't do much that I could detect so I refused to pay the last renewal.

[John T Smith]

Hmm... does that site have a trial you can test?

[John Ellenberger]

Not sure what you mean.  I trialed Nero and was not impressed.  I own an older copy of Topaz but I don't think there is a way to "trial" an upgrade.  Upgrade is $158 for a year.  I could trial the WinX but I didn't.

[John T Smith]

>Not sure what you mean

I mean do they allow using the program as a trial version, without paying?

[John Ellenberger]

Which program? I mentioned 3 different programs and somebody mentioned a
plug-in

[John T Smith]

I only suggested one program, and you said you didn't believe what they claimed

[John Ellenberger]

Sorry I didn't make the connection.   I decided to try WinxAI.  It does have a "trial" version that will process 5 minutes of video.  Even with Nvidia support (which you have to download separately) it took about 10-15 min to process.  IMHO the output was improved a little (tone, clarity) but not that great.  Settings were GenDetail, High Quality, Enhance Video, Frame Interpolation, 2X FPS

Input Video 

WinXAI Output 

[John T Smith]

I will GUESS that no software that is a 'reasonable' price is going to make 'perfect' video... and even very expensive software that a movie studio might buy is not going to do much more

If the improvement is worth the cost, buy the program... but don't expect perfection

[Warren Heaton]

To add to what @John T Smith mentioned about not expcting perfection, don't expect it to be fast.  Upconverting a few shots can be fairly quick, but upconverting SD edited masters that are thirty minutes to one hour or more can take a lot of time.

[Warren Heaton]

@John Ellenberger 

Since you've scratched Topaz off the list, check out BorisFX UpRes ML.   It's subscription based, but there's a free trial and there is an option to subscribe for one month at a time - so, in theory, you could pay for it only when needed.  When not subscribed, you don't have to uninstall it so that it's ready the next time you need it.

The BorisFX plug-ins work in both Premiere Pro and After Effects (their website only lists UpRes ML as being for After Effects, but I it shows up in Premiere Pro and can be applied).

[jessica1213]

I’ve been trying out a few tools myself and gave Nero AI Video Upscaler a shot: https://pcai.nero.com/video-upscaler

On some music videos the results were mixed — a few clips came out nice, others not as great. But with old footage and especially VHS, it’s been really solid and consistent, which I like a lot.

It’s standalone on Windows, so no need for Premiere or plugins. If you’re still experimenting, this one might be worth a try.