Removing grain

AmateurD · Feb 28, 2014

Hello guys.

Yesterday i had to shoot a concert in a theater, but the light was so bad that i had to add gains, otherwise it would be impossible to see the artists in stage.

I obviously have grain in the image. I've read that the best way to reduce it is using a tool called Neat Video (plugin for Adobe and Final Cut i guess).

Is it the best way to solve it?

Thank you.

wheatgrinder · Feb 28, 2014

I have neat and it works as advertised. RedGiant also makes a denoise plugin, its probably easier to use then neat, but neat seems to be the more popular choice.

If you want, post a short sample, 5 seconds or so, of the footage you have. Ill download it and run it through neat and you can see if its worth the investment. Or just buy neat and go fer it.

AmateurD · Feb 28, 2014

wheatgrinder thanks for your reply.

Would you do that for me? I dont have the footage with me but i'll post it tomorrow, if its ok for you.

Thanks you!

moonshieldmedia · Feb 28, 2014

Sounds like your grain problem is too severe to remove. If it were me, I'd turn all the footage black and white, up the contrast, and ADD grain. Call it a stylistic choice

Will Vincent · Feb 28, 2014

I've seen side by side comparison between neatvideo and the redgiant denoiser.. it's night & day, neat is the clear winner.

AmateurD · Mar 2, 2014

Thank you guys.

wheatgrinder i can only send you a sample this tuesday, i worked yesterday but i forgot my external drive with the video there.

wheatgrinder · Mar 3, 2014

Funny conincidink..

This past Saturday, I did shot for my kids senior project, we lost the light, so I had to boost iso 1000 and shoot wide open at f1.5 NOISY!!!

Since I had the same issue you did I created a little example with my footage.

One thing, seems the very noisy footage was somewhat cleaned by the compression process. The noise is almost not an issue in any h264 render I could pull off. So, meh, the test below doesn't seem to show much difference between the original footage and the denoised.. but maybe you can see it..

https://vimeo.com/88040073

AmateurD · Mar 3, 2014

Hello wheatgrinder, thanks for that.

There is really not much difference between them as far i can see. I think the denoised one is a little cleaner.

When you say that the noise is almost cleaned with h264 render, you mean exporting in that format?

Thank you. I'll post the sample tomorrow

wheatgrinder · Mar 3, 2014

yeah, seems the vidoe compression process cleans up noise (makes sense from a math POV)
so you might see the same thing in your sample.

Ill try and render\upload a less compressed version.

I can exaggerate the problem by increasing the brightness of the footage in post.

AmateurD · Mar 4, 2014

Thanks wheatgrinder.

Here it is the link for the download, i've exported in AVI (tell me if you want me to change it)

https://www.wetransfer.com/download...679dbd41e2229dbe21073a2020140304200126/5b2f5e

Didn't want to export in h264 because i want all the noise to be there and see if Neat can improve the image.

Thank you.

wheatgrinder · Mar 5, 2014

ok, I dont know pal so if I did something wrong on the render sorry.. but try this.
First half is original, second half is with Neat Video plugin applied in After Effect cc. I didnt mess much with the settings. I think for $100 you really cant go wrong.

http://we.tl/SMZtIq5h2b

wheatgrinder · Mar 7, 2014

HELLO! Im glad to help, but a thanks would be nice..

AmateurD · Mar 7, 2014

wheatgrinder i'm so sorry but i've been really busy but i didn't forgot it and i'm here to say thank your for your help and availability. I'm not a person who doesn't thank who help me, but yes i reckon i should've done it earlier.

There is in fact a huge difference, it's night and day! Looks like Neat Video it's anti grain miracle! I have no doubts anymore

Thank you and sorry

wheatgrinder · Mar 10, 2014

its all good. Yeah, should improve your SD footage immensely.