Hi there! It’s high time that we should give you some insights into our latest improvements and the direction of further efforts.
First of all, we would like to let you know our main goal is to improve your viewing experience substantially via a large screen and high resolution when you have a compressed DVD at your disposal and even regular movies at hand in hope of watching them at a higher resolution. Fortunately, all your expectations and desirable needs can be met now in view of our constant innovations and improvements. Thus, we are glad to share with you the challenges we have tackled from multiaspects.
Essential Details about DVD Formats
Usually, DVDs include two formats, namely, PAL (720×576) and NTSC (720×480), whose aspect ratios are respectively 16:9 and 4:3. As you may know, the data stored on a DVD is not the motion picture (that occupies a huge storage space) filmed originally, but a lossy compressed version of the original content. For a DVD, its encoding algorithm is called MPEG, a lossy compression algorithm similar to JPEG for pictures, both using the DCT algorithm on 8×8 pixel blocks. As for motion pictures, the quality of their frames remains arguably decent when viewed on a small screen, but when resized on a large screen of a modern TV, the viewing experience will be undermined at once due to the cubic artifacts of the image (blocky aspect), along with the loss of color and details.
Objectives of Enlarger AI
The challenges we have addressed can be summarized as follows in the course of improving the features of this powerful AI-driven video enhancer.
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Fix Color Loss
This aspect is probably more noticeable on high-end computers and TV displays, but, in terms of design, the MPEG DCT algorithm adopts color quantization, which means it reduces the number of original colors, making the image less vibrant and appealing. However, Enlarger AI’s algorithm (hereinafter short for the Algorithm) manages to translate the reduced color palette into a much richer one.
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Fix Image Artifacts
Eliminating the compression blocks is another tricky problem, as square elements in images are also common in nature. Enlarger AI tries to make smart decisions in reducing and eliminating the blocky effects.
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Improve True Details
Thanks to the deblocking feature, the Algorithm can improve the crisp details in a content-aware manner. Therefore, letters and small objects will be rendered with much higher quality and textures.
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Create Videos with a Solid Motion Consistency between Frames – No Flickering
It is often the case, especially in old movies, when the original content renders lots of noise and camera artifacts. We might think these undesirable effects cannot be removed because they are part of the original content, mood, and feel. Also, mood and feel represent a pattern of experience that shall not be removed during the movie playback. Hence, a big challenge in the frame-by-frame approach is the modification of background noise texture, which renders a disturbing image when put together in the motion picture. Thankfully, all these problems have been resolved.
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Speed
With Enlarger AI, we managed to improve a movie in a reasonable amount of time, considering the series of tasks asked from the algorithm to be solved. The results are not perfect yet, as for now recomposing details has become a higher priority than eliminating every single artifact, but the blocks are greatly reduced and the details are able to create a richer viewing experience. Trying to show a “hard to solve” input for the algorithm, down below we added some visual results after the video has been suffering from extreme compression artifacts.
Usually, DVDs have a considerably better compression ratio than the ones listed in the following screenshot. The Algorithm can recognize the artifacts, diminish them, and improve the texture, color, and true details of the image. The red circles we marked out in the pictures reflect the reconstruction of small image details.
DVD 3x Regular Upscale
Upscaled by Enlarger AI
Support from DVDFab
You can use DVD Ripper with Enlarger AI to convert DVDs to MKV/MP4 video format in 1080p resolution or use DVD to Blu-ray Converter with Enlarger AI to convert DVDs to standard Blu-ray format in 1080p resolution for the purpose of a better viewing experience.
Besides, the video files (like MPEG format) with 480p resolution captured by old digital video devices, and even VOB files from DVDs can be upscaled to 1080p resolution when Video Converter works with Enlarger AI.
We will keep you informed of the upcoming new features and be dedicated to bringing you much more stunning user experience. Please feel free to try out the existing new features.
