DrDre said:
Inspired by the discussion with RU.08 I decided try to reduce the noise. It appears that due to the high resolution of the upscale, much of the noise inherent to the upscaling method can relatively easily be removed using an advanced filter, without a significant detail reduction. Here are some comparisons between the noisy and denoised SRV3:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122096
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122097
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122098
Here are the comparisons with the Avisynth Spline64Resize:
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122116
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122117
http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/122118
The noise is now generally less than for the Avisynth Spline64Resize and less than for the source material.
Here's a denoised video sample:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8_LYKyZDiajY1YwNGFHZmdEZUU/view?usp=sharing
The detail is retained, but the cost has been reduced. Thanks to RU.08 for keeping on the pressure. ;-)
These are some great comparisons. I was concerned about the 'double haloing' effect that the noisy SRV3 had on the source, but the denoised version does seem to minimize or eliminate that. Could you post similar comparisons for the shot of Leia on the Tantive for example, I'm really interested in how this changes the distortion in the eyes of characters, since the previous one tended to add artifacts in the iris especially.