Black Alert

Set of comparison images for Season 1, episode 1:

https://imgur.com/a/Y1EifvZ

This project started during the first Covid-related lockdown back in March 2020 and has been continuing ever since.

The “Enhanced Edition” features a combination of the 16:9 aspect ratio PAL-DVDs (for all live action scenes) and the 4:3 aspect ratio HD remastered versions (for all CGI/VFX effect shots), which were stretched to 16:9 to conform to the live action segments.
Basically, this is a higher quality version that focuses mainly on the “clean-up” of visual aspects of the show, like: Reduced motion stuttering (stable 23,976 FPS), deinterlacing, cross color reduction, noise removal, deblocking, dehaloing, deringing, anti aliasing, reduction of color banding, sharpening.
All borders have been slightly cropped to eliminate the “VHS-tape look”.
Slight color grading has been added to enhance the color representation.
Furthermore, the audio tracks have been slowed down to correct for the PAL-shift.

The releases (4K) are encoded as follows: H265 (mkv) at 20 Mbps with Main 10 @ L5 @ Main, BT.709 @ 10 bit, resolution at 3840x2160p (16:9 aspect ratio) with English and German AC3 5.1 audio tracks at 640 Kbps.
45-minute-episodes take up between 6,5-7,5 GB of space per episode.

The releases (1080p) are encoded as follows: H265 (mkv) at 2,5 Mbps with Main 10 @ L5.1 @ Main, BT.709 @ 10 bit, resolution at 1920x1080p (16:9 aspect ratio) with English and German AC3 5.1 audio tracks at 256 Kbps.
45-minute-episodes take up between 1,2-1,4 GB of space per episode.

The realisation of this project is a very complicated multi-step approach (f.e. using several instances of AI-upscaling software), so it may take a while, but it continues to go on.

If you are interested in getting to know more technical details or in watching the “Enhanced Edition”, send me a private message!

Set of comparison images for Season 1, episodes 1&2 (pilot):

https://imgur.com/a/qL59vpS

This project started during the first Covid-related lockdown back in March 2020 and has been continuing ever since.

The “Enhanced Edition” features a PAL-DVD-based higher quality version that focuses mainly on the “clean-up” of visual aspects of the show, like: Reduced motion stuttering (stable 23,976 FPS), deinterlacing, cross color reduction, noise removal, deblocking, dehaloing, deringing, anti aliasing, reduction of color banding, sharpening.
All borders have been slightly cropped to eliminate the “VHS-tape look”.
Slight color grading has been added to enhance the color representation.
Furthermore, the audio tracks have been slowed down to correct for the PAL-shift.

The releases (4K) are encoded as follows: H265 (mkv) at 20 Mbps with Main 10 @ L5 @ Main, BT.709 @ 10 bit, resolution 2880x2160p (4:3 aspect ratio / no black borders left and right; you can decide if you want to stretch or not) with English and German AC3 5.1 audio tracks at 640 Kbps.
45-minute-episodes take up between 6-7 GB of space per episode.

The releases (1080p) are encoded as follows: H265 (mkv) at 2,5 Mbps with Main 10 @ L5.1 @ Main, BT.709 @ 10 bit, resolution 1440x1080p (4:3 aspect ratio / no black borders left and right; you can decide if you want to stretch or not) with English and German AC3 5.1 audio tracks at 320 Kbps.
45-minute-episodes take up between 0,8-1,0 GB of space per episode.

The realisation of this project is a very complicated multi-step approach (f.e. using several instances of AI-upscaling software), so it may take a while, but it continues to go on.

If you are interested in getting to know more technical details or in watching the “Enhanced Edition”, send me a private message!

I just modified it a little - a bit more saturation (about 10%) and an added 0.10 in the reds, so the faces don’t look “too pale”. But I have to wait and see it on the big screen, images on the pc don’t give the same vibe as the real thing on the 4K OLED.
Also, I switched out one model in t he workflow, since I still couldn’t get rid of the grainy pattern look the sometimes appears on faces. Once I got that covered, I should also be able to deliver a sharper output, since I had to reduce it to avoid that look I mentioned.

Will report back soon.

@lowkey:

Thanks for the input, I have actually been reconsidering my color grading lately, so your advice gave me the boost I needed to take another shot at it.
Also, I have been tinkering around again with my settings, I will post updated samples soon.

@RedRust1987:

Thanks for the information about the clickbait 4K article around the net - if it is the same one I saw (it was just on one site which I found by pure coincidence) then it talked about some studio doing a 4K remaster of DS9 which was supposedly connected to some Trek producers.

However, when I looked further, I found no evidence that there is any truth to it.

So I gues we are talking about the same thing here.

Hello there people, huge updates coming your way. Here they are in a nutshell:

New Workflow: https://www.dropbox.com/s/7xlq13flzan9g40/Detailed Workflow.rar?dl=0

Template for StaxRip: https://www.dropbox.com/s/kp6y09fxhugovht/StaxRip Template - Restoration %26 Cleanup.rar?dl=0

Color Regrading LUT (works with Adobe, DaVinci Resolve): https://www.dropbox.com/s/ezm128n0nyfhjx9/DS9 Restoration Lut .rar?dl=0

Comparison Images for the Pilot Episode: https://www.dropbox.com/s/eqffxpkjyc3610w/1x01%3B02 - E %3B DA (SD vs 4K Images).rar?dl=0

4K-Video Samples for the Pilot Episode: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/riwdi0lb9w0s5kg/AADiY-spYBjJz2MMW_MYuKaLa?dl=0

Have fun and let me know what you think!

Hey guys, sorry I have been so absent lately, but a lot of stuff kept interfering with my work here.

However, an updated version of the DS9 pilot is on the way (I will post samples here soon) - that includes some tweaking to compensate for oversharpening and better motion flow. Stay tuned.

Thanks for your sample - and since I used to work with NTSC Discs as well, I can see that the PAL Discs were definitely “down-mastered” from NTSC, which accounts for the detail and sharpness loss.

Your sample has definitely more detail and looks really nice, so let me take a bow and say “Fascinating!” 😉

I did some trial runs with Dione but found that with the PAL Discs (mixed material in the worst possible sense) it doesn’t “catch” all the problems, QTGMC however does. That unfortunately also means extrapolating image information which does not always help much with detail preservation.
Also, I am doing a little color regrading in DaVinci which darkens things slightly and reduces the shift toward the more warmer colors and gives it a bit of a cooler look (speaking about color temp here) - I was inspired by the DS9 Doc “What We Left Behind”. In rare cases (dark scenes) that can make a little detail disappear here and there, but not much.

As for the crop on the sides: My bad, sorry. I am usually doing manual cropping but for my samples I leave things on automatic with StaxRip. The problem lies with the PAL DVDs here: The image is not consistently centered, so there is no proper way to crop, since the values keep shifting (during one scene the image can have a black bar of about 2 pixels width on the left, the next scene can have 4 pixels width on the left).
I had it on automatic, so it made a bad choice. Usually, I skip through the episode and cut the smallest range. Again, sorry.

I only made the decision to work from PAL for the “smooth and stable” 23,976 FPS, otherwise I would have gladly used the NTSC.

On my workflow: Yes, it takes forever. Example for a standard 45 minute episode:

1. StaxRip - 7 hours
2. Topaz Gaia HQ 100% - 4 hours
3. Topaz Artemis LQ 1080pHD - 3 hours
4. Topaz Gaia CG 4K - 26 hours
5. DaVinci Resolve Videostream rendering - 8 hours.

So it comes down to a total of about 48 hours, so 2 days for a single episode, providing I am there to make the switch between programs/input. I am crazy enough to invest that, running on a 2060 RTX.

Hope I could clear up all your questions.

Ok guys, here are some comparisons for two scenes of the season 6 episode “Sacrifice of Angels” - I must admit the Defiant, the Galaxy ships and the Miranda ships look gorgeous.

Since it is well known that the later seasons of Star Trek DS9 (and Voyager as well) had better quality when it comes to the production values of those shows and conclusively their DVDs, I wanted to see if my workflow would hold up against the later seasons, so I decided to do two test scenes from the DS9 season 6 episode “Sacrifice of Angels”.
Both scenes focus more on the cgi/vfx elements, but I included a few shots of live action/actors/faces as well.
Please be advised that both scenes had a lot of camera shaking (which is logical, since they’re both battle scenes), so it was hard to find images that were actually “still”.

First scene:

Comparison Images (7 MB ; SD-DVD left, 4K upscale right ; Password: DS9Enhanced):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/n44dny0vrm761xr/SoA - Clip 1 (SD vs HD Images).rar?dl=0

Videofile in 4K (120 MB ; Password: DS9Enhanced):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/26hrbpy1r88oww3/SoA - Clip 1 (4K-Test).rar?dl=0

Second scene:

Comparison Images (18 MB ; SD-DVD left, 4K upscale right ; Password: DS9Enhanced):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/07wupkwg0fzuxof/SoA - Clip 2 (SD vs HD Images).rar?dl=0

Videofile in 4K (263 MB ; Password: DS9Enhanced):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/nsozbqelje8ccjv/SoA - Clip 2 (4K-Test).rar?dl=0

Have fun watching and let me know what you think.

@sade1212:

Regarding Season(s) 5+ :
I will do a test and let you know soon, ok? But I did a sample earlier with previous settings and the results looked encouraging (but as you have said, the souce quality does get better, so the results will also look better).

Regarding the CFR at 23,976 FPS :
As I have already stated, I am working from PAL, since I have already had my experiences trying to establish a CFR from the NTSC DVDs and found it to be a horrible experience.
But still, I will explain (although I am not sure if this is applicable to NTSC sources with VFR, so please let me know what you have found out on that end).
I am using StaxRip to handle the Framerate. Here, I apply QTGMC (with a custom made and rather complicated script) for Deinterlacing in Progressive Full Repair Mode and then I use “Assume FPS” towards 23,976 FPS. Works well for PAL.

As for the rainbowing :
That’s also done with StaxRip, the filter here is called “DeCross” (which needs to be manually added as a dll.-file to the AviSynth directory and has to be applied before the Deinterlacing, otherwise it doesn’t work).
I must admit, it does not catch everything, but it reduces a lot of rainbows well enough to be “less noticeable”.

As for smearing and detail loss with faces :
That’s kind of hit and miss, depending on the source. Often, faces in the background are a real pain, since there is little detail to begin with. Still, in my case, a combination of these factors helped:

• StaxRip Filters (QTGMC with adjustments on detail improvement and sharpness increase)
• Using a multi-step-approach with the AI-based enhancement software “Topaz Video Enhance AI”
  (First Pass: A Model called “Gaia HQ” at 100%, purpose: Deblock/Denoise & Detail Recovery
  Second Pass: A Model called "Artemis LQ at 1080pHD, purpose: resolution upscale on low quality input
  Third Pass: A Model called "Gaia CG at 4K, purpose: resolution upscale with Detail Enhancement)
• DaVinci Resolve
  (Adding Grain, Texture and Feature Recovery)

Not all the faces (especially in the background) look great, but they do look like faces with little to no distortion, which was important to me.

Also, I fairly recently started working exclusively with higher bit color spaces (10 bit in StaxRip and 16 bit in Topaz, back to 10bit in DaVinci), since the original 8 bit had banding issues which were handled quite nicely once I switched/encoded/rendered to/in/with higher bit ranges, which is important on DS9 whenever there are larger areas of the same color (like uniforms, walls or space) or sudden changes in light levels (like with flickering lights or explosions, something which almost drove me crazy during the pilot when the station lights on the promenade kept cutting in and out, causing hard lines on everything they touched).

Hope I could help, I will post two samples from my favorite season 6 episode “Sacrifice of Angels” here soon so we can compare quality between season 1 and 6 - that way we can see, if my workflow can be applied there as well.

Sorry, but I must say it looks more like “wishful thinking fueled by rumors” - not that I would not be happy about it, but I just don’t see it happening. I will not stop my project on that one slim chance.

Hello guys, my new topic just got an update, including new comparison images and a video sample. Check it out
(Category: “Preservation of other properties”, topic title “Star Trek - DVD-Restoration and Upscale Project”).

To make it easier, I will post the links here as well (only this time, password is “DS9Enhanced”, written without quotation marks).

Comparison images (215 images, 250 MB):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/jsllel6h2lpheqg/SD vs HD Images - 1x01%3B02 - Der Abgesandte %3B Emissary.rar?dl=0

Video sample (4K at 2880x2160p, 4:3 resolution without black bars left and right, h265 encode in mkv; 2,5 GB):
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pawv5udlr7g5t1e/AABPHoORvlW2yyoZwpgiX6-la?dl=0

Let me know what you think.

And here is (exception, only for this episode to see the quality in a 4K videostream) a sample from the pilot episode. It contains the first 16 minutes of the pilot in 4K (folder size about 2,5 GB; format h265 in mkv).

Please be advised that no further video samples will follow, only image comparisons. For more samples and additional information please contact me via private message.

Link:
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/pawv5udlr7g5t1e/AABPHoORvlW2yyoZwpgiX6-la?dl=0

Ok guys, here are the comparison images for the pilot episode of DS9 (Emissary); the folder contains about 215 images at a total size of about 250 MB).

https://www.dropbox.com/s/jsllel6h2lpheqg/SD vs HD Images - 1x01%3B02 - Der Abgesandte %3B Emissary.rar?dl=0

Currently doing upscale work on the Pilot-Episode “Emissary” - comparison images to follow soon.

Hello community, I used to be user “Animaxx” around here before - for several reasons that I will not go into with this post, I had to change a few things about my avatar and my work.

I just wanted to let you know that I am not dead, just been away for a while.

I have continued the project and have now created a new open topic, which can be found be searching the discussion category “Preservation of other properties” under the title “Star Trek - DVD-Restoration and Upscale Project”.

Check it out if you like!

With this project I want to showcase to fans of DS9 what can be possible in the universe of (AI-based) upscaling.

Those of you who have watched Deep Space Nine recently on modern/bigger screens know what the quality of the DVDs, streaming services and WEB-files look like: Most of the episodes (especially during earlier seasons) display problems like blurriness, areas out of focus, issues with grain (luma and chroma), washed out colors, a non-HD-conforming color palette (which makes sense given the technology back then), compression or block artefacts, interlacing issues and problems with motion fluidity originating from variable frame rates.

The approach of this project (in a nutshell) is to do the following steps to assure that the visual quality improves and the result is better “watchable” on a 4K screen:

1. Take the source material and extract the raw data (working from PAL sources here)
2. Adjust the audio track so it will fit with the new constant frame rate of 23,976 FPS (finished video)
3. Re-Encode and filter the source material to get rid of several issues, like:
   • Rainbowing, Interlacing, Artefacts, Block Compression, Haloing, Ringing, Aliasing, Softness, Banding
4. AI-based image enhancements and upscaling, like:
   • Detail enhancements, increase of focus, upscaling of the picture dimensions (to 1080p or even 4K)
5. Final Encode/Rendering with additional image improvements. like:
   • Custom Aspect Ratio (original 4:3 on HD-resolution without black bars left and right
   • Correction of Pixel Aspect Ratio
   • Adjustment of the SD-color-palette to more closely resemble an HD-like look
     (the work here is based on what I have seen on the DS9 Documentary “What We Left Behind”)
   • Working in grain to give a “less plastic/waxy look”
   • Sharpening an Unsharpening to create a more “pseudo-detailed look”
   • Encoding in a more HD-compatible, modern file-format

If you wish for more detailed information (like the complete guide/workflow on “how to do the project”, comparison images, samples & more) and other stuff, please contact me via private message and I shall do my best to provide what you are looking for 😉

I will do regular updates with images on what I am currently working on, so you can see what is possible - I will also actively discuss the project with you and will try to answer questions (if I can).

Stay tuned.

EDIT:
Ok, the general password to access all the files around here is: “DS9Enhanced” (without the quotation marks).
Please be advised, that all comparison images have the following characteristics:

• Left Side: Original SD-resolution image (PAL-DVD) without crop oder modifications
• Right Side: Upscaled 4K-resolution image (2880x2160p) with cropping left and right
• Images are displayed through a media player that stretches the image to fit the screen, so the right
  sided image looks a little “wider” than the left, but the original aspect ratio is maintained (4:3)