My First Filter to fix VHS/DVD videos
 

Alright, so I finally got around to seriously filtering. I've been filtering my own tapes, but they don't require heavy filtering because 95% of them are well-cared for first gen. recordings, and most of the second-gen tapes are in fine condition. However, I did stumble upon a fairly nasty set of Denver the Last Dinosaur episodes from a multi-gen tape that some moron had transferred using a DVD-VCR combo and peddled it around. Needless to say, the quality is below awful, and so I gave it a shot. While there wasn't much I could do with virtualdub (or even access to the original tape), I tried my best to get rid of the noise, chroma bleeding, and audio hiss using a heavily modified version of the filter-chain lordsmurf posted in the "How to Restore Unfiltered VHS Rips" thread.

I'm pretty sure I bungled it, but, well, I'll let you people be the judge of that.

When I get a few moments, I'll look it over.

And if needed, I'll teach you how to un-bungle it. :)

Thanks, man!

I'll get around to posting screen caps in a bit.

Original #1
http://img706.imageshack.us/img706/5548/original1b.png

Attachment 1350

Filter #1
http://img854.imageshack.us/img854/6656/filter1.jpg

Attachment 1351

Original #2
http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/4482/original2.png

Attachment 1352

Filter #2
http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/3989/filter2n.jpg

Attachment 1353

I believe I overdid the filtering process, but I'm a newbie. You fellas be the judge on that. The size of the bars on the side changes throughout the tape, so I only cropped a little from each side. Details were lost due to the hefty noise filtering (look for the floor tiles on #1), but to be fair, they were hardly there in the original. I did use a sharpening filter in an attempt to counteract the detail loss, though. I also shifted the chroma a bit to reduce the bleeding, but in some spots it moved the bleeding to other areas :(

Be sure to attach images to threads -- don't use those "image hosting" services here.
More info: http://www.tvpreservation.com/forum/...ges-files.html

Yes, there's a good deal of quality loss because you've overdone it some.

Can you share which filters you've used? (And settings therein.)
- If Avisynth, share the .avs file.
- If VirtualDub, share the .vcf file. (I do see once attached in the first post. Same one for both clips?)

I actually think you've done some major interlacing damage, too.
And cropped instead of matte.

When one of my main video systems is open, I'll give this a whirl and share my method with you. :)

I really do appreciate the feedback, LS. The .vcf should be in the first post.

Be prepared for a very long list, ladies and gents. I used the same filter chain for both clips, as they came from the same episode.
*FlaXen VHS (-7, -7)
*Field Bob (up/down)
*DotCrawl Comb Filter (Trellis correlation, Precise 4-way 7-tap w/ Saturation [MMX]
*Dynamic Noise Reduction MMX (18)
*Static Noise Reduction (18, interlaced)
*MSU Deblocking 2.2 (default settings)
*Null Transform (x1-2, Y2-10, X2-10)
*Sharpen (12)
*Chroma Noise Reduction (U-24.55 normal, V-25.45 wide)
*Resize (resize to 640x480)

I think my problem was trying to compensate for ALL the errors with just software (the off-the-charts chroma filtering, extreme noise reduction, etc.).

Also, stupid questions, but how do I avoid interlacing damage and how do I matte instead of crop? I can never get the deinterlacing part right when I'm exporting the .avi for computer viewing (for viewing on the TV, I always keep it interlaced).

I have this whole series in super high quality.

So, any tips? I'd like to know precisely what I'm doing wrong.