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Two-Pass Sharpening
  • PP CS5 has Unsharp mask and Sharpen effects. I'm sure other editors support the effects, too.

    How do you guys use the effects? At what settings?

    Apply after transcoding to intermediate format like ProRes or DNxHD?

    Apply before/after color/exposure/curve correction?

    Apply before/after denoising effect?

    TIA
  • 38 Replies sorted by
  • @stonebat
    This my personal opinion so it is not a voice of professional
    1) settings - always on the eye - as suits me - less is better
    2) apply after denoising and color/exposure/curve correction
    3)always last
  • Thanks @Mihuel.

    I'm thinking this workflow.

    - optionally transcode to intermediate format
    - correct usual color/exposure/curve
    - optionally apply denoise effect
    - optionally apply two-pass sharpening
  • Question is to denoise before color/expo../curve or after ?
  • Hmmm... I think it might be difficult to see the effect of denoising if it's not color/exposure/contrast/curve adjusted. Also the adjustments might affect how much denoising is needed.

    I still can't tell which one comes first. Denoising? or Sharpening? What's your reason for denoising first?
  • From: http://www.neatvideo.com/qna.html

    Q :Is processing via Neat Video best done before or after any other processing (i.e. tonal/color correction)?
    A: Such operations as tonal/color correction are quite conservative from the standpoint of noise, i.e., they do not significantly change the noise characteristics of the video sequence. Therefore, filtering before or after makes little difference – as long as the noise profile is built and applied at the same stage of your workflow. For example, don’t use a device noise profile built with an unprocessed (the color correction is not yet applied) video sequence to filter the same sequence with the color correction applied.

    On the other hand, certain effects, like sharpening or resampling, applied to a noisy video sequence may considerably change its noise properties. In this sense, it is generally better to use Neat Video filtration before applying such effects.
  • My reason is intuitive. I am a sound engineer, and my logic comes from the sound mixing. If you want to get as much dynamic , you must first denoise, apply noise gate, etc. . I think it is easier to work on the denoised material. In PPCS5 in the chain of effects I use denoiser first, then for example: Looks and turn on and turn off Denoiser to release the computer's processor.
  • Interesting. Thanks guys.
  • @Mihuel Absolutely agree on your audio analogy although I think I'd normalize first if the levels weren't quite right, as otherwise you don't know how much noise reduction to apply. And yes, then reduce noise and then do anything with dynamics after noise reduction. Similarly in video, I normally get the levels adjusted before applying noise reduction, and then do other things to the video. And yes, sharpening last of all.

    With both video and audio, the secret is to know how much NR to use, as too much introduces artefacts. Same with sharpening of course!

    In terms of the original question, I'd sometimes use sharpening on different clips to match them together, and then probably an overall but VERY gentle sharpening last of all, using a convolution matrix as it's very light on the processor.
  • @Mark_the_Harp
    >using a convolution matrix as it's very light on the processor
    thanks for advice
  • Video noise patterns are characteristic of each camera model's image sensor and compression chain. Neat Video can save noise profiles for each camera type at specific ISO settings. If you're applying noise reduction to a batch of video footage, it's a good idea to standardize on a consistent set of noise profiles. This type of noise reduction should be applied before any other post-production manipulation of the image.

    Sharpening is needed to compensate for the cummulative low-pass filtering effects of scaling and color correction operations. Mathematically, anytime that pixel values are averaged or combined, it rounds off the sharpness of edges. Ideally, you'd want to apply sharpening after the results of all other post-processing effects.
  • Nice to hear that my understanding of the peasants makes sense :-)
  • Thanks Mark. Audio denoising... Hmmm.

    @Mihuel can you share your CS5 (Soundbooth?) audio workflow?
  • @LPowell Neat Video noise profile sounds like a good idea.

    Last night I found out that I don't have to use Magic Bullet Looks presets. I applied individual effects and save them as my custom preset in MBL.
  • @stonebat
    It is maybe strange but I don't use CS5 for audio. I always I export a *. wav sound (48Khz 24bit) to Cubase and use Waves plagins . I use to sync *. avi files of low quality. Then, I import the renered material to PPCS 5. My videos are amateur productions for internal use :-). This is just a hobby, not to go crazy :-)
  • Oh dual system audio.

    Hobby could become moonlighting :)
  • @Mihuel
    Audio integration in the Adobe Creative Suite workflow has always been awkward. With CS5.5, however, Adobe has finally ported Audition to the Mac and fully integrated it with Premiere Pro, a big upgrade from the now discontinued Soundbooth.
  • @stonebat
    I know that would be offtopic but this (SHE) become moonlighting :
  • Congrats!!!

    I got two kids. Together weigh 80 lbs. 10 lbs rig feels like a feather to me :)
  • @LPowell how's AE 5.5's image stabilization?
  • When she would come to this strange world, will be one of the few things that I publish and praise in the video format :-). @stonebat Thanks a lot, I saw the video of your daughter and I felt such joy that I can feel what you feel :-). By Vitaliy we can communicate in this community and exchange experiences. If you have any questions about the sound, I'm happy to help. This is my domain
  • @stonebat
    Planning on trying out AE5.5 Warp Stabilizer in my next post-production session...
  • I have no idea where the warp stabilizer would fit into the workflow. It seems it does more than just cropping.
  • @stonebat
    I'd use Warp Stabilizer after noise reduction, and before color correction and sharpening.
  • I've found the warp stabilizer works fine if you set it to "No Motion" to create locked-off shots, but so far it's "Smooth motion" is creating a really weird warping effect for me, like the entire image is rippling. It's odd - it's seems perhaps the "Subspace warp" mode works best with "No Motion", but not with "Smooth Motion". But only the "Subspace Warp" mode lets you do the rolling shutter compensation.

    I think it's still always best to stabilise as much as you can on set, (obviously!) and the Warp Stabilizer should only be used to rescue or very slightly improve shots. So far, I'm not that impressed.