Hello everyone, and congratulations on the work done so far—it’s fantastic.
I started testing the Beta version of Topaz Video AI 7.0.0.3.b, using the “Starlight Mini” feature remotely. I must admit that, overall, the video output is outstanding, but I’ve encountered a rather problematic issue: after processing, despite the excellent overall results, all the outputs produced display a kind of “grid of squares/rectangles” on the moving images, which stay visible for a while and then disappear. It is very difficult to convey this issue through single “frames,” and I’m not sure if other users have noticed it. I will try to post a few frames, although they don’t fully capture the seriousness of the problem (which occurs only during playback at 1x speed).
The problem appears in more or less the same areas of the reprocessed video, and across different video sources.
The input files (source) are all .mkv files ripped from original DVDs using MakeMKV.
The video type is:
- Progressive;
- Variable bitrate (total 5,905 kb/s);
- Frame rate: 25.000 fps;
- PAL video;
- 720x576 pixels;
- 4:3 aspect ratio;
- Constant frame rate;
- YUV color space;
- Chroma subsampling: 4:2:0;
- 8-bit depth;
- Scan order: top field first;
- Compressor: libmakemkv v.1.17.7. (1.3.10/1.5.2) winx64.
Now, the files processed with Starlight Mini produce excellent results in terms of noise reduction and 2X upscaling. However, there are several scenes (not always) where these “grids” with sharp contours appear, and the image inside them seems to have different characteristics (higher contrast)… or during motion, lines of general change in the appearance of some areas can be seen, always in the shape of squares or rectangles.
I will try to upload some frames with red arrows highlighting the different areas of the image and the defects identified, although, as I mentioned, it’s difficult to fully appreciate the scope of the problem in still images.
Does anyone know why this happens, or has anyone reported this issue to the developers? Is there a way to try to mitigate these output defects that undermine the excellent work done by Starlight Mini?
