Help Upscaling? Help Upscaling The Simpsons DVDRip Using Waifu2X?

[Wicked]

Hey, umm well I didn't know where to post this but I got my hands on every single DVDRipped episode of The Simpsons until Season 12 and well since a lot of people are complaining about the Itunes Rips and the crappy aspect ratio I was wondering if anyone would want to help me doing a Waifu2X "Remaster" of said episodes and changing the aspect ratio to 16:9  It's a huge and ambitious project

Edited August 17, 2017 by Wicked13310

[Catar]

1 minute ago, Wicked13310 said:

Hey, umm well I didn't know where to post this but I got my hands on every single DVDRipped episode of The Simpsons until Season 12 and well since a lot of people are complaining about the Itunes Rips and the crappy aspect ratio I was wondering if anyone would want to help me doing a Waifu2X "Remaster" of said episodes  It's a huge and ambitious project

You wanted the AV Encoding forum, over here:

https://kametsu.com/forum/25-av-encoding/

 

that said, since you're already here, I'll go ahead and tag @Scyrous in since he's got the most experience around here with upscaling.

[Scyrous]

Thanks for tagging me @Catar.

 

First off, check out the AV guide Catar linked. If you are serious about this you need to learn about Avisynth/Vapoursynth and filtering. Which could take weeks, depending on your learning capabilities and how far you're willing to go. Aside from Waifu2x you need to learn about source issues (detelecining, denoising, dot crawl, haloing, etc) and how to improve the look of these rips. That being said, having proper quality source material is an essential part of the job. Are these DVDrips of yours encoded or untouched VOBs/ISOs? You want the latter.

 

Second, as this is a common rookie mistake: don't mess with the 4:3 aspect ratio. Don't stretch it to 16:9. It'll completely ruin the image and make everything look 25% wider. Circles will turn into ovals, characters will become obese, etc. The only people who can present you with a true 16:9 copy are the creators, if they choose to remaster the old episodes. Highly unlikely.

 

Edit: to clarify, the creators/studio 'should' have access to the animation cells and whatnot. They can re-create entire episodes by filling in the black bars with newly created backgrounds/animations.

Edited August 18, 2017 by Scyrous

[Catar]

8 hours ago, Scyrous said:

Second, as this is a common rookie mistake: don't mess with the 4:3 aspect ratio. Don't stretch it to 16:9. It'll completely ruin the image and make everything look 25% wider. Circles will turn into ovals, characters will become obese, etc. The only people who can present you with a true 16:9 copy are the creators, if they choose to remaster the old episodes. Highly unlikely.

Very unlikely it was even made in 16:9 anyway, since it's an American cartoon from a time when 4:3 was far more common in the US. Wide-screen was only just starting to take off in Japan, real wide-screen adoption in the US didn't start until after 2000.

 

If it were a live action filmed show, a 16:9 master might still exist, but in many cases you don't want them to make a version with that. See the horrible Buffy the Vampire Slayer debacle for an example of that, or The Wire's remaster for the best case result (which still wasn't great, but at least offered some benefits). 

[heck]

On 17/08/2017 at 7:05 PM, Scyrous said:

The only people who can present you with a true 16:9 copy are the creators, if they choose to remaster the old episodes. Highly unlikely.

I guess they do not have the episodes in HD or at least in true 16:9.

I think they just upscaled the episodes on Waifu2X and put in a zoomed 16:9

Edited September 3, 2017 by Matthew Ovatz

[MaxxCatt]

I'd rather watch the 4:3 than a cropped to fit 16:9.

Edited August 18, 2017 by MaxxCatt

[heck]

32 minutes ago, MaxxCatt said:

I'd rather watch the 4:3 than a cropped to fit 16:9.

Me too.

[Wicked]

I'm uploading them in 4:3  

[matchaman]

Upscaling, cropping or aspect ratio change is awful

The only solution is proper DVD rips!

[Scyrous]

18 minutes ago, matchaman said:

Upscaling, cropping or aspect ratio change is awful

The only solution is proper DVD rips!

 

Cropping = getting rid of bad borders = awful?

That's like saying AA or dehaloing is bad, even though it improves the source (when done right).

 

Upscaling is preference. If there's an HD upscale which looks better than the original SD source, you bet I'm downloading the upscale instead.

 

Proper DVD rips? What do you even mean by that? The vast majority of DVDs contain issues and problems that need to be fixed using post-processing (in most cases that means Avisynth). Simply ''ripping'' a DVD doesn't solve anything. You'll have untouched 1 GB episodes with all sorts of issues... no thanks.

Edited September 2, 2017 by Scyrous

[Dab is a Cunt]

So lemme get this straight, there's going to be a simpsons remastering project similar to the last airbender remastering project?

[Scyrous]

37 minutes ago, DabDeity710 said:

So lemme get this straight, there's going to be a simpsons remastering project similar to the last airbender remastering project?

Uhh not quite. Simply upscaling 480i/480p material to 1080p won't yield similar results right off the bat. It 100% depends on the source. ATLA has very distinct and sharp/aliased black lines which makes it easier for Waifu2x to upscale. Simpsons DVDs are a little worse in that regard so it won't look nearly as good.

[heck]

50 minutes ago, Scyrous said:

Uhh not quite. Simply upscaling 480i/480p material to 1080p won't yield similar results right off the bat. It 100% depends on the source. ATLA has very distinct and sharp/aliased black lines which makes it easier for Waifu2x to upscale. Simpsons DVDs are a little worse in that regard so it won't look nearly as good.

Yeah, Simpsons DVD's are pretty bad with quality and resolution. Mainly because the first seasons are at 384p

[SaurusX]

20 hours ago, Matthew Ovatz said:

Yeah, Simpsons DVD's are pretty bad with quality and resolution. Mainly because the first seasons are at 384p

Can you elaborate on what you mean by 384p?  DVD's only hold 720x480 NTSC and 720x576 PAL.  

[heck]

Seems that I stated something I was not sure again.

[TheOneWhoSees]

I tried upscaling a screenshot from my itunes copy of episode 1 with Waifu2x and here are my results:

 

Original 640x480 screenshot

 

Upscaled 1280x960 screenshot

Upscaled 2560x1920 screenshot

 

Not really sure about the results.

Edited September 4, 2017 by TheOneWhoSees