[kind2311]

Well, so much for that. It was fun.

LoI've been messing with Topaz Video AI and it seems to work really well for animation. I'll be upscaling the old episodes from the DVD and posting them as they finish. Right now it takes about 6 hours per episode.

Here is the intro:

[kind2311]

Ghosts R Us

[Kingpin]

Oh very nice. Great to see the show looking so sharp after all the years.

[kind2311]

Episode 2 - Killerwatt

[mrmichaelt]

Thanks for doing this, kind2311. Neat stuff.

[Chicken, He Clucked]

This is the best result I've seen from AI upscaling (much more practical than trying to re-draw and animate it ).

Awesome work, thanks kind2311. They should use this tech for a re-release. Hopefully you're archiving the files so if YT busts them, we can get a little fan circulation going.

[ccv66]

Seems like upscaling by hand fixes and improves original. A.I. cleans up the source. Way more practical though. Be cool to see 4k Discs with upgraded Audio. Not sure I want to pay $200 for a box set

[kind2311]

Yeah, with AC-3 @ 192kbps, it's obvious they really didn't take audio quality into consideration when they produced the DVDs. I've never actually seen that low of a bitrate on a DVD before. I make sure to pass the audio thru when encoding so there is no lossy sampling or degradation.

[kind2311]

Episode 3 - Mrs. Roger's Neighborhood

[Chicken, He Clucked]

Incredible work again - this is the biggest news / breakthrough for Real Ghostbusters fans since the Time Life box set. I never thought we’d see a remaster for this series. Thanks kind2311!



One minor thing - in some scenes I think the colours seem a little muted / desaturated or the hue slightly off (orange). (Still superior image quality obviously) Maybe be a side effect of the software process - a lot detail is being uncovered in the background art so could be a trade-off?

These will be the definitive way to watch this show as far as I’m concerned. The resolution of the series on Amazon and Youtube is looking very rough indeed.

[kind2311]

I know what you mean about the tone changing to kind of warm/orange. I noticed it too when checking the results after rendering. I suspect further tweaking is needed in the AI program. It's definitely a work in progress. I may go back and redo these early ones once I get the settings all dialed in.

[RichardLess]

I know what you mean about the tone changing to kind of warm/orange. I noticed it too when checking the results after rendering. I suspect further tweaking is needed in the AI program. It's definitely a work in progress. I may go back and redo these early ones once I get the settings all dialed in.

Holy shit. That looks amazing.

Extreme Ghostbusters could use this treatment.

[Chicken, He Clucked]

Extreme Ghostbusters could use this treatment.

Cough, get in line we have 173 episodes of Real Ghostbusters to process which would take 45 straight days of back to back encoding.

[ccv66]

In RichardLess defense, probably only need to do the first 3 seasons and a handful of the rest, then you can do Extreme Ghostbusters

[devilmanozzy]

Not the best way to go about making a screen cap, but the issues does show. Upscaling is always going to have negatives, no matter how good the tech is. It shows any issues in the footage including its old size, as it is a upscale. Information is never really added, and to be frank it can only be lost. I'd advise going with a straight number to multiple/upscale, such as X4 or X5 and stop resizing it at X4.5 which is asking for artifact problems. The footage is in pixels. That will always be the enemy to the project.

Best to you on this project.

[devilmanozzy]

In RichardLess defense, probably only need to do the first 3 seasons and a handful of the rest, then you can do Extreme Ghostbusters

Extreme Ghostbusters has a upscale version already out there. Hulu had it up for awhile a few years ago. You won't even get close to the quality in those.

Five episode of The Real Ghostbusters are believed to have been issued in blu-ray quality in the Japan markets in a box set special around 2017. (Episodes: Knock, Knock, Ghost Busted, Sea Fright, Don't Forget the Motor City, Night Game) from the Magic Window's master tapes that had the japan dub were likely used to digitize and therefore getting in that size which will have slightly better results than a program.

[Chicken, He Clucked]

Five episode of The Real Ghostbusters are believed to have been issued in blu-ray quality in the Japan markets in a box set special around 2017. (Episodes: Knock, Knock, Ghost Busted, Sea Fright, Don't Forget the Motor City, Night Game) from the Magic Window's master tapes that had the japan dub were likely used to digitize and therefore getting in that size which will have slightly better results than a program.

These copies should be simple to track down if they exist. Do you have any more details and where did you hear about this?

Regarding line scaling artefact - Even with the occasional disruption or pixellation the quality is still much higher than 360p.

[mrmichaelt]

Just wanna say I spun off a convo about the RGB Japan Blu-ray's to their own thread.
viewtopic.php?p=4975126

[kind2311]

Episode 4 - Slimer, Come Home

I just want you to know, that I'm having a wonderful time.

[kind2311]

Not the best way to go about making a screen cap, but the issues does show. Upscaling is always going to have negatives, no matter how good the tech is. It shows any issues in the footage including its old size, as it is a upscale. Information is never really added, and to be frank it can only be lost. I'd advise going with a straight number to multiple/upscale, such as X4 or X5 and stop resizing it at X4.5 which is asking for artifact problems. The footage is in pixels. That will always be the enemy to the project.

Best to you on this project.

I've been upscaling at X4.5 since that is getting me perfectly at 2160p, but yeah, it makes the imperfections quite glaring. I think there are tools in the program to help with this, but I'm still learning. There is an option to scale it up to 3840x2160 using preset parameters, but it adds hardcoded pillarboxes which I'd prefer to avoid by using the custom scaling option.

There are different AI models to play with, so I'm going to try a different on on Troll Bridge.

[kind2311]

Episode 5 - Troll Bridge

[Chicken, He Clucked]

Episode 5 - Troll Bridge

This is just stunning. Thank you for doing this.

Whilst happy with the fan route, I wonder if there’s any appetite at Ghost Corp (or whoever handles the rights to the cartoon these days) to run the series through this process and update the streaming services or use this for a future re-release.

Could see many old cartoons benefiting from this process.

Edit: I think in terms of colour balance the reds are slightly muted in this compared to the original, which is why it ends up looking cooler and more orange in places? It’s a minor nitpick though.

I watched this one side by side with the original and the detail it adds to the backgrounds especially is very noticeable. I could understand it may spark some debate about upscale choices and authenticity but it would undeniably make the show look better on a modern TV setup.

[devilmanozzy]

Episode 5 - Troll Bridge

I don't know if you had resized it at 4X instead of 4.5X, but it has the same issues. If you could, can you screen cap the intro where the outline of the No-Ghost is straight over his stomach (like what I posted a bit ago) for the new conversation from the video file (not on youtube). There might be a chance that some of the issues are on Youtube's side.

[kind2311]

I don't know if you had resized it at 4X instead of 4.5X, but it has the same issues. If you could, can you screen cap the intro where the outline of the No-Ghost is straight over his stomach (like what I posted a bit ago) for the new conversation from the video file (not on youtube). There might be a chance that some of the issues are on Youtube's side.

Sure here it is. The issue is definitely present without Youtube's compression:

Obviously this is something that would need to be addressed in a proper remaster rather than a simple upscaling like I am performing. I don't have the knowledge, skill, or software to perform such a remaster. I've noticed that the scaled up/restored classic Simpsons episodes on Disney+ have similar issues, so maybe it's not possible without actually reanimating/redrawing the episodes.

[Chicken, He Clucked]

I think the only way to solve those issues would be to add an additional layer of animation adding line work touch-ups etc using the upscaled video as a base.

Which is an awful lot of work. And even with the line artefacts it is still an improvement over the current quality.

Maybe the upscaling software will develop over time and improve how these sorts of lines turn out.

[kind2311]

Episode 6 - The Boogieman Cometh

[Bison256]

Try it with "You can't take it with you." That episode is in really rough shape.

[kind2311]

Try it with "You can't take it with you." That episode is in really rough shape.

oof yeah that's a bad one. Got "When Halloween Was Forever" coming up soon, and that one is possibly the worst animation of the first season, so it'll be interesting to see all that mess scaled up. Slimer, Come Home has some bad parts in it as well.

[kind2311]

Episode 7 - Mr. Sandman, Dream Me A Dream

[kind2311]

Episode 8 - When Halloween Was Forever