Fixing Low light Video

M

mvetanen

Active member
OK, I shot some event video where the scene was low tungsten light. Even on db 12, the iris was OPEN and there it was still under light with a strong yellow orange cast. NO, brining in more lights was not an options, the scene was NOT under my control.

i am using Vegas 9 for editing.

Does anyone have any techniques to fix up video like this?

Thanks in advance!
 
Well . . .

Not really. With 12 dB of gain and the brightening you'll have to do in post, you're going to have very, very noisy footage with not too much color information in it.

There are denoising programs and plugins (like Mike Crash's), but you can't do magic with them, and compromise will come somewhere -- most likely with a great deal of blur.

So, give it a shot, but don't expect miracles. I know that when shooting events, you often can't control the light, but unfortunately, light is the way to keep the noise out.
 
If you were +12 on a DVX that's really saying a lot. Chances are slim you're going to improve that much in any NLE.
 
Here is my Original shot
GOP-ORIG.jpg


Here is with some color correction and brightness/contract work
GPO_CC.jpg


Lots of noise. So any ideas how to smooth out the noise and perhaps return some color back to the skin tones, perhaps push the blacks darker?
 
The color correction plug-in can help you with the color/white balance, and pushing the blacks down (use the offset slider).

As to noise removal, there are a number of tools to help with that. I use the free MSU Denoiser plug-in for a program called Virtualdub. It's straightforward and free. There are some for-pay options out there that are similar.
 
That might be the best you can get.
It DOES look much better.
I've seen worse looking video productions out there of this visual format.
 
I am satisfied with the Neat Video plugin. It gives that pro look to what the client is paying for. I run a lot of low budget shoots where lighting is often not possible due to the location space, time or other reasons.

Has anyone got any good settings for the DVX or HVX for low light shoots?
 
Keep in mind that your initial footage wasn't all that bad. It wasn't great, but it could have been much worse, and may be in the future. Post-production fixes are only going to get you so far.

Settings which increase brightness are lower shutter speeds and 60i. You can also try different gamma settings, but the difference won't be dramatic. Keep in mind that all of this will have visible effect on the look of your footage, particularly where motion is concerned.

The DVX performs better than the HVX in lower light.
 
Have any of you neat video guys used it's supposed fixed pattern noise/banding reducing functions, say on GH1 footage?
 
David Jimerson said:
Keep in mind that your initial footage wasn't all that bad. It wasn't great, but it could have been much worse, and may be in the future. Post-production fixes are only going to get you so far.

Settings which increase brightness are lower shutter speeds and 60i. You can also try different gamma settings, but the difference won't be dramatic. Keep in mind that all of this will have visible effect on the look of your footage, particularly where motion is concerned.

The DVX performs better than the HVX in lower light.
Click to expand...

Can someone explain why 60i has better 'low light level' response... are 2 rows of pixels averaged, given taht 60i has 'half' the lines?

Or is the 'chip' running at timing of 30 fps, and just read out of the sensor at a 60i rate?
 
j1clark@ucsd.edu said:
Can someone explain why 60i has better 'low light level' response... are 2 rows of pixels averaged, given taht 60i has 'half' the lines?
Click to expand...
Yes, it's called row-pair summation. The chip scans at 60 fps, but only uses half of them (because it is the demon interlaced mode). The other field, rather than being discarded, gets effectively "binned" into the existing field.
 
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