HD to SD look ?

Y

Yaz

Active member
Hey guys,

I'm looking for ways to downsize HD video to SD look on post production. It's like Blair Witch Project look on SD part.
I hear they filmed it it better quality footage but downgraded it on post production.
I wonder how one can do it. Is that some effects worked on the footage? if yes, what are they?

thank you!
 
As far as what's needed to achieve the SD look you are going for, your going to have to play around with a couple things. Grain, blur, exposure to start. Even incorporating some of the issues you would experience with "cheap" lenses will definitely help sell the effect.

Adding some grain or noise (using the Add Grain or Noise effects) will help tremendously. I would personally go with the "Add Grain" effect as opposed to "Noise" simply because you will have more control over the amount of noise and degree in which that noise is softened.

A bit of blur to further soften your image can help unsharpen and degrade your footage so that it mimics the drop in resolution from HD to SD. I might even suggest actually compressing your footage into a lesser format (after scaling down to 720p) and then bringing it back into AE and starting from there, however, it seems like too much of an extra step if you ask me. It all depends on your particular taste and preference.

Additionally, I would play with the exposure a bit and clip your highlights just a tad. Add "HDR Highlight Compression" (but don't over do it, 10% to 15% should be fine in most cases) so your highlights aren't too bright but again, this is something that is based on preference. There's a chance you might want to leave your exposure alone altogether. I probably would to be honest, although, I think it's still worth mentioning.

Effects that replicate lens distortions, vignetting and chromatic aberration would definitely start to degrade your footage rather quickly but these little details will really make it all come together nicely. Good luck with your look.

-B
 
Wow(^-^)/ thank you so much for the detailed guide thru it. I appreciate it a lot! I will definitely try them and see it works.
 
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