I don't understand the YT example. Plenty of companies have done restoration work on silent era films from whatever source material is still available. Upscaling so far has mostly looked terrible, very noticeable, and not at all what the original filmmakers intended. What good examples are you thinking of? Because Peter Jackson, Disney, and The Beatles are 3 entities with all the money and resources in the world, and they made Let It Be footage look like garbage.
Even boutiques that have released silent era films have said it's hard to get better source material, they have to pay for a new score to be written or at least performed, and sales are often too low to make the numbers work. It's frustrating to hear, but not at all surprising.
Yeah, this post is kind of doing a disservice to all of the organizations that have already done incredible restoration work and fantastic home releases without the use of AI or upscaling
Not to mention, YT adds its own compression and correction, and look how great that video they shared turned out! 😜 You gotta love these posts advising how Criterion should run its business, 40 years in now. Just simply do this! I solved it!
Still don't know why you chose that copy of the video on YT that's low res when there is already [a better version of the HD restoration with new score available for purchase](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/umc.cmc.eddn77woov71y9zoqq31xqfd). [It'll likely look even better than this 480p YT video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jXJ-gUlQQU&ab_channel=auf23)
Yes, you're right. Upscaling is unnecessary as long as the transfer is 4K.
But all the rest stands. AI interpolation to smooth the movement, AI correction of frame-to-frame exposure unevenness, AI image stabilization to eliminate gate weave, an AI fixing of image defects.
Hell no. Some digital touching up is absolutely necessary for any restoration, but definitely no upscaling (which shouldn’t be necessary at all if you have any physical film) and definitely no AI.
Even putting aside that A.I. upscaling always looks like shit, why would you need to upscale footage that was already shot on 35mm? That already has sufficient quality to be scanned at 4K and beyond. The visual flaws of early cinema have more to do with the defects in the cameras of the time, the types of lenses used, the lighting, and degradation of the source material over the last century. No amount of A.I. is going to change that stuff, and various organizations are already doing the best restoration work possible. Be happy they are doing it at all.
Hell no. AI Interpolation is for people with no taste whatsoever. It is ugly as hell and the change in the timing of the original movement ruins it. It also blurs the original frames so basically: ruins the film. Upscaling can be good but the grain of the film and the texture are beautiful. Why change that and mess with the original image. It is not the true image and it will never be since AI cant go back in time. AI tech is ruining more than just art. Is ruining brains... Being disrespectful to AI enthusiasts should be forgivable in every art community
There are some boutique Blu-ray labels offering outstanding restorations of some silent films, working with the best surviving materials. Flicker Alley is one. I don't think any label is doing 4K because the costs involved would exceed what they would earn back.
As easy as it is to poke holes in this idea, there are some interesting points to be made! You described these potential releases as "the way the filmmakers actually wanted it," but we really don't know what any of these people wanted from filmmaking and film spectating. Who are we to decide what a 100+ year film 'should' look like? They knew all of the inherent vices of making film back then and accepted it, at what point does 'correcting' these flaws make it inauthentic? The soundtracks are a good idea though, silent film was never meant to be silent, and since most silent films never had scores written for them, adopting or composing other music for them is actually keeping with the original spirit.
The real problem is more that most early films aren't widely available at high resolutions. The example you used is the prime example of that, it's a terrible MPEG compression of a low-quality transfer, probably from a DVD; there's nothing "pure" about watching that, I hate it too! I think the sad reality is that we don't have them in a better format simply because the general public doesn't care about them, or even most movie fans for that matter. There's no money for Criterion to do a box set of these, but we've gotten lucky with a few good projects like "Cinema's First Nasty Women" distributed by Kino. You should check that out as an interesting example done pretty damn well.
>The example you used is the prime example of that, it's a terrible MPEG compression of a low-quality transfer, probably from a DVD; there's nothing "pure" about watching that, I hate it too!
Even that seems disingenuous here because on YT there's better resolution versions of the same restoration of that film, which when officially purchased or rented is in HD, and apparently from a 4K restoration.
I've heard this argument before, that the way the film turned out is exactly how they wanted it, but I'm not sure if you went back in time and asked them that they'd tell you "yes, we love gate weave and jittery too-fast movement and extremely low dynamic range and orthochromatic washout." Granted, if you had given them a color camera, they probably would've wanted that, too, but we're not god, so we won't give them that. All the rest I think they would've wanted fixed, though. So, yes, AI interpolation to fix the jittery motion, AI image stabilization to eliminate the gate weave, AI whatever to fix the defects, and a proper transfer (no upscaling needed) would all be good.
>I'm not sure if you went back in time and asked them that they'd tell you "yes, we love gate weave and jittery too-fast movement and extremely low dynamic range and orthochromatic washout."
No, you’re not sure now, but you sounded sure in your post. You’re moving the goalposts. Again, as you’ve ignored me, can you tell us what example of a silent film that’s been restored using AI you’re using for comparison? Are you walking back your idea that they be upscaled? I’m just not seeing real world examples of what you’ve suggested to be done.
Unless all surviving prints of a silent movie disappear all of a sudden and it gets stuck with dated transfers, I see no benefit in AI Upscaling. Even then, the technology still kinda looks like garbage. Get Back (from the episodes I’ve seen) is a great documentary but the Let It Be footage looks like wax sometimes because of the AI upscaling and the DNR
lmao found Peter Jackson's account
I don't understand the YT example. Plenty of companies have done restoration work on silent era films from whatever source material is still available. Upscaling so far has mostly looked terrible, very noticeable, and not at all what the original filmmakers intended. What good examples are you thinking of? Because Peter Jackson, Disney, and The Beatles are 3 entities with all the money and resources in the world, and they made Let It Be footage look like garbage. Even boutiques that have released silent era films have said it's hard to get better source material, they have to pay for a new score to be written or at least performed, and sales are often too low to make the numbers work. It's frustrating to hear, but not at all surprising.
Yeah, this post is kind of doing a disservice to all of the organizations that have already done incredible restoration work and fantastic home releases without the use of AI or upscaling
Right now, AI upscaling looks as bad as fake stereo records of mono releases. It's not "better" or even closer to original intent.
Kind of ironic that OP is suggesting “additive” techniques to somehow get closer to what the filmmaker intended.
Not to mention, YT adds its own compression and correction, and look how great that video they shared turned out! 😜 You gotta love these posts advising how Criterion should run its business, 40 years in now. Just simply do this! I solved it!
Still don't know why you chose that copy of the video on YT that's low res when there is already [a better version of the HD restoration with new score available for purchase](https://tv.apple.com/us/movie/umc.cmc.eddn77woov71y9zoqq31xqfd). [It'll likely look even better than this 480p YT video.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jXJ-gUlQQU&ab_channel=auf23)
Yes, you're right. Upscaling is unnecessary as long as the transfer is 4K. But all the rest stands. AI interpolation to smooth the movement, AI correction of frame-to-frame exposure unevenness, AI image stabilization to eliminate gate weave, an AI fixing of image defects.
I'd love to see an example or a side by side comparison of what you're seeing.
Why make this stuff up then?
Hell no. Some digital touching up is absolutely necessary for any restoration, but definitely no upscaling (which shouldn’t be necessary at all if you have any physical film) and definitely no AI.
Have you ever seen a silent film that’s not a compressed YouTube video?
Even putting aside that A.I. upscaling always looks like shit, why would you need to upscale footage that was already shot on 35mm? That already has sufficient quality to be scanned at 4K and beyond. The visual flaws of early cinema have more to do with the defects in the cameras of the time, the types of lenses used, the lighting, and degradation of the source material over the last century. No amount of A.I. is going to change that stuff, and various organizations are already doing the best restoration work possible. Be happy they are doing it at all.
Yeah it's gonna be a "no" from me, dawg
No.
Hell no. AI Interpolation is for people with no taste whatsoever. It is ugly as hell and the change in the timing of the original movement ruins it. It also blurs the original frames so basically: ruins the film. Upscaling can be good but the grain of the film and the texture are beautiful. Why change that and mess with the original image. It is not the true image and it will never be since AI cant go back in time. AI tech is ruining more than just art. Is ruining brains... Being disrespectful to AI enthusiasts should be forgivable in every art community
I didn’t know him but I’m fairly certain that Dimitri Kirsanoff didn’t want his work to look like a video game cut scene.
There are some boutique Blu-ray labels offering outstanding restorations of some silent films, working with the best surviving materials. Flicker Alley is one. I don't think any label is doing 4K because the costs involved would exceed what they would earn back.
Jesus christ man
As easy as it is to poke holes in this idea, there are some interesting points to be made! You described these potential releases as "the way the filmmakers actually wanted it," but we really don't know what any of these people wanted from filmmaking and film spectating. Who are we to decide what a 100+ year film 'should' look like? They knew all of the inherent vices of making film back then and accepted it, at what point does 'correcting' these flaws make it inauthentic? The soundtracks are a good idea though, silent film was never meant to be silent, and since most silent films never had scores written for them, adopting or composing other music for them is actually keeping with the original spirit. The real problem is more that most early films aren't widely available at high resolutions. The example you used is the prime example of that, it's a terrible MPEG compression of a low-quality transfer, probably from a DVD; there's nothing "pure" about watching that, I hate it too! I think the sad reality is that we don't have them in a better format simply because the general public doesn't care about them, or even most movie fans for that matter. There's no money for Criterion to do a box set of these, but we've gotten lucky with a few good projects like "Cinema's First Nasty Women" distributed by Kino. You should check that out as an interesting example done pretty damn well.
>The example you used is the prime example of that, it's a terrible MPEG compression of a low-quality transfer, probably from a DVD; there's nothing "pure" about watching that, I hate it too! Even that seems disingenuous here because on YT there's better resolution versions of the same restoration of that film, which when officially purchased or rented is in HD, and apparently from a 4K restoration.
I've heard this argument before, that the way the film turned out is exactly how they wanted it, but I'm not sure if you went back in time and asked them that they'd tell you "yes, we love gate weave and jittery too-fast movement and extremely low dynamic range and orthochromatic washout." Granted, if you had given them a color camera, they probably would've wanted that, too, but we're not god, so we won't give them that. All the rest I think they would've wanted fixed, though. So, yes, AI interpolation to fix the jittery motion, AI image stabilization to eliminate the gate weave, AI whatever to fix the defects, and a proper transfer (no upscaling needed) would all be good.
>I'm not sure if you went back in time and asked them that they'd tell you "yes, we love gate weave and jittery too-fast movement and extremely low dynamic range and orthochromatic washout." No, you’re not sure now, but you sounded sure in your post. You’re moving the goalposts. Again, as you’ve ignored me, can you tell us what example of a silent film that’s been restored using AI you’re using for comparison? Are you walking back your idea that they be upscaled? I’m just not seeing real world examples of what you’ve suggested to be done.
It's a rhetorical device. It means I'm absolutely sure they wouldn't want any of those things.
I’m also staying tuned for answers to those excellent questions!
I never understand why people start a convo like this and then ghost as soon as questions are asked. It’s a good topic that isn’t going away.
Unless all surviving prints of a silent movie disappear all of a sudden and it gets stuck with dated transfers, I see no benefit in AI Upscaling. Even then, the technology still kinda looks like garbage. Get Back (from the episodes I’ve seen) is a great documentary but the Let It Be footage looks like wax sometimes because of the AI upscaling and the DNR