FilmRender: "film look" and configurable deinterlacing!!

[Dr Mordrid]

This is a new product that supposedly can;

1. give clips more of a "film look"

2. provide configurable deinterlacing (!!)

3. configurable control over "film grain"

4. batch processing

5. takes advantage of multiple processors

6. tested so far with;

Canopus DVRaptor
Pinnacle DC20+, DC30+, DV200, DV300, DV500
Sony VAIO
Matrox RT-2000

So far NTSC only though....

Check it out at;

http://www.nurkware.com/

Make sure you follow the link to the de-interlacing page.

Nothing on the page about the release price but the source I got it from said about $50+ USD. This page has a download link to the lates beta which runs about 2.4 megs.

Dr. Mordrid


[This message has been edited by Dr Mordrid (edited 02 July 2000).]

[NedNurk]

Hi Guys,

Ned here, writer of FilmRender. Just to correct the previous post, FilmRender is NOT NTSC only. It works perfectly well with PAL.

As I live in the UK, having it NTSC only would have been a little pointless!

Selling price will be 40 GBP ~= 60USD

And it is not in beta anymore, Version 1 is now up there. Only thing is, we are still waiting for the online transaction processing to be set up. Hopefully it will be this week, but for now, you can use the app in demo mode.

Regards
Ned

[Dr Mordrid]

Sorry about the error, I was parroting info from a post on MUG and didn't sufficiently check the beta since I'm in NTSC country.

Now for a question: how about an MSPro plugin after you finish with Premiere?

Dr. Mordrid

[NedNurk]

*Another* Plugin?

That's why I made it a standalone app in the first place :-)

I know nowt about MSP, does it use the DirectShow filters or is it another proprietory filter?

Ned

[This_Idiot]

Ned,

Congratulations on the work you've put in on this. I'm personally looking forward to putting some work in on trying it out with DC30+ and various Marvel/RRs. I know they aren't mentioned on your compatibility lists, but maybe we can expand those with our user base. For these purposes, could you give us an idea of what functionality the shareware download contains so that the users here can post useful comments (both to you and the forum).

I'm sure that you can expect a warm reception from the readership here, many of us are deeply into experimentation.

My thanks again

Chris

AKA This_Idiot, moderator and WebMaster www.desktopvideoworld.com

[NedNurk]

Hi Chris,

Well, the DC30+ is tested and works (I have one myself. I would not imagine that the RR or Marvel will be a problem unless it uses AVI 1.1 format files.

The demo download is in fact the full app, but if run unregistered, places a red cross through the output footage. When finally you can buy it online (which should hopefully be by the end of the week), you just need to enter a licence code to unlock the app.

For a quick list of features, here's what I just put on my CV (resume I think you call it) :-)

Transformations contained : de-interlace (uniquely configurable), field
blend (configurable level), variable widescreen cropping, sharpening, colour
transform, gamma correction, contrast/brightness enhancement, B&W mode (with or without non-gray colouring), saturation control, grain (either monochrome
or colour, and uniquely can load user defined grain patterns), merge in a
percentage of up to the previous 4 frames

So far this is just version 1, and I feel there is still more to do, specifically:

AVI 1.1/DV type 1/Direct show compatibilty
Premiere plug in/DX filter
Un-Anamorphicise (i.e. from camera squished to normal,letterboxed image)
Anamorphicise (i.e. from normal,letterboxed to squished image)
Some more optimizations could be made (by performing all the stages on small, processor cache sized segments, rather than on the image of a whole in one go)
'Playback' via preview window
Grain file generator

And that's just the start. I expect when people really try it out then they will have a lot of feedback. Always interested in what people think and want, in fact it is usally other peoples enthusiam that makes me work harder, so any thoughts are appreciated.

Regards
Ned

[Fred H]

Yes, it works with Marvel G400-TV, but I made only a "run-test" so far, with a Matrox-MJPEG compressed .AVI file (704x576 PAL).

[This message has been edited by Fred H (edited 05 July 2000).]

[NedNurk]

When you say 'run tests', I take it you meant FilmRender ran across the files OK, but you have not tied to poke them back out of the video card?

Ned

[Fred H]

Ned, what do you mean, by "...tied to poke them back out of the video card?..."
I played back a rendered file with the PC-VCR and edited them with MSP6, created a new .AVI file with the MSP6, no problems. Only the two red lines appears across the screen, but it is the proof that it works, nothing more. And all this on the Marvel G400-TV.
I will mention that I did not tested different settings in the FilmRender, like colors, filters, interlaces, etc. I just ran the program, and you are right, it is NOT a test. I called it "run-test". Sorry for my English.

Regards, Fred H.

[This message has been edited by Fred H (edited 05 July 2000).]

[jeff b]

Well, I did manage to download the trial a few days ago, after several attempts to access the site with no luck. I tried it on a DV type 2 file, and it wouldn't process the file. Subsequent attempts to go back to the website to get more info failed through this point in time.

It does have the look and feel of good programming, however, and therefore I won't give up on what is obviously a dedicated effort at creating a decent product.

Jeff B

[NedNurk]

Hi Jeff,

What error message is given? If you click on the file, then look at the 'results' tab you should see some error information in there.

Make sure your target directory is not the same as your source directory - it will not process. (the file keeps the same name, so obviously it cannot open AND write to the same file)

If the error message gives you no joy, right click on the file and select 'AVIInspector', then let me know the output.

Regards
Ned

PS, thanks for the 'good programming'. I'll send you your fiver later ;-)

[jeff b]

The "results" tab just says the source filename to output filename on one line, then the next line says "no frames processed".

The file is a short clip taken from a DV Type1 file in MSP6, and saved as a DV Type2 with 32kHz audio.

I originally was trying to save to the same directory, but had typed in a different filename... but I have the same error now when using a different drive.

[NedNurk]

Hi Jeff, thanks for the reply.

From what I can see, I reckon it is my prosaic than that. There are 2 video standards on PCs at the moment, the old VFW APIs and the newer DirectShow APIs.

FilmRender uses the older VFW APIs. What I am imagining is happening is that even though you are saving as a type 2 AVI (which can be opened and file parsed by the VFW APIs), there is no codec that supports VFW. Considering you can capture and work on Type 1s (which are only supported by DShow) I think this might be the case.

The only other possibility is that the file is being exported as an AVI 1.1 format file, which cannot be read by VFW. I need to see the AVI Inspector output to determine this I think.

The only thing I can suggest is to export to another format, which is supported under VFW.

But I am working on plugin versions of FR. Does MediaStudio work with Premiere Plug-ins or only with it's own format?

Regards
Ned

[jeff b]

NedNurk:

I went back and took another short clip (MS DV Type 1) into MSP6 and created an MS DV Type 2 .avi clip from it, previewed it within MSP6 and it looked ok. I closed MSP6, and went to Explorer and double clicked this new file, and it played okay in MediaPlayer. I then opened Filmrender, added it to the list, clicked on preview and it came up with this error:

ICDecompressorOpen Failed. Error: The system cannot find the file specified.
Error Code: 0x00000002

System:
PIII-500 w/256m RAM on Asus P2B-F
6 hard drives
Windows98 Second Edition
Ulead MediaStudio v6.0.0.1
FilmRender v1.01.25


It's possible that Microshaft has laid too many rotten eggs into the current setup, since I haven't done a clean re-install since last August, and I AM beginning to get instances of odd performance lately. So I wouldn't rule out something Microstiff having gone south on this machine if this particular problem doesn't immediately evince an obvious reason for it, from your perspective.

Jeff B

[jeff b]

Ah! Well, that explains it, since this is all Dshow baloney. I think that I might be able to reinstall Adaptec DV codec (if I can find it) and render into the VFW type 2 codec at some point and give FR another whirl.

AFAIK, plug-ins that are available come in special separate flavors for MSP and Premiere.

Jeff B