Changing overall video quality settings?

[steingra]

I am comparing the purevideo vs intervideo decoders. There is a stark difference between intervideo and purevideo on the 17 inch HP M700 monitor.

I attached screenshots of the two different decoders in action. I think you should be able to see how the purevideo looks more washed out.

It seems the intervideo decoder looks nice overall. Image seems sharper and crisper. When I just tried the pure video decoder, the image seems washed out. The black bars that appear above and below the main video content (it was a concert I recorded from Voom high def channel on the USB PVR2) seem to have a lot of noise in them.

In fact the whole video itself seems to contain this same *noise*...its like small white (grey or whatever, I cant really see the color but they are there, everywhere) dots everywhere in the image.

Where would I begin, to experiment, to try to get rid of this and make the video look good using pure video decoder? I attached a SCREENSHOT of the main nvidia settings screen.

I know there are settings inside sagetv client, and also the Windows Video Settings Tab has a bunch of settings I can change for my Nvidia geforce4 MX 4000 card.

I am just not sure where to look to make such changes....and what things should I change first? There are sooooooooo many options in the Nvidia control panel, I am not sure where to begin. I would imagine many of the settings wont make a huge difference, but a handful of them could make a huge difference?

PS
I watched the whole concert in sagetv client and videolan client on this machine...and it looked nice. no skips/pauses (since I got my network speed a lot higher now). It was recorded at about 5GB for 2 hours quality. I know this isnt the fastest machine...but I am not unhappy with how that concert looked. Was just fine.

I would just like to know how to optimize the video from here on out, since I could live with the performance otherwise.

Thanks

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by steingra

I attached screenshots of the two different decoders in action. I think you should be able to see how the purevideo looks more washed out.

Well the first thing you need to do is to recalibrate your monitor for the "Purevideo" decoders. nVidia's decoders correctly maintain video levels throughout playback, however it appears that your Intervideo ones do not. So what you see is a difference in black level between the two.

Something like Digital Video Essentials is a great resource/tool for adjusting your picture settings. But if you don't have it, here's a AVS-member (3no) created test "DVD":
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post5433803

There's also a great deal of good info in that thread about display calibration in general.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Well the first thing you need to do is to recalibrate your monitor for the "Purevideo" decoders. nVidia's decoders correctly maintain video levels throughout playback, however it appears that your Intervideo ones do not. So what you see is a difference in black level between the two.

Something like Digital Video Essentials is a great resource/tool for adjusting your picture settings. But if you don't have it, here's a AVS-member (3no) created test "DVD":
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...&&#post5433803

There's also a great deal of good info in that thread about display calibration in general.

Cool thanks for the link. That will certainly consume all my cpu cycles for a while. I have one of those DVE cd's but never used it yet. Had good intentions. Guess now it got bumped up the list

Oh yes, one other thing, I had the video card in 16 bit mode (during one of my last tests) and forgot to set it back. When I changed it back to 32 bit mode, the Purevideo did seem to look somewhat better.

I cant quite explain it in words, but the concert/movie I was watching had a lot of blue lights in it. And when the beams of light were like right behind the musicians...they looked *spotty* or sort of like a halo effect. They didnt look *real* life to me. It was like there were different shades of blue within the light beam coming down from above.

But when using intevideo, I didnt really notice that effect. The blue light beams seemed more together, more smooth. more like what I would expect them to look like if you were there at the concert.

if that makes any sense.

I definately noticed differences in the overall colors of everything in purevideo vs intervideo decoders. It seemed that purevideo colors didnt jump out at me as much....

Well thats my 2 cents anyway, just trying to explain what I saw.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Well the first thing you need to do is to recalibrate your monitor for the "Purevideo" decoders. nVidia's decoders correctly maintain video levels throughout playback, however it appears that your Intervideo ones do not. So what you see is a difference in black level between the two.

On average, how long should this process take to complete? I have no idea, since I havent done it before. It sounds like fun though.

Oh yeah, when you say to recalibrate my monitor for the "Purevideo" decoders, what do you mean? I am not sure I completely understand what you mean by that? How will I _know_ what the Purevideo decoders likes/dislikes? what am I judging it by?

Is it neccessary to recalibrate everything based on which decoders you are using. Now I am starting to think that is the case. And then you would want to save a profile (I guess in the nvidia control panel somewhere) for each decoder you might want to use.

And one last question can you give me a hint where I make these setting changes? I mean, there are settings on a monitor/projector itself you can change, there there are settings in SageTV client, then there are also settings in the Nvidia control panel....geeeze that a lot of places to make changes.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by steingra

On average, how long should this process take to complete? I have no idea, since I havent done it before. It sounds like fun though.

30s - 5 minutes depeding if you know your way around your display's settings or not

Oh yeah, when you say to recalibrate my monitor for the "Purevideo" decoders, what do you mean? I am not sure I completely understand what you mean by that? How will I _know_ what the Purevideo decoders likes/dislikes? what am I judging it by?

It's not so much the decoder as the video levels. Video levels are defined differently than PC levels, PCs have black and white defined at 0,0,0 and 255,255,255 respectively. Video is defined such that black and white are 16,16,16 and 235,235,235 respectively. It used to be that PC video decoders/renders/etc would expand the video to PC levels, but due to some issues with that, crushing BTB/WTW info (probably minor) or more importantly causing banding, newer decoders/drivers maintain video levels all the way to the display.

Is it neccessary to recalibrate everything based on which decoders you are using. Now I am starting to think that is the case. And then you would want to save a profile (I guess in the nvidia control panel somewhere) for each decoder you might want to use.

All decoders should be the same because the colorspace conversion (video is stored in YPbPr but displayed in RGB) is well defined in ITU-R BT.601 (or BT.709 for HD).

And one last question can you give me a hint where I make these setting changes? I mean, there are settings on a monitor/projector itself you can change, there there are settings in SageTV client, then there are also settings in the Nvidia control panel....geeeze that a lot of places to make changes.

All you should need to do is adjust the brightness/contrast settings on your display. You really don't want to touch the PC side unless you can't get it right with just the display controls.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

All you should need to do is adjust the brightness/contrast settings on your display. You really don't want to touch the PC side unless you can't get it right with just the display controls.

So lets see, you are saying that I do not want to mess with settings on the PC monitor (except brightness/contrast) and the rest should be accomplished with the Ndivia display properties?

Thanks

[stanger89]

Other way around.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Other way around.

So when adjusting the final output of what your eyes see, is it always best to just change the settings on the output device itself (the tv, the monitor, the projector) and not the source device.

So generally you dont want to mess with settings that a dvd player setup screen might have, or the video card settings on a pc.

I could see endless tweaking of all that stuff. But if I can make it look *good* by just adjusting the tv,monitor, projector only, thats OK by me

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by steingra

So when adjusting the final output of what your eyes see, is it always best to just change the settings on the output device itself (the tv, the monitor, the projector) and not the source device.

IMO, yes, and while there are a number of reasons, the most important one is that sources are usually close to correct, and without test equipment (oscilloscopes, signal analyzers) it's just as easy to get things worse as better by adjusting the source (PC) settings. We've got numerous test signals (DVE, AVIA, 3no's patterns) that are designed to adjust the display assuming the source is either un-adjustable, or just to be left alone.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

IMO, yes, and while there are a number of reasons, the most important one is that sources are usually close to correct, and without test equipment (oscilloscopes, signal analyzers) it's just as easy to get things worse as better by adjusting the source (PC) settings. We've got numerous test signals (DVE, AVIA, 3no's patterns) that are designed to adjust the display assuming the source is either un-adjustable, or just to be left alone.

Yes I can see your point. Mannn so many things to tweak or change and without realllllly knowing what you are doing, you could really foobar the settings and make it worse.

So it does seem like a good idea to just adjust the output device itself. It certainly seems more straightforward

PS I checked and see that I purchased the Sound And Vision Home Theater Tune UP disc. So I will start with that and see how goes it. I starting watching it before, but got too dsitracted with everything else.

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by stanger89

IMO, yes, and while there are a number of reasons, the most important one is that sources are usually close to correct, and without test equipment (oscilloscopes, signal analyzers) it's just as easy to get things worse as better by adjusting the source (PC) settings. We've got numerous test signals (DVE, AVIA, 3no's patterns) that are designed to adjust the display assuming the source is either un-adjustable, or just to be left alone.

In regards to Sage, I adjusted my TV's using the Avia or DVD Essentials DVD's on my DVD player at each TV and then adjusted the individual Sage PVR card's to come as close as possible to matching that. The default setttings for the Hauppauge devices weren't even that good on the PC monitor and were complete garbage on any TV in my house. Way too muddy, and dark.

[stanger89]

Adjusting the Capture settings is a slightly different (yet at the same time strangely the same ) matter. On the one hand you defintely need to adjust the capture settings on the PC (different), but if you think about it, the PC is the sink (like the Display) when talking about capture so it's kind of the same

Anyway, Wayne, that's a good tactic, but I'd make one small modification to it. Doing it that way, I'd throw DVE in the PC, and adjust the display to match that, and then adjust the capture settings. That way you're adjusting everything to the same reference, ie the PC's decoding/output.

Of course, I have my own way that I'm rather fond of for adjusting the capture settings, and that is to load ffdshow with the Dscaler histogram filter, and adjust the picture so that black is at 16 and white at 235 (edges of the white part of the histogram.

I go into a bit more detail here:
http://www.sage-community.org/index....ki/Calibration

Unfortunately the images are missing there, so you can look at this one for the time being:
http://users.mcleodusa.net/r/ratpac/..._contrast.html

[steingra]

Originally Posted by waynedunham

In regards to Sage, I adjusted my TV's using the Avia or DVD Essentials DVD's on my DVD player at each TV and then adjusted the individual Sage PVR card's to come as close as possible to matching that. The default setttings for the Hauppauge devices weren't even that good on the PC monitor and were complete garbage on any TV in my house. Way too muddy, and dark.

So it sounds like it made a big improvement in your video quality in your sage tv recordings, when viewing them? I know once I go through this a few times, it wont be a big deal. But facing it for the first time, seems a little more intimidating that it should be.

I am keenly interested in making it look much nicer !

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Adjusting the Capture settings is a slightly different (yet at the same time strangely the same ) matter. ... Unfortunately the images are missing there, so you can look at this one for the time being:
http://users.mcleodusa.net/r/ratpac/..._contrast.html

That is very informative. Will take me some time to understand all of it. Im a total newbie to this calibration stuff.

From the link above "One more comment, my recommendation to calibrate from 16-235 assumes your display is calibrated to Video levels (via Digital Video Essentials or similar) and/or you want to burn the recordings to disk, in either case you'd want the MPEGs to have standard levels. If you are displaying on a PC monitor (which has a 0-255 range), you may want to calibrate to the whole graph, otherwise black and while will appear dark and light gray respectively."

So it sounds like I definately need to be thinking about how the content will eventually be viewed (long term storage - on dvd)

I plan on choosing all my favorite shows, and burning them all to dvd's (until the day when 10 Terrabyte drives are standard and can hold everything) And then I will pop them in the PC's dvd player to watch them mostly on the projector via DVI connection from PC to Projector.

Although we have a STDV 32 Inch, with a dvd player hooked up to it, so they could easily be played on there too, if we feel like watching them in the living room.

And lastly, I cant rule out that they would be played on a PC. But that is not going to be the norm. SO I guess that means I go for what would be best on TV output and not PC output.

PS
The post above says: " in either case you'd want the MPEGs to have standard levels "

That means you are calibrating to standard video levels, and not using full range of the PC levels? right? I guess the standard depends on what you are outputting for

[waynedunham]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Anyway, Wayne, that's a good tactic, but I'd make one small modification to it. Doing it that way, I'd throw DVE in the PC, and adjust the display to match that, and then adjust the capture settings. That way you're adjusting everything to the same reference, ie the PC's decoding/output.

For many people that would definitely be the way to go. Since I never watch recordings on the PC I haven't done that. I'm kind of afraid that all my recordings would then look great and the desktop/applications would look like I was in a snowblind situation. Then I'd have to go into my adapter settings and create a custom setting for the video card to make the desktop look good again.
If I watched recordings on the PC I would do that, but for my situation it's only important that they look good on the Tv in the living room and bedroom.

Tonight will be the first night with what are hopefully my final adjustments to all the tuners in place. I'll have to see what they look like on my TV's. I had all this sorted out on my old Sage 2/3 installation, but installed fresh for V4 so I had to do the settings all over again. Plus now my living room display is going through my MediaREADY 5000 client machine so that may effect the settings. Before what little I played in the living room was going through my Roku Photobridge with no Sage UI.

I'm hoping the settings will mesh well with the output in the bedroom which goes through an MVP. If not then I'll probably look a building a client for the bedroom and selling the MVP.

[steingra]

So it sounds to me, like I will also need to calibrate the hauppauge cards that I have. (one USB2 PVR and a PVR 150)

Since that is the original source of *everything* I guess it seems silly to not take time to calibrate it, right?

Of course I am also wondering, if I just left those settings along, and make the calibrations on the PC or TV/Projector...if I would end up with the same result. I dont want to do more tweaking than what is needed. My sageTV todo list is already long enough as it is

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by steingra

That is very informative. Will take me some time to understand all of it. Im a total newbie to this calibration stuff.

From the link above "One more comment, my recommendation to calibrate from 16-235 assumes your display is calibrated to Video levels (via Digital Video Essentials or similar) and/or you want to burn the recordings to disk, in either case you'd want the MPEGs to have standard levels. If you are displaying on a PC monitor (which has a 0-255 range), you may want to calibrate to the whole graph, otherwise black and while will appear dark and light gray respectively."

So it sounds like I definately need to be thinking about how the content will eventually be viewed (long term storage - on dvd)

Probably, all DVDs (at least all DVDs that are made correctly) are set so that black is at 16, and white at 235. Now those are essentailly targets, not hard limits, as it's legal for stuff to fall outside that. If you plan to put them on DVD, I'd suggest you aim for 16-235 capture, that way your recordings will roughly match off the shelf DVDs. FWIW, if you calibrate for your recordings to be 0-255, they'll end up with the darkest/lightest stuff crushed if you play it in a "properly" calibrated standalone DVD player.

I plan on choosing all my favorite shows, and burning them all to dvd's (until the day when 10 Terrabyte drives are standard and can hold everything) And then I will pop them in the PC's dvd player to watch them mostly on the projector via DVI connection from PC to Projector.

Although we have a STDV 32 Inch, with a dvd player hooked up to it, so they could easily be played on there too, if we feel like watching them in the living room.

And lastly, I cant rule out that they would be played on a PC. But that is not going to be the norm. SO I guess that means I go for what would be best on TV output and not PC output.

Really the only time I'd... (trying to come up with something less strong than "suggest" ) advise (didn't work ) setting your recordings for other than 0-255 is if you don't plan on playing other media, and don't plan on keeping them.

If you record other than 16-235 your recordings won't match retail DVDs.

PS
The post above says: " in either case you'd want the MPEGs to have standard levels "

That means you are calibrating to standard video levels, and not using full range of the PC levels? right? I guess the standard depends on what you are outputting for

It could, but see above, I'd advise going video levels on recordings always, that way your recordings will match other sources (DVDs/HDTV/etc). Otherwise you'll need different playback settings for recordings/DVDs. If you really need/want PC levels, I'd advise doing that adjustment on the playback side.

Originally Posted by waynedunham

For many people that would definitely be the way to go. Since I never watch recordings on the PC I haven't done that.

There are of course exceptions to every rule My aim is to get people a good starting point, and a bit of understanding. After that, all bets are off as each system is a bit different and each user has a bit different needs/wants.

[steingra]

Originally Posted by stanger89

...
There are of course exceptions to every rule My aim is to get people a good starting point, and a bit of understanding. After that, all bets are off as each system is a bit different and each user has a bit different needs/wants.

Most certainly. And I can appreciate that (there are always exceptions). But you are definately helping me understand what the goals here should be.

Thanks!

[lakeman]

Originally Posted by stanger89

Of course, I have my own way that I'm rather fond of for adjusting the capture settings, and that is to load ffdshow with the Dscaler histogram filter, and adjust the picture so that black is at 16 and white at 235 (edges of the white part of the histogram.

I go into a bit more detail here:
http://www.sage-community.org/index....ki/Calibration

Unfortunately the images are missing there, so you can look at this one for the time being:
http://users.mcleodusa.net/r/ratpac/..._contrast.html

stanger89, I have a couple of q's related to thses steps.

Once you have calibrated the capture settings, do you continue to use the ffdshow mpeg2 filter within Sage? If so, after you turn off the histogram filter, do you turn on any other filters in dscaler?

Thanks!

EDIT:
I found some more of your info:

Originally Posted by stanger89

For video (TV/sage recordings etc) ffdshow WILL NOT HELP YOU. Those sources require good deinterlacing, and I have yet to find anything that can match a Geforce 6 series card, with nVidia's decoders in DXVA mode for that.

It sounds like getting better video on TV recordings is limited to calibrating the capture card according to the guide above, right?

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by lakeman

stanger89, I have a couple of q's related to thses steps.

Once you have calibrated the capture settings, do you continue to use the ffdshow mpeg2 filter within Sage? If so, after you turn off the histogram filter, do you turn on any other filters in dscaler?

It sounds like getting better video on TV recordings is limited to calibrating the capture card according to the guide above, right?

I disable it and go back to using nVidia DXVA. If I could find a good film detection/deinterlacing method for ffdshow/AVISynth, I'd probably run ffdshow and mess with some of the denoise/sharpen filters.