Been enjoying the remastered Babylon 5 on HBO Max. Has anyone else been (re)watching this... seems to be well-trained AI upscaling for the most
part, though I'm not sure. It's not perfect, but far more than most had
ever expected to see this series get. I do kind of wish they'd
re-created the CGI, but it's still much better than the older DVD releases.

I'd actually been wanting to get an RTX 3080 (hard to get) partly to run
AI upscaling software on the series. It does seem that the models used
by warner/hbo are much better than what I've seen of a lot of upscaling software, so glad someone else did the hard work.

On a similar note, hoping we see more of older shows given similar
treatment and won't be surprised to see a lot more of it as time moves forward.

For those outside the US, I think they also have a corresponding Blu-Ray release, and may buy it on media to rip and keep locally... though I
only tend to re-watch shows about once every 8-10 years or so.
--
Michael J. Ryan (tracker1)
+o roughneckbbs.com

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þ Synchronet þ Roughneck BBS - roughneckbbs.com

On 2021-02-04 6:27 a.m., Tracker1 wrote:

Been enjoying the remastered Babylon 5 on HBO Max. Has anyone else been (re)watching this... seems to be well-trained AI upscaling for the most part, though I'm not sure. It's not perfect, but far more than most had ever expected to see this series get. I do kind of wish they'd
re-created the CGI, but it's still much better than the older DVD releases.

From what I heard, note sure if true, but the live sequences where
shoot on film, so they just had to rescan in hd. And the shoot apprently
where shoot in 4:3 but frame for 16:9 so that it could be cropped
without missing important element. But for the CGI part yup, amiga video toaster by then where ntsc beast, so 4:3 for lightwave 3D with maybe was limited to 474 vertical lines. I guess they did kept any files to have
it re-processed with modern computers. So yeah the cgi is upscaled and
cropped to 16:9 which is not the best :-/

I'd actually been wanting to get an RTX 3080 (hard to get) partly to run
AI upscaling software on the series. It does seem that the models used
by warner/hbo are much better than what I've seen of a lot of upscaling software, so glad someone else did the hard work.

Some time I see people doing sequences in 4k. it look good https://youtu.be/MKj-N5j0SBY

On a similar note, hoping we see more of older shows given similar
treatment and won't be surprised to see a lot more of it as time moves forward.

DS9 or Voyager would be cool, but i think the problem with Voyager is
that like B5 a lot of stuff was cgi instead of models, so they can't
just rescan.

For those outside the US, I think they also have a corresponding Blu-Ray release, and may buy it on media to rip and keep locally... though I
only tend to re-watch shows about once every 8-10 years or so.

I was thinking of buying the set on Apple, the full set if at 70$, I
think that people who already bought it in SD got bumped to HD for free.
Only watched some key episodes here and there since the original
broadcast (had them all on vhs :-/) so I could use the upgrade I guess
and rewatch

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­ Synchronet ­ MtlGeek - Geeks in Montreal - http://mtlgeek.com/ -

On 2/4/2021 11:20 AM, Ennev wrote:

On 2021-02-04 6:27 a.m., Tracker1 wrote:

Been enjoying the remastered Babylon 5 on HBO Max. Has anyone else
been (re)watching this... seems to be well-trained AI upscaling for
the most part, though I'm not sure. It's not perfect, but far more
than most had ever expected to see this series get. I do kind of wish
they'd re-created the CGI, but it's still much better than the older
DVD releases.

From what I heard, note sure if true, but the live sequences where
shoot on film, so they just had to rescan in hd. And the shoot apprently where shoot in 4:3 but frame for 16:9 so that it could be cropped
without missing important element. But for the CGI part yup, amiga video toaster by then where ntsc beast, so 4:3 for lightwave 3D with maybe was limited to 474 vertical lines. I guess they did kept any files to have
it re-processed with modern computers. So yeah the cgi is upscaled and cropped to 16:9 which is not the best :-/

The show was filmed in widescreen, but displayed/broadcast in 4:3, the
footage was re-scanned, re-composed then cropped to original aspect 4:3.

The special effects were done at 4:3 originally but 1/2 scale (1/4
screen then upscaled)... this appears to have used some AI upscaling as
the cgi actually looks decent, just somewhat Wii quality models overall.

I'd actually been wanting to get an RTX 3080 (hard to get) partly to
run AI upscaling software on the series. It does seem that the models
used by warner/hbo are much better than what I've seen of a lot of
upscaling software, so glad someone else did the hard work.

Some time I see people doing sequences in 4k. it look good https://youtu.be/MKj-N5j0SBY

Yeah, the results of the remaster are as good or better than some of the existing AI upscaling examples.

On a similar note, hoping we see more of older shows given similar
treatment and won't be surprised to see a lot more of it as time moves
forward.

DS9 or Voyager would be cool, but i think the problem with Voyager is
that like B5 a lot of stuff was cgi instead of models, so they can't
just rescan.

I think this is the case, but with proper training AI models for AI
upscaling can do a pretty stellar job of things.

For those outside the US, I think they also have a corresponding
Blu-Ray release, and may buy it on media to rip and keep locally...
though I only tend to re-watch shows about once every 8-10 years or so.

I was thinking of buying the set on Apple, the full set if at 70$, I
think that people who already bought it in SD got bumped to HD for free. Only watched some key episodes here and there since the original
broadcast (had them all on vhs :-/) so I could use the upgrade I guess
and rewatch

It was definitely *MUCH* higher quality than the DVD, and even what I've
seen of simpler HD upscaling.
--
Michael J. Ryan (tracker1)
+o roughneckbbs.com

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