Edge enhancement questions... (1 Viewer)

[Dome Vongvises]

Lately, every transfer that I've seen that I've deemed excellent has usually been bashed to pieces because of complaints by members of this forum about edge enhancement. About a long time ago, there was a website dedicated to showing what edge enhancement was. The one thing I didn't get was: can you only notice edge enhancemnt on HDTV? I've watched Lawrence of Arabia (an often bashed film for its edge enhancement) and I'd have to squint to see the supposed "ringing" effect that seems to put HTF'ers into a frenzy. And recently, it seems that even the reissued 2001 and Die Hard With a Vengence are getting thumbs down with edge enhancement. Is EE really that bad? What are some obviously bad EE (meaning you can see it on a 27 inch regular TV) examples? What are the alternatives to EE to helping picture quality? Hmmmmmm...
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"I don't know, Marge. Trying is the first step towards failure." - Homer J. Simpson

 

[Wes Ray]

I've learned that a majority of the people at the HTF complain about DVD-related things whether they are actually truly important or not. As long as the picture looks halfway decent, I really don't care how about edge enhancement. Honestly, how many of you sit and watch the edges of the screen for two hours? Wait, please don't answer that. A better question would be, why not give credit to the studios where credit is due at giving us very good DVDs of the mentioned movies? The Die Hard 5-Star collection is loaded with extra stuff, as is Lawrence of Arabia. Are the DVDs an improvement over the previous VHS versions? Yes. So what is to complain about? No doubt, I'll be written off as a "Joe Six-Pack" but I do own quite a few DVDs and honestly, as long as the transfer is decent and leaps and bounds better than the VHS one, I could care less about "edge enhancement" and such things that you all feel is so very crucial.
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[Jeff Ulmer]

Edge enhancement has nothing to do with the edges of the screen... and everything to do with degrading an otherwise great image. Why should we care? Because we invest a lot of money in a DVD library, which could be far more enjoyable if we weren't plagued by the artificial sharpening process employed in these transfers, and the side effects they cause. They are adding an extra process which is completely unnecessary, and detrimental to the highest image quality. You may not see it on a small set, but it is glaringly obvious on mine.
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[DarrenA]

I really don't care how about edge enhancement. Honestly, how many of you sit and watch the edges of the screen for two hours?

Honestly, you should probably learn what "edge enhancement" is before making inaccurate comments about it. As Jeff Ulmer stated, it has nothing to do with the edges of your screen.
To learn what "Edge Enhancement" is, take a look at Bjoern Roy's excellent site about EE... http://home.t-online.de/home/bjoern....ml/Page_01.htm
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DarrenA
The Academy Home Theater

 

[Heinz W]

You should care about EE. Do you care whether or or not a disc is anamorphic (where applicable, of course)? You should. One of the great things about DVD is its possible longevity. Properly cared for DVDs will last a lifetime (barring rot). Anamorphic discs will still be viable 10-15 years from now when hopefully every TV will be Hi-Def and 16:9 if you want it. You may be able to buy a new Hi-Def version of Die Hard, but your old anamorphic 5-Star disc will still look good on a 16:9 set. Anamorphic, besides a better picture, means future proofing your investment.
What does that have to do with EE? Well, if I have a movie on DVD now that is otherwise excellent but has EE and I can see it fairly easily on my 32" NTSC set NOW, how will it look on a larger display? A Hi-Def display? A front projector with the picture blown up to a 100"? I'll tell you. Worse! And I will be getting one of those sets eventually. And I don't intend to replace ALL of my DVDs with HD versions; most likely just my favorites. So if a disc is anamorphic but plagued with excessive EE it will look even worse on my new 16:9 HD set. I don't want to repurchase every DVD I have simply because the old one has EE and the new HD disc doesn't (HOPEFULLY!).
This is an unnecessary tweak that ruins many good transfers. It needs to stop! I don't need halos around things to tell me where a person/object ends and the background begins. It is VERY distracting once you are aware of it. EE is most prominant in scenes that are either daytime or brightly lit, so although I haven't seen the new Die Hard yet I'm willing to bet it has a lot less EE than Die Hard: WAV simply because it is a darker film than Part 3. As much as is possible, films should look like films, not video.
I don't understand why they do this but I sure wish it would stop.

 

[Jonathan Perregaux]

The most horrific example of edge enhancement gone wrong is on prominent display in Born on the Fourth of July. Holy God, that DVD looks horrible! Just try to watch the golden-colored Vietnam sequence without noticing that something is drastically wrong with the picture. The tree branches are all glowing and everyone is surrounded by frigging auras...
"I have been able to see the human aura for many years. I was not born with this ability but taught myself the old fashioned way. It took me several years! I developed this new method to help beginners overcome the problems I encountered."
--From a metaphysical Web page I found
Now you can just pop in the Born on the Fourth of July DVD and you'll be able to see auras no problem! Yay!

 

[MikeEckman]

My question is....since everyone hates Edge Enhancement so much, then why is it used at all? Titanic was shown as a movie with no edge enhancement, and although its not anamorphic, I thought that movie looked excellent!! I mean, whats the point?

 

[Morgan Holly]

I just looked through that web site. A lot of what I saw was MPEG artifacting, not aperture correction (EE). I know that LoA was compressed on the Sony DVA-1100 encoder, which rarely has a pre-processing box on the front end, so it is VERY unlikely that AC was applied to the image during compression. MPEG algorithms is some encoders will yield edge artifacts called "mosquitoing" or "mosquito wings." This is unavoidable in most cases, a limitation of the box.
DVDFile.com just ran a review of Akira complaining about excessive AC. We did that title and applied none, so you can bet your britches I spend the morning doing frame grabs of the D1 master and the DVD to figure out exactly what they're talking about. I'll post my findings here.
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[Jeff Ulmer]

Morgan, I would love to see your findings. I really wish we had an online resource that would demonstrate in detail the effects of different artifacts and their causes, since I see problems on a majority of titles, and would really like to know what is causing them. Edge enhancement still must go, but I'd prefer to be calling an anomalie what it really is if the picture doesn't look as it should.
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[TedD]

Morgan,
If some encoders yield an inferior picture, then why are they being used at all? It seems to me that anyone who is trying to deliver a top quality product should be using the most accurate encoder that has the fewest negative side effects on the image.
Ted

 

[Seth]

The question I have for everybody who is complaining about
edge enhancement. Do you really think the movie studios are going to give you a perfect digital copies of movies to own? My answer I don't think so. I'll be surprized if you'll ever be able to own a hi-def copy of Star Wars. Second they don't look that bad with EE even on a 7 foot screen. I got the Die Hard set for $47.79 that's including tax. Some of you guys are demanding to have the same quality of a new 35mm film print, which isn't going to happen. God forbid Citizen Kane has edge enhancement and you persuade people not to buy it like you did on the Apartment dvd(which isn't that bad).

 

[TedD]

Sorry, Dup Post
[Edited last by TedD on July 16, 2001 at 11:17 AM]

 

[Brian Kidd]

I have to agree that sometimes people see EE where there is none. I've seen many films that have been lambasted for video quality that look great to me. On the other hand, I've seen some films that have so much enhancement that they look terrible, even on my 25" screen. My question is this: If EE never really adds anything to a picture, why use it? Can anyone name a disc where EE has actually improved the picture?

 

[Matt_Stevens]

EE is used because the suits think it will help widescreen images look sharper on small screens. That's from the horses mouth.
Now I disagree with that. On my 36" Wega with 16x9 squeeze, I can see some EE on some titles. Not all, but some of the titles that have been singled out. However, I only noticed it after seeing screen grabs here in this forum, which made me look for it. NOW I can see EE and I wish to God I had never heard of it.

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[Jeff Ulmer]

Blow that image up to a 65" widescreen and it's pretty damn noticible. My vote is NO edge enhancement at all, it simply looks better. If those with small sets don't like it, they can turn up their sharpness control and get the same effect.
If these are in fact MPEG issues, then I'll be rethinking my commitment to the DVD format.
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[TedD]

Morgan, can you help us identify the artifacts present in the following images?
Warning: The following images are full resolution images photographed of my 5' x 12' screen.
Die Hard 3 Image 1
The halos on the sides of the buildings:
Die Hard 3 Image 2
The dark line just to the left of the second edge to the right of the tallest tower::
Die Hard 3 Image 3
The bright halos around the traffic signal poles and the signals themselves:
Die Hard 3 Image 4
The bright outline around the door:
A Refence Image follows:
The HTPC (WinDVD)
All of these are actual photgraphs off of my screen. They are not frame grabs or captures. The camera is a Casio QV3000EX. What you see in the images above is what I see on the screen.
Thanks, Ted
[Edited last by TedD on July 16, 2001 at 01:08 PM]

 

[Morgan Holly]

Ted,
Different encoders deal with different picture sources in different ways. We have two types of encoders here, one works well for new transfers, one works well on older grainy films.
Some encoders just plain suck, but it's always a tradeoff when you choose which encoder to use and how much noise reduction to use for a particular job. How good your DVD looks has a lot t5o do with who is at the controls. "suits" don't decide how much NR or AC to use on a picture, the compressionist and the QC people do.
We're picking up copies of Akira from Long Beach today as our only check disc was sent up north. I'll try to have framegrabs and text up by the end of the day.
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[Morgan Holly]

Ted reply 2:
To identify the artifacts I need to know exactly what equipment was used to capture the image and what type of signal you fed your capture board.
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[TedD]

Morgan, I have added the info to my original post.
These are actual photographs taken with a Casio 3.3 megapixel camera. They are not screen captures! I have also included a reference photo taken with the same camera for comparison, lest someone think that my system is contributing to the problem.
Ted

 

[Morgan Holly]

I can't really tell from that. What kind of set are you using, what outputs from what DVD player are you using and have you defeated all picture processing on your DVD player?
I'll be using an uncompressed SDI capture card sending the component outputs of the DVD player through a AJA YUV->SDI converter.
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