Converting a project from SD to HD

[Jayell]

I have a continuous video going of all the animals that I 'capture' on my property. I started it a few years ago .. and it will continue indefinately. As I get better footage of a particular animal, I replace older clips. It was started as an SD project, into which I am just beginning to bring HD footage. Somewhere along the way I will have more HD footage than SD and will want to convert it to an HD project. Other than saving to an AVI and bringing that into a new HD project (or bringing all the footage in again from scratch .. not likely!) .. is there any other way to convert it into an HD project?

.. AND for the time being, it's all being exported to FLVs for my Website .. so does it buy me anything quality wise (even a small amount) to make the conversion from SD to HD?

[Jayell]

OK then .. I'm going to assume the answers are 'NO' .. and 'maybe'

[Chuck Engels]

I'm waiting for some of the more knowledgeable people to chime in about this. Maybe there is a way to upconvert from SD to HD but my guess is that the quality will suffer greatly.

You can put SD footage into an HD project it will not take up the entire screen. It would cover 720 x 480 in the center of the HD project.

[John 'twosheds' McDonald]

Maybe there is a way to upconvert from SD to HD but my guess is that the quality will suffer greatly. You can put SD footage into an HD project it will not take up the entire screen. It would cover 720 x 480 in the center of the HD project.

Someone commented on the forum to the effect that you can't put pixels back where there weren't any to begin with. So HD is 1920 x 1080, SD is 720 x 480. Full 1080 HD has about six times as many pixels as SD. The only solution to producing the full output as HD will be to zoom in on the SD footage. The resulting quality of the 'zoomed in' footage will be reduced markedly. Now whether this makes a hugely material difference on an flv file I wouldn't know. My choice would be to use the SD footage at native resolution and use it in 'picture in picture' mode in the HD output.

[Jayell]

I think I probably knew that .. but thanks, John, for walking me through it. Last nite I found that there weren't quite as many video clips to deal with as I thought, so starting from scratch in a new HD project might not be as painful as I was thinking it might. I don't mind the clips not filling the screen .. I always use a background anyway. Just wanted to make sure there wasn't an easier way to get from SD to HD.

[Ken Jarstad]

If you are interested there is a technique called 'super-resolution' which is able to enhance lower res images into higher res images using an algorithm to compare frames before and after the current frame. Search for the term and you may be surprised at the hits. Here is one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super-resolution

I bought the app named 'Video Enhancer' which has a 'Super Resolution' mode - however haven't tried that mode. He wants $40.
http://www.thedeemon.com/VideoEnhancer/

This guy also makes a plugin for Adobe After Effects and Premiere Pro for $99.
http://www.thedeemon.com/super_resolution/

[Jayell]

My project isn't critical enough to spend much $$ on, but interesting to know what's out there and what can be done. Thanks Ken for the links!

[Chuck Engels]

Yes, thanks for the links Ken, very interesting stuff

[Ken Jarstad]

Here is another interesting application on the TMPGEnc website if you are willing to spend a few bucks. Scroll about halfway down the page.

http://tmpgenc.pegasys-inc.com/en/product/te4xp_spurs.html