My mom and I have always had a special bond. She raised me single-handedly after dad, always showered me with love, and gave me everything I wanted despite our tough times.
That's why when I had to go to Europe for a year, it was an emotional time for both of us.
The day I came back, mom made me my favorite dinner, and we sat down to watch some old family videos when I came across one that left me in tears.
It was an old video of my mom holding my hand, helping me walk. She has been having some trouble with her Arthritis lately (she is using a walker now), and my trip had made things very difficult for her because she had to do everything on her own)
I loved the video to bits, but I could also see that it looked pale, jaded, and grainy compared to what was shot originally. Some of the things that bothered me:
While I loved the videos and how they took me back to my childhood, I wanted them to be as beautiful as my memories of that time. I needed to find an application to enhance video quality and breathe life into these old videos.
That is when I turned to some of the video editing software available online. However, most of the applications available required a lot of video editing skills and technical knowledge. While I was searching for a good video enhancer that I could use without any technical background, I came across the concept of AI-based video quality enhancers.
Back when video creation and editing started, the videographers and cinematographers were the only ones who could edit your videos for you.
However, today many things have changed in the world of video editing. With the advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI), editing your videos has moved away from using tricks, hacks, and techniques that only a pro could understand to a single click option where the machine does everything for you.
AI has taken over many manual applications in education, healthcare, businesses, automobiles, and even digital media.
Unlike a non-AI video quality enhancer, an AI software enhances video quality using a sophisticated technique. It analyzes millions of poor-quality videos, compares them to high-quality versions of these videos, and identifies and codes what needs to be changed to make them more lifelike.
The machine studies and analyzes each frame and identifies the missing pixels in low-resolution videos. The AI model, then, produces impactful and quality videos by using the following methods:
Capturing videos in low light makes the camera more sensitive to lighted areas. Therefore, the videos appear grainy or noisy, which cuts down overall video clarity. The AI machine eliminates video noise.
Blurriness and distortion in a video are a pain to watch. While it is quite natural to get your videos blurry sometimes, it completely ruins the video.
AI models are trained to enhance video quality by picking up areas that need scrutinizing them and then processing them with three models: Sharpen, Stabilize, and Focus.
AI tools are simply amazing. They don't just enhance video quality; they add more pixels to make the picture richer! How do they do this? Through the magic of interpolation.
The AI machine takes up to ten continuous frames, figures out which pixels are missing in each frame by comparing them to each other, and then applies this knowledge to fill in missing pixels, thus making the picture richer.
It also uses its trained knowledge of millions of similar videos and what pixels would fit in which situation. It also pulls out ghosted and deteriorating images.
By using a sharp contrast to black and white balance, the AI video enhancer adjusts the video's color. Color correction helps to eliminate gray areas and establish a fine line between blacks and whites.
On the other hand, color grading involves picking up a certain color and adjusting it in the best possible way to enhance video quality.
Now that I knew that AI tools could help me edit my old videos, I went back and checked my old videos to understand which problems AI could solve for me. I believe these are all common problems in old videos, and any good tool that you should look for should be able to solve most of these problems:
My family shot the videos with old cameras and outdated phones, and to be honest, these are home videos, so nobody was an expert at making good videos. So you need to have a video enhancer that can improve the quality of the video itself, rather than just changing a few pixels here and there.
My father shot most of my old clips on 720p cameras; some were even worse. Those videos could never match the kind of stuff that we are used to these days, what with the 4K and 8K TV and other video watching devices that we have.
What I needed was something that could enhance the number of pixels itself and bring the videos up to 4K level to enjoy the videos on today's video devices.
Some of the clips appeared dusty due to low light or incorrect camera settings. There were small dots all over the clips, distorting the image and vision. In technical terms, this is referred to as video noise.
A good AI tool needs to remove noise from your videos.
There was a clear distinction when I tried playing the video on the TV. Most of the faces came off as blurred and unrecognizable. A good video enhancer needs to remove this blurriness as well.
When you look closely at some of these old videos, you will notice that the areas that should have more black reflect white. On the other hand, the white background is unclear and cannot stand out. In some places, the color of the objects lacks depth and clarity and requires color grading as well. These should also be on your wish list for an AI video enhancer.
You need to be sure that your hardware should support the application you use. You should check about:
With this wish list in hand and the internet at my beck and call, I set out to search for the best video enhancer for my little home project. I finalized three which I felt were up to the mark:
If there is one video editing software that ticked all the boxes on my list, it was DVDFab Video Enhancer AI. Power-packed with premium features, this AI tool is a one-stop-shop for all your video makeover requirements.
I am always a little skeptical about the tall claims of AI software. I feel that the product will not be easy to use, or it may not be as good as it's made out to be, or else it may be too expensive for me. But luckily, contrary to my expectations, the DVDFab video enhancer AI made perfect videos for me without much effort and at a reasonable cost!
There is no need to tweak settings or parameters with its automated feature. Every input is calibrated automatically by the sensors of the application, and a perfect video comes out without doing anything.
After all, what use is an AI application if I have to do all the settings myself!
While my childhood video had a 720P resolution, I had a 4K compatible TV. Having already experienced the brighter, cleaner, and more detailed output of a 4K video, watching these old and grainy videos felt a bit of a letdown.
Unlike other non-AI-based video enhancers, DVDFab's product will not just make your video look better; it will enhance video resolution up to 4K. But how does it achieve that?
The product uses advanced AI models trained with a huge number of 4K TV shows, movies, music videos, random videos, and animated videos. This AI model identifies where it can fill up missing pixels to your video and then regenerates them to form a higher 4K quality video.
Some of my old videos had blurred because, to be frank; I used to love running around a lot! As a kid, it was nearly impossible to get me to stop running around, and often the videos had blurs simply because I never let my dad get the right focus.
The DVDFab AI video quality enhancer solved this problem for me. Within seconds, the AI-enabled model passed through every frame in the video, fixing blurred lines and images.
A few old black and white clips from my nana's time did not have the right color balance. The DVDFab AI video enhancer was able to correct the color to get the right balance of black and white. It could make the black areas look pure black and the white areas completely white, thus ensuring the right contrast and shading.
Some of the videos also had faded colors, and DVDFab could ensure color grading so that the videos looked true to the real colors. It almost felt like magic.
How To Enhance Video Quality Using DVDFab Video Enhancer AI
It is that simple! Everything from denoising to removing blurs to adjusting colors is taken care of by the AI model automatically.
The Topaz Video Upscaler is another great option that controls multiple videos all at once. This is a widely used tool, but it's quite expensive for the features it offers.
With Topaz Labs AI, you can convert an SD video to HD (1080p), HD movies to 4K, and 4K movies to 8K. For example, in my case, I could only convert my 720p videos to HD (DVDFab did a better job here because it converted the movie to 4K)
There were a lot of clips in my videos that were low resolution and grainy. The product was able to remove graininess as well.
One problem that I could not crack with DVDFab's product was how to enhance video quality for deinterlaced videos. I had a few old shows whose videos I wanted to deinterlace. Topaz AI had the feature to deinterlace old videos as well.
With their proprietary Chronos AI model, the Topaz AI video enhancer could predict and generate new frames between the existing video frames. This helped in achieving more realistic details in the video.
Slow-Mo is another interesting feature which Topaz AI has in contrast to DVDFab. Though I did not need it, it is probably a useful feature for professional use.
How to Enhance Video Quality Free of Cost Using Topaz AI
Note: For choosing the best model for one video, simply use the "Add video" button and use the same video with different AI models. Then "preview" it to see the results.
This product has many features and is "free" for a limited period. I tried it out because it was free to download and comes with free upgrades for a limited time.
The product has almost the same features as DVDFab and Topaz AI. However, the feature to enhance video quality free of cost was only up to 1080p which did not serve my purpose (I was dead set on upscaling my videos to 4K).
I found DVDFab's ability to upscale my old 720p videos to 4K unbeatable in the market. The product was reasonably priced, and I found the quality of video enhancement was the best of the lot. I even made a small comparison table between the products.
Feature |
DVDFab |
Topaz AI |
AVCLAbs |
OS supported |
Windows 11/10 |
Win/Mac |
Win 10 |
Pricing |
Free trial for the first 5 videos. 1-month plan: $79.99 1-year plan: $109.99 Lifetime plan: $149.99 with unlimited free upgrades (30% discount with code VEA30) |
Free trial for a month Lifetime: $199.99 + $99 for upgraded license |
Free trial 1-month plan: $39.95 1-year plan: $199.99 Lifetime: $499.95 |
Video Upscaling |
From 720p to 4K |
SD to HD, HD to 4K, 4k to 8K |
480p to 1080p, 1080p to 4K and 8K |
Deblurring |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
DeNoising |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Enhancing Brightness |
Yes |
No |
No |
Slow Motion |
No |
Yes |
No |
DeInterlacing |
No |
Yes |
No |
Color correction |
Yes |
No |
No |
Overall, I felt that DVDFab's product offered excellent value for money for a home project like mine. The upscaling was superb; video enhancement left almost zero artifacts and enhanced color and sharpness.
Yes, you might want to consider Topaz AI for professional purposes, but for most purposes, DVDFab's product is the best on offer at a price.
So what are you waiting for? Download DVDFab Video Enhancer AI and start reliving your memories today!