On a positive note I managed to finish the Scottish DVD on Glasgow around deregulation and I'm now putting the old video derived scenes on the DMS volume through the processing programme. I've also now treated a cine derived clip very successfully , the results are quite stunning. Here is the new volume which I'll pop on the shop tonight. Tomorrow I might start updating the EBay shop in readiness for the Christmas trade. The lucky dip boxes get their first outing on a Buses PMP advert out today. You'll note the new style of cover for this type of edition, the others such as Tickety Boo can be super tickety boo if I process future cine film usage.
I really do hope and pray that I don't end up testing positive tomorrow as next door has now tested and felt a bit 'off', other than Elton Linda is fine but they were out with friends last week and think it could be there Elton caught it. On top of waiting to go in for the operation on Monday I really don't need another layer of anguish. I suppose with most people unaware they have it it's really hard to control. We wear masks going round M&S or Tescos. Most if not indeed all my filming is alone outside. On a positive note I managed to finish the Scottish DVD on Glasgow around deregulation and I'm now putting the old video derived scenes on the DMS volume through the processing programme. I've also now treated a cine derived clip very successfully , the results are quite stunning. Here is the new volume which I'll pop on the shop tonight. Tomorrow I might start updating the EBay shop in readiness for the Christmas trade. The lucky dip boxes get their first outing on a Buses PMP advert out today. You'll note the new style of cover for this type of edition, the others such as Tickety Boo can be super tickety boo if I process future cine film usage. Rough weather today, I tried my luck at Lymm as its near home, I got more than enough for one DVD but the wind really started to be a problem so I came home. I managed to finish the Glasgow post deregulation (1986-90) film , I do still need to do the cover. Now I'm working on the London DMS project which I started a couple of weeks or more back. I'm now concentrating on this for the mean time and also scanning more of Dave Forrests material plus I picked up another pile of reels from Peter Waller in Shrewsbury. Some shots from Lymm and then we are at St Oswalds PCC meeting this evening. The weather tomorrow should be sunny which means trucks are the easiest while I do buses archives from home. I've a few more ideas in my head for different uses of the new AI systems of treatment. It has been a hard learning curve but I've now achieved my first PMP film with most in 60fps although often it is more like 50fps, a challenge on that to see any difference. I've put a few words together on the whole subject. NOTES FOR PMP ON ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND UPGRADING OLD CINE AND VIDEO Restoring old footage whether from cine or video is not easy at all. It involves several separate stages with various types of software. The first step is to get you clip you wish to treat, we scan cine film to HD but it still needs more processing, video can be obtained from old tape original sources or from DVDs we had already completed, this saves wearing out now delicate tape media. Particularly with cine we can motion-stabilise it but overdone it makes everything wobbly. This is important because watching film as if it was originally shot on a tripod makes viewing far easier suffering wobbly footage. We can enhance the contrast, brightness and sharpness, as well as apply noise reduction and dust and speckle removal filters. We can organise various clips and adjust them to a realistic speed, old cine cameras often produced the Laurel and Hardy speeded up effect. How to do this the correct way involves a lot of experience and the treatment of every film will be entirely different. The third step involves upscaling and/or enhancing to 1080p HD using contemporary A.I. software. This process adds a lot of clarity to almost any footage. In itself this stage is not too difficult providing you know how to set the correct parameters about which we are still learning but the processing times are huge, often over night or even several days. Another step would be to colourise old B&W material. A very good software tool for this purpose is Deoldify but this takes you into the realm of dos beyond my current ability but we are watching progress. The final step is to add sound and any commentary or titles plus our now usual greeting and introduction. Hopefully I'll have clips on Youtube tonight or tomorrow. The weather is looking a bit grim for the rest of the week, I hope to get the DMS London bus volume complete. Today I was down in Shrewsbury with my friend Peter Waller from the OTA, he's at the Transport Trust function tomorrow with Princess Ann in attendance, no tram, talk there I bet. I pick up some more film to scan but I'm in the middle of Dave Forrests collection so i'll bash through that and see how I'm fixed. The cine I've picked up from the OTA is more of Phil Tatts collection, not the best of cine but not bad and very varied in transport content. This section is on the 1970s. My London Underground film is another potential target for finishing this week. I had to finish off the painting in the main bedroom this morning and then there were some bits to touch up in the lounge after the new carpet went in. It was wet and dark, the most miserable looking day of the year. I went back to the editing suite lunch time but I couldn't find the files I'd already processed for the final section, it is a weakness that you get no menu to pick from it just goes where it last went. Less than 2 hours to go and it should be ready to finalise tonight. Tomorrow I'm down in Shrewsbury with Peter Waller of the OTA, films to deposit with them and some to pick up for scanning. I'm working my way through Dave Forrests films, a lot are still on 50' reels which are a bit of a chore to tackle. Mainly if not all 1980s scenes plus we have his video digitised. The DVD post bag was enormous today, orders kept coming through all over the weekend and still coming this morning, all have been sent out. A week today I'll have had my operation but I won't get out until Tuesday lunch time, don't expect too much from me after the weekend. I've certainly got plenty to do indoors. I was hoping to get some bus and lorry film this week but the weather looks awful but I'll do anything I can. Yes all the treatments with artificial intelligence have now been completed and we are nearly ready to do the cover, just some final editing. Although the images are vastly improved the techniques used were by people just exploring the medium of video. They are hand held amateur work but the glory now is that you can relish the buses in much sharper images played as HD and at 60fps, which seems to be the holy grail at present. At church our final few regulars are getting back, one today after nearly two years of isolating due to a degenerative disease. We also started to use hymn books again which adds to the work of the sides-persons tidying up. When we got home we had lunch and I was back on the bedroom decorating challenge. I've still got some glossing to do but its nearly all done, we even have a feature wall with sparkle in the paint, it actually looks quite good. I'll try and use screen shots from the actual DVD for the new Glasgow video, I hope its freshness brings back happy memories for many, there will be clips jn Youtube. I'm 10 minutes over the hours and want to get rid of any really wobbly bits and over zealous zooms etc! We are stacked out with DVD orders this weekend, I've got all the discs ready to go our just need to pull out the covers. How about a look back at Glasgow, I didn't film there until 1992 but here are some shots which may whet your appetite as you wait for the finished DVD. everyth8ing just vanishes as I finished typing, I hate this Weebly site but all American things are poorly engineered same as China. We had our jabs first things then back to clear the bedroom and get ready to decorate, finished the ceiling and first coat on the walls at 6pm. Along the way there was a little remedial work on the walls. Mandy went out to order new blinds and dropped the curtains at the dry cleaners. The clip for the 1980s Glasgow production at 60fps is still processing, yes the same one are was going when I blogged yesterday, it should be ready by bed time and I can then put the last clip on, it is taking a week and the computer has only been off all week the night when we had a power cut. Nothing unusual in our village.Thankfully the clip I was treating was already finished. Frustrating but hopefully rewarding, this particular film needed to go through two processes, one to clean, sharpen etc and the other now to get it up to 60fps. A few more Detling shots to finish with.. So another hectic week behind us, it seems never to have stopped and we get some very large DVD orders are present which we still try and turn around in one working day until our travels get a bit more intensive. It was the day for the physical pre op appointment at the Spire at Murrayfield on the Wirral. All went with incident plus we got some errands done first thing including materials for decorating the main bedroom over the weekend although first thing Saturday we have our flu jabs. My work on the artificial intelligence processing carries on, I got some of the 1988 film processed to upgrade quality now it is going through even more treatment to get it up to 60 fps the holy grail of HD enhancement for old video. Some will do the whole process in reasonable time other clips just take a lot longer well into two days at a time. Thankfully last nights power cut was after the first treatment had ended. The whole task is our first IA enhanced programme and it is Strathclyde area post deregulation 1986-90. There will be several clips going on to Youtube including one showing a before and after. The next one will be on Birmingham perhaps. Meanwhile the London DMS and London Tube are in the background. The next round of PMP magazine articles will be pushing our well received lucky dip boxes in both bus and lorry variants. I will try and get more digital downloads loaded to our shop, to be fair there haven't been that many uptakes on this but it really is something I'll try and stick with as it opens up nearly a whole world audience. For the AI features there will be another production brand IA60fps. I'm looking up ideas for the covers. I also called at the car repair and restoration place in Northwich ref the 'wrap' for the Toyota IQ, it is away being designed pending pricing. I return to Detling last Sunday for our slide show tonight. Looking ahead we have a busy week after a weekend of decorating. Monday paint skirting boards in lounge and bedroom. Tuesday meet with OTA at Shrewsbury, Wed/Thurs possible truck and bus film weather dependent. Friday Covid test, then isolate until operation on Monday 25th Oct. I think with Roy Finney's models and the Wythall Midland Red running day I seem to be getting hooked on a company I only knew from the NBC era onward- no bad thing and I really love immediate post war specimens. BMMO really did their own thing and for quirky this is a gold mine. We had the monthly British Polio Fellowship meeting for our branch today, Mandy is chair and after being acting secretary this was confirmed today as a permanent post. I will need to get the minutes typed up and send HQ our newly mostly re-elected officers. We are planning a Christmas lunch for the November meeting. The treatment of the old video through the Topaz AI software is a very frustrating and at times lengthy business. If it is going to crash with your settings it lets you walk away or more likely go to bed or on holiday with crossed fingers that it will be processed. Anyway I'm having yet another go at the 1980's Glasgow material taking it up to Dave Cole's 1990 scenes, other shots from Tim Bubb and Richard Lomas. It will be great when it is finished. The easiest parts are ripped from DVD then just processed at not too high a setting and the results seem splendid. Mixing sources just confuses and trying to scale to high leads to a crash ( eventually). I have my hospital pre op to attend tomorrow, then I can make the payment, 5 days before at least. It is the weekend put aside for the decoration of our bedroom before my op and alas the new carpet which has been delayed until November. Getting the dining room back to good order involved Mandy in two falls, a bruised bottom was the worst injury thankfully although on the second try some broken vases and a stretched plastic storage box which Mandy tumbled backwards into and got stuck. I made sure she was ok and then fetched the camera, no I value my life too much to spread that shot so widely, hard luck! Slide show tonight from Chesterfield a couple of days back, the DVDs are on the shop. It looks as if the next DVD will be that using our oldest video of Glasgow, if I can get it all to work it will be from 1980-90 inclusive. It will stretch the artificial intelligence editing and if I can this to work then I should be able to finish the one on London DMS classes. We have the carpet layers back with us this afternoon, getting everything back in place may well spill into tomorrow although we have the polio fellowship meeting in the afternoon and I want to get my hair cut before the meeting and we usually have lunch at M&S in Ellesmere Port while we are there. I've got all the latest completed DVDs on the PMP shop and here they are I hope to get some more clips on Youtube this evening. The artificial intelligence software called Topaz is proving a mixed blessing, there are no instructions with it and the videos show the very basics and miss out a lot of vital information. Really it seems a work in progress and not fit to sell, it works if you have something to enhance which matches one of their models but what do you do if there isn't. Supposedly there is some way you can create your own but I haven't found it yet. I was in Mansfield and Chesterfield filming, met one of our loyal customers, friends, viewer at Chesterfield and spent a pleasant few minutes together. I'm downloading the video at the moment. I had a bad trip/fall courtesy Chesterfield's council pavements, a bit sore knees and chest but otherwise I and cameras are ok. See the slide show for Mansfield. I'll make sure I get other releases on the shop as I think I might not have updated it for last week. |
PMP Sponsors the North West Vehicle Restoration Trust at Kirkby.
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