4K to 8K. How to do this ?

Hi Guys,

I got the DR 17.X studio. I want to venture into upscaling. I need some help. I went through some youtube videos. I am confused on some fundamentals.

Here are some questions.
1. What's the difference between super scaling the clip ( 2X, 3X, 4X etc) vs exporting to a higher resolution ? Say for example, If I have a 4K video, I can go for super scaling ( 2X) to make it 8K OR In delivery tab, i can simply export as 8K. Will the results be same ? If no, what's the difference.

2. Lets say, you guys suggest that i go for Super scaling. How do i do it ? Should i select the scaling ( such as 2X) and then in the export tab, should i deliver has regular 4K or 8K ? Please let me know.


Thanks
Pritam

Let's start with the basics: which GPU do you have? There are not many to handle 8K.
I'd recommend using SuperScale or even VEAI (separate product).

Page 264-272 in the manual goes over this in detail, but the summary is:

1) Super scale is higher quality and more processor intensive, and can be done on a per-clip basis. The manual suggests this is useful for upscaling SD archival footage into a HD timeline. It also allows more adjustment on a per-clip basis with the "sharpness" and "noise reduction" parameters. Delivery scaling, by contrast, is the last step in the "sizing pipeline", and affects all clips equally and does not use the "advanced algorithms" used by Super Scale.

2) The general workflow would be: open a new project and set the timeline resolution to your desired output. It sounds like that's 8K (7680 × 4320). Then import your clips into the media pool, and edit their clip attributes to use Super Scaling such that their new resolution is equal to or greater than 7680 × 4320. Drop those bad boys into your 8K timeline, edit as normal, and then in the delivery tab make sure your output resolution is also 7680 × 4320. The idea here is to make sure that the clips get upscaled first, and then from then on it's a "pure" 8K edit so all of your titles, effects, etc are all native to 8K and no further upscaling is required.

Be warned: this will require a VERY powerful computer. 8K video editing generally expects 16+ GB of VRAM in your graphics card, and 32GB of system memory minimum. And of course powerful processors and large storage pools.

What's the difference between super scaling the clip vs exporting to a higher resolution?

The algorithm, and hence, the results.

SuperScale is better.

Let's start with the basics: which GPU do you have? There are not many to handle 8K.
I'd recommend using SuperScale or even VEAI (separate product).

HI Uli,

Here are my system specs

Operating System : Windows 10 Pro,

Processor (AMD RYZEN Threadripper 3rd Gen)
24-Core 3.80 GHz AMD RYZEN Threadripper 3960X 3rd Gen with Overclocking Stage #2 +400 MHz (up to + 10% performance)

Memory (DDR4 3200 MHz) " 128 GB (4 x 32 GB)

Graphics Card #1 : NVIDIA RTX 3090 24 GB

500 GB PCI-E NVMe SSD : For OS and DR

500 GB PCI-E NVMe SSD : For DR cache files and video files.

HDD : 2 TB PCI-E NVMe SSD : For additional storge

HDD : 8 TB HDD : For archives


With this , i am hoping that i should not have problem editing Raw 8K or SuperScaled 8K.

Thanks
Pritam

You should edit with super scale turned off as I don’t see a point of having it on for editing part. Turn it just before 8K export.
Overall I really don’t see a point of upscaling 4K into 8K. If you have 8K TV then you may let it upscale 4K into panel native resolution. I doubt you will see much of a real difference in normal viewing conditions.
Such a upscaling makes sense if you have eg 80% of desired resolution source and just small portion of lower resolution ( archive footage etc.). Those upscales on whole masters are typically waste of time and effort. You also simply lie about real nature if your final master. Another thing is that if you have 4K out of prosumer camera, which is already over-sharpenned and not “real 4K” then your upscale only boost all imperfections and creates poor end result.

What's the difference between super scaling the clip vs exporting to a higher resolution?

The algorithm, and hence, the results.

SuperScale is better.

Great, Thx Jim

Thanks
Pritam Kumar

You should edit with super scale turned off as I don’t see a point of having it on for editing part. Turn it just before 8K export.
Overall I really don’t see a point of upscaling 4K into 8K. If you have 8K TV then you may let it upscale 4K into panel native resolution. I doubt you will see much of a real difference in normal viewing conditions.
Such a upscaling makes sense if you have eg 80% of desired resolution source and just small portion of lower resolution ( archive footage etc.). Those upscales on whole masters are typically waste of time and effort.

Valid point Andrew, "Why do i need to super scale ? if i don't have the 8K device to Njoy " , But i am trying to explore if i can pull out the extra bit of clarity. As a matter of fact, al though my subject says 4k to 8K, i might sometimes do 1080p to 4K. I just want to understand the correct way and the workflow steps. If i understand for 4K to 8K, I can apply that to anything.

My perfect use case for 1080p to 4K is , slow mo. Lets say i am shooting B roll. Rest of the shots are all 4k, except the slow mo shots are 1080p. I want to up scale those 1080p to 4K so that slow mo shots are not odd man out.


Thanks
Pritam Kumar

2) The general workflow would be: open a new project and set the timeline resolution to your desired output. It sounds like that's 8K (7680 × 4320). Then import your clips into the media pool, and edit their clip attributes to use Super Scaling such that their new resolution is equal to or greater than 7680 × 4320. Drop those bad boys into your 8K timeline, edit as normal, and then in the delivery tab make sure your output resolution is also 7680 × 4320. The idea here is to make sure that the clips get upscaled first, and then from then on it's a "pure" 8K edit so all of your titles, effects, etc are all native to 8K and no further upscaling is required.

Thanks Sturmen, for the details, I will follow the workflow as suggested. Some additional questions on the workflow,
> If i am doing other stuff such as Color grading, Neat Video Noise Reduction, Stabilization etc, at what point should i do the super scale ? Should SuperScaling be the last step ?
> I do a lot of drone stuff. On delivery tab, i am left with only one option H.264. To get 8K output, should i be using a better codec for youtube or personal viewing ? What's the best codec for Dji Mavic 2 pro and how to set it up ?


Some other fundamentals questions I am always confused on, and may be this is the right time to ask, is
> If the Timeline resolution is lower than the raw video resolution, does that affect the final output ?
> If the Timeline resolutions is higher than the raw video resolution, does that make the final output any better ?

Thanks Again
Pritam Kumar

Any upscale is only ‘20% as good’ as native master.
Resolution is not all and even same resolution masters can look day and night when it comes to final look. All down to sensor which it was shot on and also math behind RAW to debayered image process. Arri seems to be the best in it. Even their original 3.2K sensor produces ‘sharp’ masters with real details which look as good as masters from much higher resolution sensors. BM is also recently trying to go more into organic rather than artificially sharp look.

Rule is simple. Your source files should be at least the same (or higher) resolution compared to final master. Any upscale is compromise and it will never look the same as native resolution. If you deliver to some standard then choice of your final resolution is limited: SD, HD, UHD etc. If you create web/masters for your archive then you may use some custom resolutions depending on your source files.
As I said before. If you have HD sources then creating UHD final master is for me waste of time and effort. If you have UHD sources with some HD slowmo then it does make sense to create final UHD master. Sometimes it also makes sense to create eg 3K master out of UHD source, specially when you need to stabilise your footage. Loos of resolution in such a case can be less important than gains thanks to reframing, stabilisation, etc.
Hardly ever we end up with higher resolution than source files. Rule is rather opposite.

> If i am doing other stuff such as Color grading, Neat Video Noise Reduction, Stabilization etc, at what point should i do the super scale ? Should SuperScaling be the last step ?
> I do a lot of drone stuff. On delivery tab, i am left with only one option H.264. To get 8K output, should i be using a better codec for youtube or personal viewing ? What's the best codec for Dji Mavic 2 pro and how to set it up ?
Thanks Again
Pritam Kumar

Try UHD source with grading, Neat video noise reduction, stabilisation and super scale within 8K timeline I doubt even your very good GPU will be near handling it. You will quickly start turning off things which are not needed for given part of the editing process. If you just edit then you don't need 8K timeline, nor noise reduction nor super scale. When you start giving final look then you start turning on things and switching timeline to desired resolution. SuperScale should be last thing (after de-noise etc.). You don't want to upscale noise and then try to remove it SuperScale should be turned on on export stage, not per clip on input, but I'm not sure if Resolve allows for it.

Really waste of time going to 8K if your main source comes from Dji Mavic 2.

Who are you delivering 8K to? I don't know of any service or channel in the world using 8K yet.

You should edit with super scale turned off as I don’t see a point of having it on for editing part. Turn it just before 8K export.
Overall I really don’t see a point of upscaling 4K into 8K. If you have 8K TV then you may let it upscale 4K into panel native resolution. I doubt you will see much of a real difference in normal viewing conditions.
Such a upscaling makes sense if you have eg 80% of desired resolution source and just small portion of lower resolution ( archive footage etc.). Those upscales on whole masters are typically waste of time and effort. You also simply lie about real nature if your final master. Another thing is that if you have 4K out of prosumer camera, which is already over-sharpenned and not “real 4K” then your upscale only boost all imperfections and creates poor end result.

I’m with Andrew on this one: if you cannot see, you are wasting your time and at home you will see compression waaaaaaayyyyy before you see a pixel.

So, while super scale might yield a slightly better image than a normal “sharper”, you will be challenged to see in a 80inch TV at 3 meters of distance if you play UNCOMPRESSED.

So, my recommendation is to keep it simple: in the resize filters in the image scaling you have now [custom] filters: use the [Lanczos] one that has a very good sharpen algorithm and go to town.

the slow mo shots are 1080p. I want to up scale those 1080p to 4K so that slow mo shots are not odd man out.

I've done that. SuperScale works quite well.

Thanks all of you for such prompt response.

What i gather is this -->
> It's not worth upscaling to 8k. Too much effort is not worth the return.
> If at all i plan to upscale 1080 slowmo to 4K, i would follow the super-scaling as the last step, just before export.
> While i agree to "Andrew" on the fact that, "Native resolution from a great sensor is always the best", I don't have a camera that produces 4k slowmo. So, i will give "1080 to 4K" super-scale a try.


Thanks
Pritam Kumar

No problem upscaling 20% of source files.