Oidn, dpDenoiser, and Optix. Did anyone compare them already for animations?
- Thread starter inakito
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raymondtrace
Founding member
They all work the same on animations (not well). Each of these denoisers affects the current frame without any understanding of what denoising is necessary on adjacent frames. This can result in a flicker at playback. For animation, you should seek out "temporal denoiser" solutions, often found in video editors.
You can still use these denoisers in LW if you only apply a small amount of denoising. Additional denoising can be applied in your video editor.
I personally prefer the OIDN plugin offered by Denis, because it is CPU based and offers more options than LW's native (and GPU-only) Optix process. More discussion: https://forums.newtek.com/threads/open-image-denoise-node-for-dp-filter.159322/
You can still use these denoisers in LW if you only apply a small amount of denoising. Additional denoising can be applied in your video editor.
I personally prefer the OIDN plugin offered by Denis, because it is CPU based and offers more options than LW's native (and GPU-only) Optix process. More discussion: https://forums.newtek.com/threads/open-image-denoise-node-for-dp-filter.159322/
Thomas Leitner
Member
We use both for animations too. But as raymondtrace has already mentioned, the render should not be too noisy to avoid changing artifacts.
About the differences:
Denis regularly updates his plugin to the current state of Open Image Denoise. According to the manual, Lightwave uses nVIDIA Optix 6.5 AI denoising (Yes, we already have AI in Lightwave!
). The current version is nVIDIA Optix 7.7.
nVIDIA Optix can be selected individually for each render buffer. The idea seems very good to me: you only use the denoiser where it is needed (e.g. sub surface scattering). However, it should be noted that the individual buffers must then combined in compositing.
Open Image Denoise takes into account whether you want to denoise HDR or LDR images. It has the ability to use already denoised albedo and normal buffer.
nVIDIA Optix runs on the GPU (nVIDIA of course) and is faster (dependenting on the GPU). Open Image Denoise runs on the CPU.
I don't see any big differences in speed (both don't take that long).
nVIDIA Optix also works in VPR, Open Image Denoise is an Image Filter Effect and is therefore not used in VPR.
In terms of quality, I can unfortunately not give a clear recommendation. In some cases one result seems better to me, in others it is different.
In any case, you should also consider special video denoiser tools in post-production.
ciao
Thomas
About the differences:
Denis regularly updates his plugin to the current state of Open Image Denoise. According to the manual, Lightwave uses nVIDIA Optix 6.5 AI denoising (Yes, we already have AI in Lightwave!
). The current version is nVIDIA Optix 7.7.nVIDIA Optix can be selected individually for each render buffer. The idea seems very good to me: you only use the denoiser where it is needed (e.g. sub surface scattering). However, it should be noted that the individual buffers must then combined in compositing.
Open Image Denoise takes into account whether you want to denoise HDR or LDR images. It has the ability to use already denoised albedo and normal buffer.
nVIDIA Optix runs on the GPU (nVIDIA of course) and is faster (dependenting on the GPU). Open Image Denoise runs on the CPU.
I don't see any big differences in speed (both don't take that long).
nVIDIA Optix also works in VPR, Open Image Denoise is an Image Filter Effect and is therefore not used in VPR.
In terms of quality, I can unfortunately not give a clear recommendation. In some cases one result seems better to me, in others it is different.
In any case, you should also consider special video denoiser tools in post-production.
ciao
Thomas
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Thomas Leitner
Member
A few more thoughts on the nVIDIA Optix implementation in Lightwave:
As previously mentioned, noise filtering can be activated for each render buffer individually. This also applies to the Final Render buffer.
However, it seems that this setting has no effect. Once the GPU denoiser is selected in the Render tab of the Render Properties, the Final Render buffer will be denoised no matter what setting is selected in the Buffer tab.
As a result, it is impossible only to denoise individual buffers and use them for the Final Render within Lightwave. You have to combine the buffers in compositing.
It looks as if this feature is not quite well thought out.
ciao
Thomas
As previously mentioned, noise filtering can be activated for each render buffer individually. This also applies to the Final Render buffer.
However, it seems that this setting has no effect. Once the GPU denoiser is selected in the Render tab of the Render Properties, the Final Render buffer will be denoised no matter what setting is selected in the Buffer tab.
As a result, it is impossible only to denoise individual buffers and use them for the Final Render within Lightwave. You have to combine the buffers in compositing.
It looks as if this feature is not quite well thought out.
ciao
Thomas
chunderburger
New member
I seem to recall a standalone application for denoising but can't remember what it was called.
i use OiDN + Video Denoisers
use OiDn, but use it sparingly, then, add Neat Video Denoiser
or, alternative, use Topaz Video Ai Upscale
(btw, if you use a video Denoiser, then often you can skip OiDN or such)
beware that thin lines can be problematic for Denoisers like OiDN,
it can merge thin lines (hair) by mistake.
also, images that contain too much noise can become blurred.
some people think that "i'll just make a very noisy render, then OiDN will take care of the resst"
but this is false. too much noise will make these Denoisers blur the area, or ignore the noise.
Tim Parsons
New member
Affinity Photo!
That's what I use anyway. Of course I only use it when doing stills and I use the Object and Surface buffers to selectively de-noise and the amount I want to de-noise the various regions of my render. Affinity Photo's de-noise does a really nice job. Not sure if it is driven by A.I. or not but works better than the Topaz Denoise I bought just for denoising.
Planeguy
Active member
I've tried the LW denoiser and DP's denoiser plugin, but they don't work very well for animations even if you try your best at keeping original noise down.
Erikals mentioned Neat video, and that's what I use as well, and it works wonders. Only thing is it takes a while to figure it out. Lots of trial and error until you get an image that's not only clean, but that still contains 80-90% of the original detail.
I used neat video for this animation, (GI on the space station, had tons of noise!). Not only was Neat Video able to keep details, but got rid the granular noise which was all over the surface. Took like 2 hours trying to get a profile I was happy with though:
Another animation I used neatvideo on, was on this Borg cube sequence.
The first scene, the cube borg had so much GI noise, aliasing and other artifacts (I render it out on a slow computer, and I wanted GI, Raytracing and the whole nine yards!) that the image was unusable, it was so bad. So I uploaded the image seq on neat video, and after lots of tweaking it gave me spectacular results.
Not only did NV get rid of the noise, but practically almost eliminated the aliasing and gave me a pretty solid image (considering the resolution) to work with.
Erikals mentioned Neat video, and that's what I use as well, and it works wonders. Only thing is it takes a while to figure it out. Lots of trial and error until you get an image that's not only clean, but that still contains 80-90% of the original detail.
I used neat video for this animation, (GI on the space station, had tons of noise!). Not only was Neat Video able to keep details, but got rid the granular noise which was all over the surface. Took like 2 hours trying to get a profile I was happy with though:
Another animation I used neatvideo on, was on this Borg cube sequence.
The first scene, the cube borg had so much GI noise, aliasing and other artifacts (I render it out on a slow computer, and I wanted GI, Raytracing and the whole nine yards!) that the image was unusable, it was so bad. So I uploaded the image seq on neat video, and after lots of tweaking it gave me spectacular results.
Not only did NV get rid of the noise, but practically almost eliminated the aliasing and gave me a pretty solid image (considering the resolution) to work with.
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Planeguy
Active member
I don't remember if I did. But render times were heavy already without GI. I don't know if you ever played with Marc Bell's Borg cube, but it's heavy. It's got so much detail it could be used as a rendering benchmark lol
yeah, no, haven't loaded it.
but i don't think you used interpolated Gi here,
it would have render faster and have much less flicker / splotches.
blurry reflection flicker is also a challenge, but Neat Video can fix that to a degree.
regarding, interpolated Gi,
the first video you posted might have a bit much light-flicker for Gi interpolated to do an Ok job. maybe.
Planeguy
Active member
I don't remember, but probably you're correct. I will have to check my scenes and see what settings I used for that scene. I render it out on LW2020 btw. But like I said,even without GI the cube renders very slow due to the massive poly amount. If I remember, the major problem I had was aliasing as I was dealing with fine detail on that model. I wanted fast renders about 1-2 min per frame max, so had to lower things down, but neat video did a great job cleaning up all that mess.yeah, no, haven't loaded it.
but i don't think you used interpolated Gi here,
it would have render faster and have much less flicker / splotches.
blurry reflection flicker is also a challenge, but Neat Video can fix that to a degree.
regarding, interpolated Gi,
the first video you posted might have a bit much light-flicker for Gi interpolated to do an Ok job. maybe.
Planeguy
Active member
Indeed. I'm going to try topaz video upscaler soon. I have their image upscaler, but doesn't work well for image sequences.
Rayek
Well-known member
Ah, Neat Video. That brings back memories.
Years ago I had worked on a job which required me to key green screen footage and the original footage was way too noisy for a clean matte (even though it was filmed under studio conditions, the camera operator had used less-than-ideal settings). Continuously moving fringes at the edges were the result, and it proved to be impossible to create a clean looking matte no matter what I tried.
I was under extreme pressure to finish the job, and in my moment of despair (it had to be done by next day) I discovered Neat Video. The problem was that this was a Sunday, and I emailed them early in the morning, not expecting a response.
The guy behind Neat Video, Vlad, was about to go to sleep (I am in Canada), but responded immediately, told me that he'd wait for the payment, then sent me a key, and Neat Video in After Effects did absolute wonders to the footage. All my keys were clean and crisp around the edges and I finished the job by the end of Sunday.
Best customer experience ever!
Later that week my team members were wowed by those clean mattes. Someone dealing with noise in footage ought to have Neat Video in their standard toolkit.
(just checked - this was back in 2009! Time flies...)
Years ago I had worked on a job which required me to key green screen footage and the original footage was way too noisy for a clean matte (even though it was filmed under studio conditions, the camera operator had used less-than-ideal settings). Continuously moving fringes at the edges were the result, and it proved to be impossible to create a clean looking matte no matter what I tried.
I was under extreme pressure to finish the job, and in my moment of despair (it had to be done by next day) I discovered Neat Video. The problem was that this was a Sunday, and I emailed them early in the morning, not expecting a response.
The guy behind Neat Video, Vlad, was about to go to sleep (I am in Canada), but responded immediately, told me that he'd wait for the payment, then sent me a key, and Neat Video in After Effects did absolute wonders to the footage. All my keys were clean and crisp around the edges and I finished the job by the end of Sunday.
Best customer experience ever!
Later that week my team members were wowed by those clean mattes. Someone dealing with noise in footage ought to have Neat Video in their standard toolkit.
(just checked - this was back in 2009! Time flies...)