<p>If this is no raw material, there is no additional pixel information to balance your colors and achieve a natural look. Only chance you have is to denoise your video and desaturate the colors. Try to find a good relationship between brightness and noise to get an acceptable result.</p>

<p>Unfortunately there is no good, free, build-in or open source solution at the moment. Denoising a video requires very complex algorithms, not only because every camera produces different noise types. Currently best approach are <a href="http://cs.haifa.ac.il/hagit/courses/seminars/wavelets/Presentations/Lecture09_Denoising.pdf" rel="nofollow">wavelet algorithms</a>, but there are only 2 tools which use it:</p>

<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.neatvideo.com/" rel="nofollow">Neat Video</a></li>
<li><a href="https://vimeo.com/26571727" rel="nofollow">Nuke's Denoiser</a></li>
</ul>

<p>Note: In my experience Neat Video does a very good job and in some cases you are able to denoise the video twice without getting an <em>over blurred image</em>. </p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-09T21:46:39.947Z
2015-04-09T21:46:39.947Z
p2or
<p>I recently was at friends birthday with a few musical performances and this friend asked me to film the event. Unfortunately, it was really badly lit (I did notice it, but I couldn't do anything about it). So I had a bad feeling, but I shot as much footage as I could anyway. So, this is how it turned out:</p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/Ilghj.jpg" alt="original still"></p>

<p>With a luma curve adjustment, raised saturation and an orange-ish color-grading, it looks like this:</p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/60f7U.jpg" alt="still with corrections"></p>

<p>If I lighten it up even more, it becomes even more grainy. Also, the missing color informations become more obvious: </p>

<p><img src="https://i.sstatic.net/xPqev.jpg" alt="still with corrections, lighter"></p>

<p>So, my question; should I rather sacrifice some visibility so that it looks not totally grainy (2nd picture) or lighten it up even more at the cost of strange-looking colors and very grainy scenes (3rd picture)? And, using either variant as a starting point, how could I further increase the quality of the result? Especially bring more color into it while maintaining a natural look and reduce the noise. I'm working with Premiere Pro CC. I've tried the <em>remove grain</em> effect in After Effects, but that didn't yield great results (I'm not sure if I got the settings right though, I'll try it again later). I also found the <a href="http://www.neatvideo.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Neat Video</a> Plugin for PP and AE, but I'm not making any money from this, so I'm not so keen on spending money on it ...</p>

<p><strong>Edit:</strong> As requested, here are some <a href="https://www.dropbox.com/sh/7q73qgz5e013r0u/AAApYTMX0Kc7FAzMoN_SK4Yka?dl=1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">uncompressed stills</a> (directly exported frames from Premiere). I've decided to go with the 'middle ground' option (uncompressed_graded.bmp).</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-10T04:28:14.607Z
Honestly, when it comes to indoor musical performances, grain is the norm. Any performance shot in a bar or club tends to be grainy, which gives it that rock and roll look! :-)
user1118321
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-10T11:21:09.770Z
Could you please add an uncrompressed image (maybe with a link) to your question? I would like to give you a preview...
p2or
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-10T11:26:55.580Z
That would be great! I'll upload some once I get to my Computer ... @user111 well, yeah ... I hope my friend shares this view °v°
MoritzLost
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-10T11:49:55.710Z
@poor I added the uncompressed stills!
MoritzLost
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-10T13:32:10.427Z
I'm not sure tbh ... a CyberShot something, maybe? It wasn't my camera, but that of a friend of my friend ... the recording was pretty spontaneous too ... sorry I know this sounds awful, but it was a birthday party, not a recording session after all ... It was a photo camera with a video recording mode ... not top notch, that's for sure.
MoritzLost
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-11T08:56:05.100Z
Just an idea if you're getting  too much trouble with the colors: What about complete black and white? From my expierience noise on  black and white images looks better...
Max
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-11T11:28:48.063Z
@Stoyno I've already suggested to desaturate in my answer.
p2or
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-11T11:57:00.797Z
@poor I marked your answer as accepted. I guess there's really not much I can do about this footage ... so from your last question I gather that even the Neat Video plugin wouldn't be of much help for this footage?
MoritzLost
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-11T12:36:09.847Z
@Gin-San Thanks - there is no other method. Yesterday i've tried 1 hour to repair it and couldn't finish my tests. At the moment I don't have access to a workstation, will continue testing as soon as I can. BUT as I said **the footage is not only noisy, it contains a lot of compression errors and bad pixels**, this often results in big pink squares or random withe pixels, which are probably will floating over the whole video, especially the black areas, will flicker. **In general Denoising works, when you denoise first**, but there is no opportunity to make it brighter, without getting erros.
p2or
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-04-11T13:50:59.143Z
Hm ok, thanks. Don't put too much work into that - I'll try to repair it as good as possible and take it as another reminder of how important a good lightning setup is °ω°
MoritzLost
<premiere><color-correction><post-production><noise-reduction>
How to deal with this heavily underexposed footage
MoritzLost
# How to deal with this heavily underexposed footage

(Asked by: username_0 on 2015-04-09)

I recently was at friends birthday with a few musical performances and this friend asked me to film the event. Unfortunately, it was really badly lit (I did notice it, but I couldn't do anything about it). So I had a bad feeling, but I shot as much footage as I could anyway. So, this is how it turned out:

![original still](https://i.sstatic.net/Ilghj.jpg)

With a luma curve adjustment, raised saturation and an orange-ish color-grading, it looks like this:

![still with corrections](https://i.sstatic.net/60f7U.jpg)

If I lighten it up even more, it becomes even more grainy. Also, the missing color informations become more obvious:

![still with corrections, lighter](https://i.sstatic.net/xPqev.jpg)

So, my question; should I rather sacrifice some visibility so that it looks not totally grainy (2nd picture) or lighten it up even more at the cost of strange-looking colors and very grainy scenes (3rd picture)? And, using either variant as a starting point, how could I further increase the quality of the result? Especially bring more color into it while maintaining a natural look and reduce the noise. I'm working with Premiere Pro CC. I've tried the *remove grain* effect in After Effects, but that didn't yield great results (I'm not sure if I got the settings right though, I'll try it again later). I also found the [Neat Video](http://www.neatvideo.com/) Plugin for PP and AE, but I'm not making any money from this, so I'm not so keen on spending money on it ...

**Edit:** As requested, here are some [uncompressed stills](https://www.dropbox.com/sh/7q73qgz5e013r0u/AAApYTMX0Kc7FAzMoN_SK4Yka?dl=1) (directly exported frames from Premiere). I've decided to go with the 'middle ground' option (uncompressed\_graded.bmp).

**Tags:** premiere, color-correction, post-production, noise-reduction

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: Honestly, when it comes to indoor musical performances, grain is the norm. Any performance shot in a bar or club tends to be grainy, which gives it that rock and roll look! :-)  
> **username_2**: Could you please add an uncrompressed image (maybe with a link) to your question? I would like to give you a preview...  
> **username_0**: That would be great! I'll upload some once I get to my Computer ... @user111 well, yeah ... I hope my friend shares this view °v°  
> **username_0**: @poor I added the uncompressed stills!  
> **username_0**: I'm not sure tbh ... a CyberShot something, maybe? It wasn't my camera, but that of a friend of my friend ... the recording was pretty spontaneous too ... sorry I know this sounds awful, but it was a birthday party, not a recording session after all ... It was a photo camera with a video recording mode ... not top notch, that's for sure.  
> **username_3**: Just an idea if you're getting  too much trouble with the colors: What about complete black and white? From my expierience noise on  black and white images looks better...  
> **username_2**: @Stoyno I've already suggested to desaturate in my answer.  
> **username_0**: @poor I marked your answer as accepted. I guess there's really not much I can do about this footage ... so from your last question I gather that even the Neat Video plugin wouldn't be of much help for this footage?  
> **username_2**: @Gin-San Thanks - there is no other method. Yesterday i've tried 1 hour to repair it and couldn't finish my tests. At the moment I don't have access to a workstation, will continue testing as soon as I can. BUT as I said **the footage is not only noisy, it contains a lot of compression errors and bad pixels**, this often results in big pink squares or random withe pixels, which are probably will floating over the whole video, especially the black areas, will flicker. **In general Denoising works, when you denoise first**, but there is no opportunity to make it brighter, without getting erros.  
> **username_0**: Hm ok, thanks. Don't put too much work into that - I'll try to repair it as good as possible and take it as another reminder of how important a good lightning setup is °ω°  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2015-04-09. Score: 1 | Accepted answer

If this is no raw material, there is no additional pixel information to balance your colors and achieve a natural look. Only chance you have is to denoise your video and desaturate the colors. Try to find a good relationship between brightness and noise to get an acceptable result.

Unfortunately there is no good, free, build-in or open source solution at the moment. Denoising a video requires very complex algorithms, not only because every camera produces different noise types. Currently best approach are [wavelet algorithms](http://cs.haifa.ac.il/hagit/courses/seminars/wavelets/Presentations/Lecture09_Denoising.pdf), but there are only 2 tools which use it:

* [Neat Video](http://www.neatvideo.com/)
* [Nuke's Denoiser](https://vimeo.com/26571727)

Note: In my experience Neat Video does a very good job and in some cases you are able to denoise the video twice without getting an *over blurred image*.


---

