Best Software I've found for removing grain from video!

[mark-mvs]

Hey guys...."Neat Video" silly name but the results are amazing. As you all know sometimes the receptions we shoot are in some pretty dark rooms and the video gets that grainy quality which I think really cheapens the look. In the past I did some tricks (like increasing the contrast) and I've tried some software programs that didn't really help much. Well the last wedding I shot was in a REALLY dark room. Poorly lit and it was a large sort of log cabin structure so the inside walls were dark wood which didn't reflect what little light was coming in through the one window. They didn't want me to use a lighting kit because they wanted to room to retain that dark woodsy feel. Well after shoot the video and looking at what I had, I spent a lot of time online looking for a program that could reliably take care of the grain. The reviews for Neat Video were all good so I downloaded it yesterday and used it today and it's fantastic. If you need to remove the grain, check it out. It's a life saver.

Hope 2011 is treating everyone well, and Hank how's the car business going? The videography world won't be the same with you.
Mark

[HankCastello]

Thanks for the post & for asking about the car biz.

We started off with a bang, but are in a bit of a slump now.  I'm sure things will pick up again shortly.  We've had a bunch of cars needing work and it distracted from sales.  Even with the "bad" couple of weeks though, it's going alright.  Got a great crew (added their photos to our carlot website, Grannys-Used-Cars.com).

[DavidPartington]

I've been sing Neat Video on noisy video for quite a while and it's been a life saver.   I don't need it as much now we're shooting DSLRs but with older 1/3" video cameras it could make a huge difference!

It really is worth going through the effort of making some camera profiles.  I did it for the HMC151 but haven't got around to it with the DSLRs because we haven't needed it so much.  Once the wedding season really kicks in I'm sure I'll find the need for it again because it saves a lot of time trying to find good sample areas and if you know the gain level (or ISO on the DSLRs) then you can have a pre-tuned profile ready to go.

I really can't speak highly enough of this little program, though be sure not to over use it because you can easily get plastic looking footage