1. Select Your Layer
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Make sure that the layer you are applying the noise reduction to is selected. |
2. Click on the Effects Menu
3. Select Neat Video
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Look down your list of effects and find the Neat Video plugin. Hover over the text and select Reduce Noise from the fly out menu. |
4. Click Effect Controls
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Click on the effect controls tab at the top left (Using the standard After Effects layout). |
5. Click Options
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Find the Reduce Noise effect in the effects panel. Click the text link for options. |
6. Find a Uniform Area
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Click and drag to select an uniform area on the frame that is showing. If you cannot find a uniform area, select an area that is dark and has the most noise. You can adjust the size of the selection area during this process. |
7. Click Auto Profile
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Click the auto profile button. The software will process your video and calculate areas of noise. |
8. Quality Measurement
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Notice the quality measurement on the right side of the interface. This tells the user how well the software feels it will be able to remove the noise in your video. The target should be about 80+ percent. This is hard to achieve when the video does not have a uniform area to select. It will stil do a good job with the noise at low percentages. |
9. Click Noise Filter Settings
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Click the noise filter settings tab to adjust the output of the noise filter. |
10. Preview Toggle
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While adjusting the settings it is helpful to toggle the preview button (This temporarily removes the filter). This is helpful to see how the video is being affected by the filter. |
11. Luminance Adjustment
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The adjusts how much reduction is applied to the video based on the luminance channel. Typically 60-80% is a good number. |
12. Sharpening
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Sharpening is like image recovery. When noise reduction is applied to video with any software interpolation occurs. This means that the software guesstimates the pixels the should replace the noise based on the other pixels in the image. This causes soft edges in the video. This adjustment corrects some of that softness. Typically about 20% is the limit for sharpening due to the unrealistic look it can cause. |
13. Brightness
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Sometimes when noise reduction is added it causes the video to become darker than the orginial. This adjustment at the bottom of the interface allows the user to birighten the video back up. |
14. Apply
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Once you have the desired look for your video you can apply the noise reduction filter by clicking the apply button. This will close the options window. |
15. Continue working
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Now that you have the filter applied you can continue working on your project. If you find that your video needs more adjustment you can edit the filter by clicking on the options link in your effects panel. Please note that any filter/effect that works on a per pixel level will increase your render times. This plugin is no different. |
Neat Video Resources
Other Tutorials
- Basic Workflow
- Building A Noise Profile
- Adjusting Filter Settings
- Dust and Scratches
- Slow Shutter Mode