How To Improve Video Quality: Use 8 Methods To Enhance Footage Without Reshoting

Have you captured a perfect moment on your camera, but it turns out that the quality of your video is really poor? The shot came out dark, fuzzy, or full of grain. You can't go back and film it again because the moment has passed.

The good news is bad footage doesn't have to stay that way. In this guide, we'll explore how to improve video quality without any reshooting involved so that you can convert the existing video into something impressive.

Part 1. What Makes a Video Low Quality After Reshooting?

Below are some of the most common reasons why your video quality is poor after capturing:

Blurry or Out-of-Focus Shots

Your video might look blurry when the camera struggles to focus correctly. This lack of sharpness makes it hard to see important details, and viewers often lose interest when they can't make out what's happening on screen.

Grain or Noise

Video quality suffers when footage turns grainy or noisy. Think of this as static covering your video-it blocks out fine details and makes your work look amateur instead of professional.

Poorly Balanced Colors

Colors that look off can ruin your video quality. If skin tones appear unnatural or the overall palette seems wrong, it breaks the mood you're trying to create and pulls viewers out of the experience.

Shaky Footage

Nobody enjoys watching shaky videos. When the camera bounces around too much, viewers might even feel a bit queasy. More importantly, unsteady shots make your work seem unprofessional.

Motion Blur

Fast action sequences in your video are sometimes captured as streaks rather than being clear and sharp. In this case, you lose the impact of important moments in the frames because someone who's watching your video can't see exactly what's taking place.

Compression Artifacts

Heavy video compression often creates ugly blocks and pixels in your captured video. These digital artifacts make it look cheap and degrade the viewing experience significantly.

Frame Interpolation Issues

Problems with frame interpolation can make the movement look strange or create ghost-like effects. This happens when your editing software tries to smooth out motion by adding new frames and fails, resulting in jarring transitions that catch the viewer's eye in all the wrong ways.

Part 2. How To Improve Video Quality Without Reshooting It? 8 Methods

Post-production techniques can improve the quality of your existing video without reshooting. This saves you time and resources, and you still get a professional result. Editing software like Adobe Audition, iZotope RX, Divinci Resolve, and others have all the basic tools to get this done. You just need to master them a bit.

Here are 8 ways to do so:

1. Improve Video Sharpness

Your first step in improving your video quality is to sharpen it correctly. This is where a filter like an unsharp mask in editing software can help you greatly. This filter increases contrast around edges without creating fake-looking results. Set your initial values modestly - keep the radius between 1-2 pixels and strength at 50-100%. Look closely at detailed areas like text, faces, and buildings - these need the most attention.

To get precise results, split your adjustments into layers and use masks to target specific areas while protecting the sharp parts. Don't go overboard with sharpening, though, or you'll end up with bright halos and extra noise. Create masks for problem areas like skin blemishes, smooth skies, and blurred backgrounds since sharpening these will only add unwanted texture.

When you work with compressed video, focus your sharpening on the midtones to avoid making compression artifacts worse. Try different sharpening levels for subjects in front versus backgrounds. If working with 4K footage that will be delivered in 1080p, consider sharpening after downscaling to preserve natural detail.

2. Reduce Grain and Noise

If there is unwanted noise and grain in your video, you can tackle that through targeted reduction techniques.

Start by looking at what type of noise you're dealing with - it could be digital noise from shooting in low light or film grain from older video. Begin your cleanup with the brightest noise first before moving on to color specks. Use a side-by-side view to check your work - you want to remove noise without losing important details. For tricky shots, try cleaning up different parts of the image separately.

Dark areas usually need more work than bright spots, but be careful not to make things look artificially smooth. If your scene has mixed lighting, adjust your cleaning strength based on how bright each area is.

When you're working with moving subjects, clean up frame by frame, but watch out for any smearing. Test your settings on the hardest frames first - usually the dark scenes with lots of movement. Remember, a bit of grain can actually look good - don't try to make everything perfectly clean.

3. Correct Colors and Improve Lighting

Getting your colors right in your poor-quality video starts with fixing the basics. For this, you need to learn to read video scopes to nail those blacks and whites. Use them to check exposure and white balance because they're more reliable than your eyes.

When you're fixing dark footage, carefully brighten the shadows while keeping an eye on noise levels. Utilize the curves to keep the contrast looking natural. Don't rely on basic sliders for color temperature fixes. Instead, adjust your red, green, and blue levels separately for better control.

You can target specific areas in your video for separate adjustments. If your scene has different colored lights, use windowing to fix each area on its own. This way, you can boost colors that need to pop while toning down problem bits.

It's also a good idea to keep an eye on your vectorscope for natural results. For example, if you're working on skin tones, a subtle darkening around the edges can add depth and draw attention where you want it.

4. Stabilize Shaky Video

The video editing tools offer multiple ways to fix shakes. Point tracking, which follows specific features throughout the clip, and warp stabilizer, which analyzes the entire frame. Begin with automatic stabilization, then fine-tune parameters like smoothness and crop margin to balance stability against frame loss.

In extreme cases, use multi-point tracking to maintain natural camera motion while removing unwanted shakes. The secret to natural-looking stabilization is preserving intentional camera movements while fixing the wobbles.

When stabilizing footage with moving subjects, place tracking points on stable background elements. For scenes with parallax, use planar tracking to account for perspective changes. Watch for warping artifacts near frame edges and adjust boundaries accordingly. Consider the trade-off between stability and crop factor - stronger stabilization requires more frame cropping. For extremely shaky footage, combine stabilization with slight slow motion to smooth out the remaining jitters.

5. Enhance Audio to Match Video Improvements

Now, let's make your audio sound as good as your video looks. First, clean up any background noise, hum, or room echo that's getting in the way. Shape your sound with EQ to make voices crystal clear - boost around 2-4kHz and cut out problem frequencies.

For dialogue, focus on the 100-400Hz range to clear up muddy sound, and carefully handle frequencies near 1kHz to control harshness. Use compression to balance your loud and quiet parts for consistent volume. If you're dealing with complex audio, try compressing different frequency ranges separately.

Set up your gain levels properly to avoid distortion while keeping your signal strong. If you've recorded new dialogue to match older footage, add a touch of reverb to make it blend in. Target specific problem frequencies when cleaning up the noise to protect the sound you want to keep.

Quick Tip: When mixing music and background sounds, make sure they support your dialogue instead of fighting with it.

6. Upscale Video Resolution

You can also upscale video resolution to improve the quality, but you need to think about how much you want to scale. Going from 1080p to 4K is more feasible than extreme upscaling from 480p. Work on your video in chunks so you can check the quality as you go, and watch the edges and textures closely during the upscaling process. If you've got text or graphics in your shot, you'll need extra detail enhancement to keep them readable.

For old footage, sort out any interlacing issues before you start upscaling. Look out for any artificial smoothing, especially in detailed or textured areas. Add some targeted sharpening after upscaling to bring back natural detail.

If your original video has film grain, try to keep that texture. For best results, combine your upscaling with subtle sharpening and noise cleanup to get a natural look.

7. Use Frame Interpolation

Want smoother motion in your video to enhance it? Frame interpolation creates new frames between your existing ones. This works great for slow motion or converting 24fps footage to higher frame rates. The process analyzes movement to generate the in-between frames.

But you do need to identify common problems like objects appearing twice or warping, especially with fast movement. For shots with complex motion, mask out tricky areas like quick hand movements or facial expressions.

Be extra careful with shots that have camera flashes or sudden light changes - these can cause problems.

Also, think about whether smoother motion fits your story - sometimes, that film-like feel works better. Start with gentle settings to avoid artifacts, especially around fast movement or complex scenes. For slow-motion effects, combine frame interpolation with time remapping for more natural results.

8. Export and Save Your Video Correctly

Your final step is saving your video without losing quality. Choose your codec based on delivery requirements - H.264 for web delivery, ProRes for professional workflows, or DNxHR for broadcast. Set your bitrates right - for H.264, use two-pass encoding with 15-20 Mbps for 1080p and 35-45 Mbps for 4K.

Use the High profile in H.264 for better quality and efficiency. Set your keyframes to appear every 2-3 seconds for smooth streaming. Variable bitrate encoding helps balance file size and quality in complex scenes. For HDR content, double-check your color and transfer settings. Match your export size and frame rate to what you need for delivery. Use the right color space settings (Rec.709 for HD, Rec.2020 for HDR) and check your pixel aspect ratio. For videos that you might need to edit later, save a lossless copy as a backup.

Part 3. Use HitPaw Online Video Enhancer To Improve Quality Without Reshooting

You may find the above 8 video improvement steps a bit technical because to use them, you need to learn complex software. However, there is an easy way out!

HitPaw Online Video Enhancer has dedicated AI models that can do each of these tasks and enhance your poorly recorded video without losing quality. Just upload your video to the online tool and use one or all of the following models to get the best outcome:

• Face Model: Improve facial details.
• General Denoise Model: Fix grain and artifacts.
• Color Enhancement Model: Add richer colors.
• Colorize Model: Tuen black-and-white videos into color versions.
• Low-Light Enhancement Model: Brighten dark videos.
• Upscale Resolution: Upscale resolution up to 8K.

Part 4. FAQs of How to Improve Video Quality

Conclusion on How to Improve Video Quality

This guide covered how to improve video quality if you don't want a reshooting. Although you need to know the basic concepts of video editing and the use of software to implement improvement techniques, you can use AI tools like HitPaw Online Video Enhancer to enhance your footage without much hassle.