Some Simple Ways to Improve Video Quality

Read time: 6 minutes

Imagine recording an important event in 4K, only to find that the whole video is blurry or grainy in appearance. It may have happened because of incorrect camera settings or environmental factors, like improper lighting or camera instability. This guide will discuss the common factors why a video turns out to be blurry and how to improve video quality without making the video quality worse.

What factors affect the video quality?

Before we begin on how to improve video quality, you need to understand the factors that impact video quality. From technical settings to environmental conditions, there are several factors that affect a video’s quality. Take a detailed look below.

• Video Resolution: One of the major factors affecting video quality is resolution. Even though HD and Ultra-HD videos (1080p & 4K) have better resolution, improper upscaling and downscaling of videos can result in pixelated or blurry videos.
• Camera’s Frame Rate and Shutter Speed: The speed at which each frame of the video is recorded and played again also influences a video’s quality. If you want smooth video playback for fast action, opt for 60fps frame rate. Similarly, opt for 24fps frame rate if standard rates work best for you.
• Heavy Compression: Data is removed from the compressed video file to reduce its size. A heavily compressed video loses fine details and in extreme cases, develops visual artifacts and distortion.
• Incomplete video transfer: If the video transfer process gets interrupted in between, the video file can get corrupted because of missing important metadata.
• Outdated graphics drivers: If our system’s graphics drivers are outdated or corrupt, then the video won’t play properly.
• Noise in video: Low light and high ISO settings can introduce noise and grain in the video. This can degrade the overall quality of video files and may even introduce digital artifacts.

Your priority should be to capture perfect footage, instead of relying on post-production tools to fix video quality issues.

How to enhance video quality?

Now that we have discussed what all factors are responsible for the video quality, let’s now discuss how to enhance the video quality.

Method 1. Reduce noise and grain

Videos shot in low lighting and with high ISO settings develop noise and grain, making the video footage appear blurry or unclear. Sometimes, grain also appears as colored dots or random speckles all over the video file. You must denoise your video file and then sharpen the video to improve its quality and make it appear cleaner. Sometimes sharpening can make the noise even more noticeable; this is why experts recommend denoising the video first.

Method 2. Upscale the low-resolution video

Upscaling a low-resolution video helps to improve the visibility of the video by increasing the resolution of the video file more than its original resolution. Commonly, users upscale their videos from 480p to 720p, 720p to 1080p, and 1080p to 4K videos. However, a thing to note is that upscaling the video file doesn’t necessarily enhance its detail.

Method 3. Use a device that suits your video resolution

For a good video experience, the device on which you are watching is important. If you are watching an action movie and the video resolution is HD or Full HD or 4K, then it is best to watch it on a Television instead of a Mobile phone or Tablet. The small size of your display device will often make you miss important details of the video even though the video quality is sufficient.

Similarly, if you are watching a video which has low resolution, it is better to watch it on your mobile or tablet instead of watching it on your Television. The big screen size and high PPI of your television set will render the video with blurred pixels.

Method 4. Lighting

One of the most critical factors that affect video quality is lighting. Proper lighting can make a world of difference in the overall quality of the video. Here are some easy tips to improve lighting:

• Position your subject in front of natural light sources like windows or doors.
• Use artificial lighting sources such as ring lights, softboxes, or lamps to illuminate the subject.
• Adjust the brightness on your camera or editing software to compensate for uneven lighting.

Method 5. Adjust brightness, exposure, and color settings

Shooting videos with incorrect brightness and exposure settings often lead to the video coming out blurry or dark. Adjusting these settings during production and post-production can make a lot of difference in the video quality. Here are some settings that can improve video quality:

• Brightness
• Exposure
• Lighting
• Saturation
• Contrast
• White balance
• Shadows and highlights

Be careful when you adjust these settings though, over-adjustment can ruin the video quality.

Method 6. Improve audio quality

Audio is an important aspect of video content. Poor audio quality can make it difficult for viewers to understand or engage with your content. Therefore, it’s important to invest in good quality microphones so that your audio is clear and crisp. You can also experiment with different microphone positions and settings to achieve the desired effect.

Method 7. Preserve video quality when uploading on social media platforms

A video can look perfect during editing but may look noticeably worse after exporting it to social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, or WhatsApp. This can happen because the encoding settings of these platforms might have unnecessarily compressed the video file.

A few important encoding settings include bitrate, resolution, frame rate, and codecs. One thing to note is that increasing the bitrate value will not restore the missing detail that was either missing from the start or was removed by compression in an earlier step.

Method 8. Check if the video is corrupt

Enhancement can only work for videos that look poor but play normally. If you notice your video freezes, appears blurry or pixelated, editing can help in this case. However, if your video file appears to have missing frames or shows black screen, then there’s a chance that your video file is actually corrupted.

If the video displays clear signs of corruption, then it’s necessary that you repair your video file with the help of a video repair software. One such utility that can fix such video file corruption issues is Kernel Video Repair. It can also fix broken and damaged videos ranging from MP4, MOV, MPEG, MJPEG, MTS, M4V, MKV, AVI, AVCHD, WEBM, ASF, WMV, FLV, DIVX, 3G2, TS, 3GP to F4V file formats.

Conclusion

We have discussed various factors impacting video quality and offered quick hacks to address them. Go through the factors that affect video quality and choose the most appropriate way to improve video quality. With these simple steps, you can drastically improve the quality of your videos and enjoy them without any disturbances. While these fixes may work for minor glitches, a corrupt video requires specialized tools to restore quality.

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