Scanning D2 tape for digital transfer

[Robert Chuck]

Aloha everyone, 

I couldn't figure out where to put this, maybe someone can recommend the right category and I can repost.

Anyway, I have a question about making a digital transfer from old source media. I have a client requesting the digital transfer of a film to enable him to upload onto a streaming service. Ordinarily this would be fine, but the best available source material is from a D2 digital video tape. The target resolution is 1080p. My understanding of resolution and scaling is mainly in graphic design and print, so jumping from 486p (SD) to 1080p (Full HD) seems like a pretty significant jump. I've already attempted to up-res the file in DaVanci Resolve (free version) and unsurprisingly the image isn't that great, not terrible, but most likely not what the filmmakers intended. In addition, interlacing lines are also noticeable and deinterlacing the image just makes the image muddy and blocky.

The current plan of action is to have a transfer house rescan the D2 as a Pro Res 422, 486p with an SDI cable, and attempt to up res the file from a new scan. As a note, I have an existing file that is Pro Res 422, 486p but do not know what was used to scan it. I was told by the transfer house that this was doable even as the new scan would still be 486p. 

Is attempting to upgrade the resolution from a D2 digital tape to a 1080p digital file, without a significant loss of quality even possible? Could there be an alternate affordable process I'm missing? 

Thanks in advance to anyone that answers this. 

[Chris Burke]

It is possible to get a "descent" looking 1080p upscaled image.It all depends upon the source material.  Scanning as you mentioned above isn't quite the correct term. Scanning usually refers to the transfer of film based material into digital.  Transfer is what will be done with your D2 master. You should have the lab transfer the tape from the deck via SDI to a Terenex to be properly scaled to 1080p.

Is this a film based project? Do you have access to the film elements? I would find a way to scan the film if I could. That will give you infinitely better quality

[Robin Phillips]

I'd follow Chris's recommendation, but would also note that if you can do a 444 transfer you should. The source many not have had that much data in it, but if you're going to have to pay someone to dig out a D2 deck anyway I'd recommend getting everything out of the source that you can

[Tom Moore]

D3 is never going to look amazing scaled upto HD. Its a composite format, so your going to get all that nasty chroma noise etc...

In terms of capturing the file you are just going to need a good quality component video to SDI converter.  I'd get the post house to transfer it as a SD ProRes HQ, 4:4:4 ideally, but 4:2:2 would also be fine since component has terrible colour to start with (you won't loose anything by going 4:2:2)

I wouldn't get it upscaled to HD during the transfer, that would be expensive and there are better solutions then a  terranex or snell and Wilcox real time converter. 

As you noted scaling the image in Resolve isn't going to give amazing results because the source material is poor. 

Ideally you are going to need to us an AI up-converter like the Topaz labs one. The results can be magical, but be prepared for some very long render times. It will never look like proper HD, but if it's really well shot it might look ok....something you'd need to test.
https://www.topazlabs.com/topaz-video-ai