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YouTuber Denis Shiryaev has upscaled a mid-1890s classic silent short to 4K/60p modern goodness using “several neural networks.” And the result is nothing short of breathtaking.
L’arrivée d’un train en gare de La Ciotat is less than a minute long and was the work of the Lumière Brothers. It shows a steam locomotive pulling into the station at La Ciotat in southeastern France and comprises one continuous shot in real-time from the same camera position. It was filmed using a combined film camera, projector and printer invented by the film-making brothers.
Legend has it that when it was first screened, the audience was so taken aback by the sight of a huge train apparently coming straight for them, that they retreated to the back of the room in terror. Shiryaev used the online version below as the jumping off point for his enhancement attempt.
L’Arrivée d’un train à La Ciotat (Louis Lumière, 1896)
To raise the resolution up to 4K, Gigapixel AI from Topaz Labs was used. And to increase the frames per second, DAIN. Both algorithms are available online. Some sound has also been added for a little extra realism. Shiryaev says the real credit for the impressive results should go to the authors of the code.
“Credit should go to DAIN, Topaz AI, ESRGAN, Waifu2x, DeOldify, Anime 4K and other developers who are part of the worldwide ML-community and contributing to humanity by making these algorithms publicly available,” he commented.
The upscaled footage can be seen below.
[4k, 60 fps] Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat (The Lumière Brothers, 1896)
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(For the source of this, and many other equally curious articles, please visit: https://newatlas.com/good-thinking/denis-shiryaev-lumiere-ciotat-film-upscaled-4k-60p/)