Quote:
Originally Posted by videopat
Exactly this. Removing grain isn't a terrible idea because grain is so great, it's a terrible idea because it completely alters the fine detail throughout the entire image. Even Cameron's proprietary DNR can't mask the unnaturally-smoothed effect it gives to faces and objects. The end result yields an image that's neither beautifully-filmic nor modern video pristine, essentially giving you the worst of both worlds.
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This is a pretty fair and succinct condemnation of excessive dnr.
Unfortunately, a fairly large number of decision-making folks in their estimation have decided that a manipulated mish-mosh is going to be more appealing to the average consumer than seeing a film in a more natural state with its inherent warts. Or weirder yet, they just don't want their film to look like a film anymore.
The one place where I will make exceptions for copious manipulation is clean-up of distracting damage, where the damage (usually existing on a negative) is so significant that it actually pulls you out of the film experience. Some smearing and moshing is to be expected in those situations around areas of more significant repair efforts, and is usually warranted. I've watched some un-repaired 4k scans where the absolutely relentless flurry of thousands of instances of specs, flecks and scratches flying by holds my attention moreso than the film content itself.
