The Latest CUDA App: MotionDSP’s vReveal

NVIDIA had more slides in its GTX 275 presentation about non-gaming applications than it did about how the 275 performed in games. One such application is MotionDSP’s vReveal - a CUDA enabled video post processing application than can clean up poorly recorded video.

The application’s interface is simple:

Import your videos (anything with a supported codec on your system pretty much) and then select enhance.

You can auto-enhance with a single click (super useful) or even go in and tweak individual sliders and settings on your own in the advanced mode.

The changes you make to the video are visible on the fly, but the real time preview is faster on a NVIDIA GPU than if you rely on the CPU alone.

When you’re all done, simply hit save to disk and the video will be re-encoded with the proper changes. The encoding process takes place entirely on the GPU but it can also work on a CPU.

First let’s look at the end results. We took three videos, one recorded using Derek’s wife’s Blackberry and two from me on a Canon HD cam (but at low res) in my office.

I relied on vReveal’s auto tune to fix the videos and I’ve posted the originals and vReveal versions on YouTube. The videos are below:

In every single instance, the resulting video looks better. While it’s not quite the technology you see in shows like 24, it does make your videos look better and it does do it pretty quickly. There’s no real support for video editing here and I’m not familiar enough with the post processing software market to say whether or not there are better alternatives, but vReveal does do what it says it does. And it uses the GPU.

Performance is also very good on even a reasonably priced GPU. It took 51 seconds for the GeForce GTX 260 to save the first test video, it took my Dell Studio XPS 435’s Core i7 920 just over 3 minutes to do the same task.

It’s a neat application. It works as advertised, but it only works on NVIDIA hardware. Will it make me want to buy a NVIDIA GPU over an ATI one? Nope. If all things are equal (price, power and gaming performance) then perhaps. But if ATI provides a better gaming experience, I don’t believe it’s compelling enough.

First, the software isn’t free - it’s an added expense. Badaboom costs $30, vReveal costs $50. It’s not the most expensive software in the world, but it’s not free.

And secondly, what happens if your next GPU isn’t from NVIDIA? While vReveal will continue to work, you no longer get GPU acceleration. A vReveal-like app written in OpenCL will work on all three vendors’ hardware, as long as they support OpenCL.

If NVIDIA really wants to take care of its customers, it can start by giving away vReveal (and Badaboom) to people who purchase these high end graphics cards. If you want to add value, don’t tell users that they should want these things, give it to them. The burden of proof is on NVIDIA to show that these CUDA enabled applications are worth supporting rather than waiting for cross-vendor OpenCL versions.

Do you feel any differently?

CUDA - Oh there’s More The Rest of the Performance Charts - Age of Conan Performance
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  • SiliconDoc - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    So he just told you why he's gettting NVidia, and the little red fanboy in you couldn't stand it. You recommend taking steps that void the warranty, but why should you care - then you blabber about a 4850, but he already noted the 260 - and finally you let the last word in you could barely bring your red rooster self to say GTS250 - as in you might as well get it.... if you have to - 'cept he was already looking above that.
    You red ragers just have to spew about your crap card to people who already seemingly decided they don't want it. Why is that ?
    You gonna offer him red cuda, red physx, red vreveal, red badaboom, red forced game profiles, red forced dual gpu ? ANY OF THAT ?
    NO -
    you tell him to HACK a red piece of crap to make it reasonable. LOL
    What a shame.
    Hey, maybe he can hack the buzzing fan on it , too ?
  • helldrell666 - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    What the hell are you talking about?
    Im not a fan boy of any of those big companies that don't give a shit about me.
    I have used both nvidia and ATI, and both produce great graphics cards.

    I had a 8800gtx before my current 4870, and i had and athlon x2 6400+ before my current core i7 920.I go with whoever has the product with the best price.

  • SiliconDoc - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    No, you are a fanboy and you are exposed. Deal with it.
  • helldrell666 - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    It's you, who the fanboy is.You're trying hard to show the advantages of nvidia cards over the ATI cards, and guess what, you fail.

    And i don't give a rat ass about CUDA.Im a gamer, and what matters to me is the card's gaming performance and the features that enhance my my gaming experience "which is what 99.9% of who buy those cards care for", Like physx, which is a true con for nvidia cards.But physx isn't supported on most games, and the physx effects that nvidia is trying to promote can be easily processed on a decent sub 300$ cpu by enahncing the on cpu physx performance via a driver/software that could utilize all cpu cores and utiliz the cpu processing power in a better way.

    Ohh wait.ATI has DX10.1 and tessellation which nvidia doesn't have, and thanks to your nvidia, we didn't get much games that support
    DX10.1, and we didn't get any game that supports tessellation which is a geometry accelerating technique that can accelerate geometry processing by up to 4 times using the same amount of floating points aka. processing power.If tessellation, which is included in ATI cards APIs since the Hd2000 series days, was used in those demanding games like crysis and stalker, we would've been able to play them using sub 300$ graphics solutions.Put aside the DX10.1 features like the aa enhancement.....and the GRS color detector that allows the gpu to use more accurate color degree for a texel using a more advanced texturing algorithm compared to the tri/bi-linear buffering teqnique used in nvidia's illegal uncompleted DX10 API.



  • SiliconDoc - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    rofl - the long list of your imaginary hatreds against nvidia - you FREAK fanboy.
    The problem being, that just like some lying retard, you blame ati's epic failure with tessalation on who ? ROFL NVIDIA.
    Sorry bub, you're another one who is INSANE.
    You won't face what IS - you want something that isn't - wasn't - or won't be - so keep on WHINING forever, looney tuner.
    In the mean time, nvidia users outnumber you, enjoy the large amount of added benefits, and don't have a 2 billion dollar loss hanging over their heads - with a company that might collapse in bankruptcy - and lose support of the already problematci drivers.
    You bought the wrong thing, now you have a hundred could be would be if and an's and garbage can complaints that have nothing to do with reality and how it actually is.
    Fantasy red rooster fanboy.
    LOL - it's amazing.
  • helldrell666 - Tuesday, April 7, 2009 - link

    Freak fanboy......? Hatred....? Are you serious...or ....?

    I don't hate any company because i have no reason to.I blame nvidia for not allowing those few developed games companies to include those great features in these very few modern demanding games.
    Accelerating physx processing using the gpu is a great idea, but is it worth it?
    Is the cpu realy unable to keep up with the gpu in games due to it's slow physx processing ability?
    Are those primitive physx effects realy that heavy n a modern quad core cpu?
    These are questions that you should ask yourself before trolling for the idea.

    And i have to remind you that ATI has coded Havok physx effects in
    OPEN-CL programming language, which in case you don't know, is standard langauage compared to nvidia CUDA, which is based on some kind of c programming codes.

    Talking about the drivers, i haven't had problems with my 4870 on MY Vista 64bit OS, compared to my old 8800gtx that almost brought me a heart attack.

    As for your beloved nvidia, we need nvidia as much as we need AMD and INTEL to keep the competetition alive, which in its turn will keep innovations going and adjust the prices.

    Ohh... and thanx to the red camp, we can get a decent graphics card for less than 300$.so have some respect for them.

    as for you, i wonder how old you are, cuz you don't seem to have a mature logic.
  • tamalero - Monday, April 20, 2009 - link

    dont worry, this guy clearly as mental issues, a nvidia paid troll.
  • SiliconDoc - Tuesday, April 7, 2009 - link

    Yeah, sure. Just like any red rooster, you never had a problem with ati drivers, but nvidia drove you nearly to a heart attack, but I have problems with logic or detecting a red rooster fanboy blabberer ! ROFL
    Dude, you keep digging your own hole deeper.
    Then you try the immature assault - another losing proposition.
    YOU'RE WHINING about nvidia and yeah, you do blame them, and after going on like a lunatic about wanting offload to the cpu, you admit it might not work - yes I read your asinine quadcore offload blabberings, too, and your bloody ragging about nvidia "not letting" your insane fantasy occur - purportedly to advantage ati (not like you're banking on intel graphics).
    So red rooster, keep crowing, and never face the reality that is, and carry that chip for all your imiginary grievances of what should be or, what you say could have been.
    In the mean time, know you are marked, and I know who and what you are, and I'm sure you'll have further whining and wailing about what nvidia did or didn't do for ati. LOL
    roflmao
    Logic ? ROFLMAO
    " I, almost had a heart attack " said the sissy. lol " But I'm an objective person with logic ". roflmao
  • Jamahl - Monday, April 6, 2009 - link

    Wow what a stunning pile of crap i've just read.

    ATI's can fold, guess what it's downloaded via CCC.

    ATI has open source cloth physx, stream and avivo which pisses all over that trash nvidia call 'purevideo' or whatever.

    But best of all, you can ACTUALLY BUY A 4890 whereas the 275 only exists in the Nvidia fanbois tiny little green with envy minds.
  • The0ne - Tuesday, April 7, 2009 - link

    If you haven't noticed, SiliconDoc is basically ignored in all his responses. Be wise and do that same. He'll eventually kill himself :)

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