Understand the Topaz Video AI user interface.

Upon opening for the first time, you are presented with a Pop-up window to import your footage.

Note: if you’ve previously opened a video, the app will automatically pull up your last file with enhancements.

There are five ways to bring files into Topaz Video AI.

Open the app and select "Browse Videos" to navigate to your file.

Click anywhere on the screen to open a file path.

Drag-and-drop files directly into the app.

Use the “File” drop down menu and select “Import”

Use a keyboard shortcut of CTRL+I (windows) or Cmd+I (mac).

Video AI supports a wide variety of video codecs and containers. For a full list of compatible input files, 

please refer to this chart for libavcodec

Supported File Formats, Containers and Encoders

In the import folder, on the lower screen right side, make sure to change from “Video Files” to “Image Sequences”.

Check that all frames are in consecutive order.

At least 5 frames must be in the sequence.

Once you’ve imported your video, you are presented with a pop-up menu overlaying the Workspace layout. Simply put, this menu is designed to allow the user to decide to immediately use an existing preset or start from scratch.

Start from Scratch: Starting with just your original file with no adjustments applied.

Start from Preset: Starting with pre-established settings and adjustments.

You can always prevent the menu popping up every time the application is started, by clicking on the “Don’t Show Again” on the lower screen left corner of this menu.

There are 9 available presets. Be sure to use the middle mouse button to scroll through the menu.

If you have a couple preferences that you use often, you can click on the star to ensure that your favorites are brought up to the top.

The video library will display the Source files you are working with. You can add or remove files at any time with ease.

Files will be displayed in the order that they are imported.

 menu unless you turn off this notification.

When working with a large batch, use the scroll bar or mouse wheel to scan through the files.

Add additional files by dragging into this panel or use the 

To remove a file, select the triple dot menu and Close Input or use the keyboard shortcut.

Reduce the menu height by dragging the top edge down.

Use the playback and video edit toolbar to control playback on previews, crop, trim, play sound and more.

 are centered below the Player. These controls manage the content playback on the Player.

” button. You could quickly get the Playhead to start at the beginning or at your established “In” position.

” button. This allows the user to go back by a single frame.

 button. Pressing the arrow button, allows the user to play the footage forward. Alternatively you can press the spacebar. When the Play button is pressed, it is immediately replaced by the Pause button. Pressing the Pause button will halt the playing video.

” button. This allows the user to move forward by a single frame.

” button. You could quickly get the Playhead to End at the final point of the video or at your established “Out” position.

 button allows the user to be able to player the video sound. By default, this is disabled with the “

 button, when selected, opens up to another menu allowing the user to crop to into their footage to change the focus of the frame. Be sure to click on the Check mark to save the current setting. Do note that any previously cached previews will be removed since there is now a new resolution.

Click and drag the the playhead to scan through the file and determine which section of the file you wish to preview.

When you move the playhead, you'll see the length of the file and specific timestamp.

Use the [ ] buttons to select the range of the input video that will be processed during exports. Keyboard shortcuts "I" and "O" can also be used to set this range.

Choose from one of the default presets near the upper screen right side of the application. Be sure to scroll down to see all available presets or add your own by clicking on the 

 button. Presets can be edited from the 

You can click on the star on the right side of the preset to bring these to the top.

This gives the user a few options that can be modify.

: You are able to rotate your video by selecting the degree number.

: select if your video is originally black and white.

: Select if your video is a result from a telecined process.

: Here you can modify how color will be treated for your video.

This informs the user with how many credits are available for their 

 with the arrow facing to the right, you can click it to collapse/hide the panel to the right. With the arrow facing to the left, if you press the button, it will expand/return the original placement of the 

Topaz Video AI offers many filters in the Controls Sidebar, that have been trained for specific use cases.

User Interface

Learn how to import, preview, and export. 

There are two ways to bring file(s) into the app. 

Open the app and select Browse. From here, select the video files.

Drag and drop files directly into the app.

Video AI supports a wide variety of video codecs and containers. For a full list of compatible input files, 

Import image sequences using the same steps listed above. 

When using an image sequence make sure that:

The "Video In" menu will display the input file's resolution, aspect ratio, and frame rate.

The "Video Out" menu will allow you to alter the output file's resolution and frame rate.

If you are using a video file with a square aspect ratio an intermediate menu option will allow you to keep the original pixel type or square pixels.

Use the toggle switch to enable filter(s). We recommend using one to two per file.

The Output Settings menu allows you to alter the export encoder, container, and audio settings.

To generate a preview, select the resolution, filters, and output settings and press the 

You can select up to 15 seconds to preview and you can adjust the view and zoom to inspect the results.

You can generate as many previews as you need. 

The progress of each preview will be shown in the Output library. 

A purple progress bar and an ETA will appear for each file. 

Once the preview is ready, you will see a green checkmark.

To view the Preview using your default video player, double-click on the preview or use the triple dot menu to open an external player.

Once you have inspected the preview, you are ready to export. 

By default, the exported file will be saved to the input file's location. 

 if you wish to change the save location. As a note, 

In Video AI v5, exports can be paused and resumed even after closing the app or rebooting your system. 

Paused exports will be saved in multiple segments and joined together once processing completes. 

The following settings must be enabled in Preferences -> Export for pause/resume to be available in the app menu: 

Importing, Previewing & Exporting

Choose a premade preset or make your own. Learn the use case for each Preset, and how to create, modify and delete Presets. 

Open Topaz Video AI and locate the Preset filter at the top right-hand corner of the app. 

After choosing a Preset, you can continue to add or change the model selection. 

 from the dropdown menu or select the filters you wish to combine and then select 

 to slow down the playback speed of your file.

For speed changes above 4x, we recommend using Apollo. 

This will reduce the output resolution, however, this setting is recommended for most stabilization needs. 

We recommend using this model when altering the frame rate of files that are not in slow motion. 

 model to deinterlace and upscale your interlaced file.  By default, 

The output frame rate will be doubled. If you wish to retain the original frame rate or change it, select the desired frame rate from the 

 to upscale to a resolution of 4K (3840x2160). 

You can change the Enhancement model to reflect your unique use case. 

 to upscale to a resolution of 4K (3840x2160) and set the frame rate to 60 FPS.

 to upscale to a resolution of HD (1920x1080). 

1. Select the preset you wish to edit. 
2. Select Edit to 

Presets

You can quickly set In and Out points, trim clips in the Timeline, crop, and more.

To trim, use the [ ] buttons on the left side of the app's timeline. 

The in-point in the sequence where the clip begins and the out-point in the sequence where the clip ends. 

If at any point you wish to alter the trim selection, press 

To set the trim by frame number, select frame number instead of timecode in the 

Allows for more precise control over the range of the selected video. 

This setting will also change the length of Previews in Video AI to be displayed in frames instead of seconds.

To crop, locate the crop tool which is denoted by a crop icon on the upper right-hand side of the Timeline. 

Choose an aspect ratio or set a custom height/ width/ x/ y axis or use the crop handles to adjust the selection. 

Trim and Crop 

There is an ever growing list of accepted video files that can be imported into the Topaz Video AI software. These currently include:

This is the list of accepted images sequence files that can be imported into Video AI. When importing image sequences, the app requires a minimum of 5 frames that must be in consecutive order within the same folder. The image file types include:

Topaz AI can read 16-bit and 32-bit RGBA EXR frames. To process EXR data, Video AI will create temporary 16-bit .tiff files -- 32-bit EXR will not retain full color information when imported.

Learn about the different encoders and containers that Topaz Video AI offers.

Choose from Topaz Video AI's 14 encoders.

QuickTime V210 Uncompressed YUV 10-bit 4:2:2

QuickTime Animation Run-length compressed RGB 8-bit

The following Codec and File Types support Alpha Output within Topaz Video AI.

Please note that Interpolation, Stabilization and Motion Deblur will remove the alpha channel.

Some encoding options include a Dynamic mode, which will adapt the bitrate of the output video to match the visual complexity of the scene being processed.

When available, most users should try the High or Medium setting for Dynamic mode before trying some of the constant bitrate settings.

Changing the encoder selection converts information from one format to another for standardization, speed, and/or compression.

*Please note, though there are some encoders that have incredibly large maximum resolutions, Topaz Video AI is limited to 16K. Resolutions over 15360 × 8640 may not run with default settings in Video AI -- if you are working on a project that requires over 16K output resolution, 

 for details on possible custom builds that surpass this limit. 

Apple ProRes codecs take advantage of multicore processing and feature fast, reduced-resolution decoding modes. These codecs are intended for use with editing software and create large output files, especially with high-resolution videos.

The lowest-bitrate variation of the ProRes codec, intended for use in editing software as a smaller version of larger files like ProRes HQ.

Great for environments where storage capacity and data rate are limited.

Highly compressed with roughly 70 percent of the data rate and 30 percent smaller file sizes.

The original implementation of the ProRes codec, and the standard conversion format for Final Cut Pro X

Supported File Formats, Encoders and Containers

Topaz Video AI allows you to customize various settings that can improve performance and the overall user experience.

This category holds everything you need to adjust your preferences for the front end of the Topaz Video AI software. This section controls the preview experience, processing speed display, default preset, and the collection of anonymous data.

The Application Category is broken down into 5 subcategories:

Select the default view mode when initiating a preview task.

Single will display the entire processed clip in the preview area, and will show the unprocessed input when holding the left mouse button.

Side by Side will display the unprocessed clip in the left half of the preview area and the processed clip in the right half of the preview area.

Split will display both the unprocessed and processed clips in the preview area and split them with a vertical bar that can be dragged left to display more of the processed video and dragged right to display more of the unprocessed video.

Select the default Control mode of either “Dynamic” or “Constant” and the corresponding quality level/bitrate.

Please note, larger bitrate values will result in a larger file size of the exported video file.

By default Audio is set to “Copy”. You have a few choices when dealing with audio from your video. Choose between copy, convert, or none.

We recommend leaving the audio mode set to the default selection of "copy" for most cases. Use "convert" when necessary for a certain output format. Selecting "none" will remove the audio stream.

If it is necessary to choose "convert" when "copy" is selected, the app will notify you.

Choose the default file format for exported video files. 

This is the folder where all exported files will be saved. The input folder 

 is the default location for exported files.

To alter the selection, click on the folder icon.

When enabled, you can preview the completed frames of the output while it is being processed via an external player opening the temporary file. Note that this will require 2x the storage space as a previewable temporary file is being generated.

This clears the temporary previewable file once the rendering process is completed.

This setting determines where the preview files are stored on your machine.

This category gives you options to adjust your disk space and enable certain features that are a bit more experimental.

The Application Category is broken down into 2 subcategories:

Defaulted to 5 gigabytes. This decides the threshold from which a confirmation is needed for a preview or export when there is low disk space.

When enabled, this allows for two enhancement passes. Note that this would increase render time for the additional pass, however this is a great way to experiment with mixing multiple AI models at one time.

When enabled, you can utilize previous versions of AI models. This is not recommended since these models are no longer supported. 

Set to “None” by default. You can decide to start every new session with a preset such as “Upscale to 4K”. Excluding “None”, there are 9 presets that you can make as your default.

By default this setting is disabled. When enabled, relevant prompts will appear with workflow suggestions. Great for beginners.

Choose whether or not Topaz Video AI collects anonymous data for maintenance and application improvement.

Enable when connecting to the model download server through a workplace/university proxy.

By default this is off so that you start in single view mode. You have the ability to start the app in A/B comparison mode by turning this feature on.

This represents the speed display order of a processing render/buffer.

Choose between displaying the timecode or the frame number.

Altering the selection will require an app restart.

Preferences 

Cloud Rendering

Filters

Dive into the details of various functions and features of Topaz Video AI. Learn different elements of the app and best practices for how to use them.

Functions

User Interface

Importing, Previewing & Exporting

Presets

Trim and Crop

Encoders and Containers

Preferences