‘Star Trek: Voyager’ gets an unofficial 4K remaster thanks to AI
As with Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager is unlikely to ever get an official high-resolution remaster. The effects were shot on video rather than added to film after the fact, making it much harder to upgrade the quality than it was for The Next Generation. However, an unofficial project might get relatively close. Series fan Billy Reichard has started processing Voyager with a machine learning program that upgrades that ’90s era image quality as much as possible. You won’t forget that the show was made for tube TVs given the aspect ratio, but the AI is surprisingly effective — it produces something you probably wouldn’t mind watching on an idle afternoon if you’re a Star Trek devotee.
The effort is time-consuming at about six hours for an episode, and the necessary software is both expensive and tricky to work with. Voyager had variable frame rates that make audio sync a pain, as you can see in the sample clip below. It could be a long, long time before you can see Janeway and crew in 4K glory. Still, Reichard hopes to give every episode the AI treatment. Just don’t count on CBS sanctioning this, let alone making it officially available.
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