By 2020, AI upscaling had matured from a sci-fi concept to a consumer-accessible tool. Software like Topaz Video Enhance AI (then called Gigapixel AI for video), DAIN (Depth-Aware Video Frame Interpolation), and various ESRGAN (Enhanced Super-Resolution Generative Adversarial Networks) models allowed hobbyists to do what studios wouldn’t.
A single 4K upscaled episode from Season 1 was approximately , totaling roughly for the entire season. Technical Challenges: Processing Time: Upscaling each episode took roughly 6 to 10 hours star trek deep space 9 s01 ai upscale 4k 2020