An improved method for color transient enhancement in an input video frame of pixels. The luminance value of a current pixel is compared to that of neighboring pixels. A correction value is determined and the chrominance value of the current pixel is "pushed" towards the neighboring pixel that has a luminance value closest to that of the current pixel, by adding the correction value to the current pixel's chrominance value. The original video frame is also separately processed using a CTI method, and the current pixel's corrected chrominance value is combined with the corresponding pixel in the output of the CTI processing by soft switching unit to generate an output video frame that is an enhanced version of the input video frame.