Canon 1D MKII, 600mm non IS f4, @ f6.3, 1/2500, ISO 1600 (doh!), RAW, RSE, CS2, bean bag on garden fence
Hi All,
I live next to a flood plain and the last couple of days the rain has lashed down, so the water level has got very high. Today there has been a group of six male Mallard's swimming about. Threw some bread out to get them over into the nice setting sun light, but like a complete donut did'nt check the ISO which was on 1600 .
So have done a lot of work in CS2, Is it obvious?? And can anybody tell me what hte best noise reduction prog is, I've tried to use the free download of noise ninja but find it very confusing to use
Hi Rob, well considering the ISO setting, you've done excellently. A credit to your PS and NR skills. The water droplet is a nice touch and well timed. For me, the shooting angle is quite high, and unfortunately, due to the commoness (is that a word?) a Mallard shot needs to be a bit special to attract attention. Sorry.
As far as NR software goes, I too use Noise Ninja, but not very successfully and like you, find it a bit complex to use and haven't the time to get into it, so I shoot on the ISO of caution generally!!
I use NeatImage. I have the fully monty version which works as a plug-in filter in PhotoShop (in 16 bit mode) and will also work in standalone mode.
Noise Ninja is the other highly regarded noise suppresion program, although performance wise I believe they are similar and you wouldn't notice much difference between them.
More and more RAW converters also have some form of noise reduction in them but I don't know how well they compare to the NeatImage or Noise Ninja tools. Adobe RAW, BreezeBrowser, and I think the latest version of DPP all claim to have noise reduction features.
I like NeatImage. Very simple to use. I normally just use the auto-analysis which is usually good enough. I then usually apply the noise filter with the filter strength reduced to about 70% to avoid softening detail (although 100% filtering is amazingly good). Sometimes I might just apply the noise reduction to the background or sky area.
Must admit I use Noise Nija, the new PS plug in version is a bit more simplified than older version. and so not so intuitive, it has been set up for one button useage....
using the tabs in turn
Profile - well load the correct profile for your camera, (top menu bar - profiles) assuming you have downloaded them, I tend not to change anything else on this tab - Sometimes when I have an exceptionally noisy image in shadows I will use full auto profile (profile image button), but the ready made profiles are pretty decent
Filter -always turn USM down to 0, and sharpen thro' PS, then on bottom menu window
scroll through the various channels RGB, Lum(inescence) etc - I usually find one channel is noisiest and apply noise suppression to that channel only, you can usually turn down the strength as well making the noise reduction less deastructive to detail, I don't normaly change smoothness or contrast
Brush - is for fine tuning excessive noise - I never use it, time is too short
Angle is a touch too high for me too, but a nice enough image of a bird often overlooked because it is common.
I have both Neat Image and Noise Ninja, starting to use NJ more for its noise brush feature, it is often quicker than masking, performance wise and result wise I don't think there is any appreciable difference, both can be as simple or as complicated to operate as you like.
My main complaint with NJ is that you can only work on a 100% view, whilst this is fine for judging the effect of the noise reduction it is not so easy when you want to mask a larger area.
Discussion
5 repliesHi All,
I live next to a flood plain and the last couple of days the rain has lashed down, so the water level has got very high. Today there has been a group of six male Mallard's swimming about. Threw some bread out to get them over into the nice setting sun light, but like a complete donut did'nt check the ISO which was on 1600
So have done a lot of work in CS2, Is it obvious?? And can anybody tell me what hte best noise reduction prog is, I've tried to use the free download of noise ninja but find it very confusing to use
All comments welcome
Regards
Rob
As far as NR software goes, I too use Noise Ninja, but not very successfully and like you, find it a bit complex to use and haven't the time to get into it, so I shoot on the ISO of caution generally!!
Regards, Graeme
I use NeatImage. I have the fully monty version which works as a plug-in filter in PhotoShop (in 16 bit mode) and will also work in standalone mode.
Noise Ninja is the other highly regarded noise suppresion program, although performance wise I believe they are similar and you wouldn't notice much difference between them.
More and more RAW converters also have some form of noise reduction in them but I don't know how well they compare to the NeatImage or Noise Ninja tools. Adobe RAW, BreezeBrowser, and I think the latest version of DPP all claim to have noise reduction features.
I like NeatImage. Very simple to use. I normally just use the auto-analysis which is usually good enough. I then usually apply the noise filter with the filter strength reduced to about 70% to avoid softening detail (although 100% filtering is amazingly good). Sometimes I might just apply the noise reduction to the background or sky area.
cheers
Sean
using the tabs in turn
Profile - well load the correct profile for your camera, (top menu bar - profiles) assuming you have downloaded them, I tend not to change anything else on this tab - Sometimes when I have an exceptionally noisy image in shadows I will use full auto profile (profile image button), but the ready made profiles are pretty decent
Filter -always turn USM down to 0, and sharpen thro' PS, then on bottom menu window
scroll through the various channels RGB, Lum(inescence) etc - I usually find one channel is noisiest and apply noise suppression to that channel only, you can usually turn down the strength as well making the noise reduction less deastructive to detail, I don't normaly change smoothness or contrast
Brush - is for fine tuning excessive noise - I never use it, time is too short
Mike
I have both Neat Image and Noise Ninja, starting to use NJ more for its noise brush feature, it is often quicker than masking, performance wise and result wise I don't think there is any appreciable difference, both can be as simple or as complicated to operate as you like.
My main complaint with NJ is that you can only work on a 100% view, whilst this is fine for judging the effect of the noise reduction it is not so easy when you want to mask a larger area.
HTH
Thankyou for your help
Regards
Rob