Noise in low light: what workflow can you show works well??

Asher Kelman · Dec 20, 2010

Faced with low light, ISO 6400 is chosen on the 5DII so as to be able to capture the dancers ay 1/180 sec f4.0. What methods do you have in tackling the resulting noise.

Asher Kelman: Dancer mage at 100%

I tried Neat mage but it fell short.

Asher

Murray Foote · Dec 20, 2010

You could try something like:
- create new layer
- convert to LAB and blur the colour channels. Usually you would sharpen the luminosity channel but there's not enough detail here for it to help.
- then return to RGB and create new layer
- denoise with Neat Image and reduce the opacity to get some noise back. Not enough detail for a mask to help.
- Topaz Simplify/ BuzSim (on new layer) maybe helps a little. I didn't download the noise reduction and my trial has run out. If it doesn't work straight you might try posterising.
- Then sharpen for appropriate areas only.

Whatever, you do, you're up against it.

Regards,
Murray

Asher Kelman · Dec 20, 2010

Murray,

These are great ideas. do you want to have a go at it? It's at 100% so when reduced, it will be even better than whatever you can achieve.

Asher

Sandrine Bascouert · Dec 20, 2010

Hi! I had a quick go with the basic tools of PS CS4. This is absolutely of no value by itself but There are some ways which combined with some effective third party programs might be to consider...

I first apply the remove colour and luminance noise in ACR...all sliders at max.
then I copied the BG layer and applied the remove noise filter mostly on the green channel, then applied a level adjustment layer to transform the background into a black solid colour, then masked the background (floor and wall), inverted it and applied a median 1 px filter, then applied a smart sharpen filter and then a high pass only on the dancers, then lower the saturation on the reds and magentas mostly...

If you browse on the photobucket root album, you'll see 2 other version with mostly sharpening variations

Asher Kelman · Dec 20, 2010

Sandrine Bascouert said:
Hi! I had a quick go with the basic tools of PS CS4. This is absolutely of no value by itself but There are some ways which combined with some effective third party programs might be to consider...

I first apply the remove colour and luminance noise in ACR...all sliders at max.
then I copied the BG layer and applied the remove noise filter mostly on the green channel, then applied a level adjustment layer to transform the background into a black solid colour, then masked the background (floor and wall), inverted it and applied a median 1 px filter, then applied a smart sharpen filter and then a high pass only on the dancers, then lower the saturation on the reds and magentas mostly...

If you browse on the photobucket root album, you'll see 2 other version with mostly sharpening variations

Your version, Sandrine, is far less disturbing. If you could send me the PSD file layers, I'd love to go through your methodology, especially inverting and adding a that median 1px filter!

I think I'd like to be able to actually bring in good color. I wonder whether or not it would be too much of a stretch to use the "match color" photoshop tool after noise removal in this case?

Thanks,

Asher

Murray Foote · Dec 20, 2010

Asher,

OK, here's the first version with some correction:

and then here's a further tweak with glowing edges to 50% and solarise:

However, it would be easier if you could see the faces because a little detail in the faces could go a long way.

Regards,
Murray

Sandrine Bascouert · Dec 20, 2010

files sent....
I wonder if some frequency separation cloning afterwards may do the trick... just to even the colour without disturbing the edges...But I may need a larger version. It will go after the noise reduction of course, so there always be a lack of sharpness at some point. It will only help to get rid of the wormy aspect of the skin.

Andrew Stannard · Dec 22, 2010

HI Asher,

This is version processed through Lightroom 3...

Color and luminance noise reduction. I then actually added in a little bit of fine grain to remove any plasticky look...

Copyright Asher Kelman

Regards,

Asher Kelman · Dec 22, 2010

Thanks Andy,

New light shed on Lightroom's capabilities. I have the software but use CS4 for everything. Looks like I should use Lightroom too! Or, do you think it's just a matter of using the same tools in CS4?

Asher

Andrew Stannard · Dec 22, 2010

Hi Asher,

Not sure - I don't have CS4!

I would imagine the same tools exist - but probably in the Camera RAW part of Photoshop (which can happily deal with jpgs as well). The noise reduction tools were improved significantly in LR3, and I'm fairly certain they made into Photoshop somewhere - someone else can probably step in here and clarify?

Asher Kelman · Dec 22, 2010

Andrew Stannard said:
Hi Asher,

Not sure - I don't have CS4!

I would imagine the same tools exist - but probably in the Camera RAW part of Photoshop (which can happily deal with jpgs as well). The noise reduction tools were improved significantly in LR3, and I'm fairly certain they made into Photoshop somewhere - someone else can probably step in here and clarify?

Thanks,

I'll try color and luminance noise reduction in CS4 and CS5. What setting did you use, if you can remember?

Asher

Andrew Stannard · Dec 22, 2010

Benefits of a non-destructive LR workflow - you can go back and look at the settings!

Colour Noise: Colour 90, Detail 50

Luminance Noise: Luminance 76, Detail 16, Contrast 0

Sharpening: Amount 128, Radius 3, Detail 1, Masking 46

Grain Effect: Amount 23, Size 24, Roughness 50

Don't know quite how these translate into CS4, hopefully the same maths is at work in the background.

Regards,

Bart_van_der_Wolf · Dec 22, 2010

Andrew Stannard said:
Don't know quite how these translate into CS4, hopefully the same maths is at work in the background.

Hi Andy,

They don't. Adobe made significant improvements with the LR3 / ACR6.2+ Raw converters, but the settings of earlier versions when used in the newer versions will give significantly different results. Settings of LR3 and ACR6.2 (in CS5) and later should produce similar results. The early ACR 6 was not full featured yet, so an update is necessary.

Cheers,
Bart

Asher Kelman · Dec 22, 2010

Bart_van_der_Wolf said:
Hi Andy,

They don't. Adobe made significant improvements with the LR3 / ACR6.2+ Raw converters, but the settings of earlier versions when used in the newer versions will give significantly different results. Settings of LR3 and ACR6.2 (in CS5) and later should produce similar results. The early ACR 6 was not full featured yet, so an update is necessary.

Well then, Bart, it looks like should start using CS5!

Asher

Ben Rubinstein · Dec 23, 2010

Is that how noisy the top iso on the mkII really is or is this file significantly pushed?

Asher Kelman · Dec 23, 2010

Ben Rubinstein said:
Is that how noisy the top iso on the mkII really is or is this file significantly pushed?

Ben,

This is pushed 2 stops I believe!

Asher

Mark Hampton · Dec 23, 2010

Asher,

change this image to black and white !

it will work so much better ..... come on people ... colour is a lie !

... just a thought !

cheers

Noise in low light: what workflow can you show works well??

Asher Kelman

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