Excessive Noise on D7000

[kirbym2]

Hi All,

Looking for some tips. I am often restricted to shooting indoors. For me, this means a relatively dark environment. I'm often trying to shoot my little one, who makes a habit of crawling away from me at warp speed (tripod is not an option). I've noticed that when I use any iso above 800 I get an unacceptable level of noise. I'm no expert in LR or PS, but when I play with noise reduction, the image comes off looking... processed.

I've heard that one way to combat this problem is selecting a high enough iso to over-expose the photo. I know by shooting in RAW, exposure isn't too big of a concern (unless I've completely blown out the image).

What's the general consensus here? Any thoughts on noise with the D7000? In terms of lens specs, I'm often using my 50mm 1.4 wide open (or pretty close to it).

Thanks!

 

[mrpink]

Post an example photo with the EXIF data attached.






p!nK

 

[Kerbouchard]

What's the general consensus here?

That you can't take photos in the dark. Buy a flash.

 

[Kerbouchard]

The real answer is to buy a flash, but here is my 'other' real answer.

Increasing ISO does not increase exposure. It tells the camera processor to amplify the signal of the analog data that was recorded from your sensor before it converts it to digital data. Sometimes, increasing ISO will reduce noise because it is sometimes easier to amplify an analog signal instead of a digital signal. It all depends on the read noise and what the signal to noise ratio is.

My guess, you are using a kit lens with a small max aperture and you are still trying to get 1/60th or faster of a shutter speed. There just isn't enough light in most houses to do that. When you try, the inherent noise that is part of your circuitry plays a larger part in the overall signal since there wasn't much of a signal from the light that was recorded.

To reduce noise, you want to maximize your signal to noise ratio. You do that by increasing the light, increasing the light that is let in by the lens(larger aperture), or increasing the amount of time the sensor has to record the signal(longer shutter speeds). ISO is merely an amplification of the analog data that is created by those three things.

Basically, pick the slowest shutter speed you can and the largest aperture that you can with as much light in the room as you can. From there, increase ISO until you get an image that looks like it has the proper exposure. If the noise is still more than you are willing to deal with, you can buy a better lens that has a larger aperture, or you can buy a flash to add light.

You don't really have any other options than those.

 

[nickzou]

What's the general consensus here?

That the D7000 is the king of crop mountain and has the best ISO performance of DX/APS-C bodies. You need better ISO performance? Next step up is the D700 or the Canon 5D mark II.

 

[OrionsByte]

Getting a better exposure when you take the picture will result in less noise than taking an underexposed picture and trying to brighten it up in post.

Personally, I've shot photos at ISO 1600 with my D7000 and found them pretty acceptable, if not super clean. If all I did was look at them at 100% magnification I might change my mind, but generally speaking I think the sheer file size makes a little bit of noise less noticeable than it could be.

 

[D-B-J]

I've shot at 6400 with my D7000 and been ok with the results. Please post an example with the exif data, because there should be no excessive noise at that low an iso.

 

[KmH]

Hi All,

Looking for some tips. I am often restricted to shooting indoors. For me, this means a relatively dark environment....

And likely have under exposed photos.

Under exposure makes image noise more visible.

Investigate the exposure technique known as ETTR, or expose-to-the-right, and learn how to read the histogram your camera can display on the rear LCD. Set your D7000 up so it displays the 3 color channel histogram.

 

[ghache]

I have no idea what your doing but i don't even hesitate to shoot my d7000 at iso3200.

 

[kirbym2]

Great feedback all around. Hand held, my prime lens wide open (50mm 1.4) is still requiring shutter speeds that cause motion blur. I thought I could offset this by increasing the iso, allowing me to increase shutter speed. I think the big problem is the exposure... I'm underexposing, and trying to brighten up after the fact. I'll look into some of the theories recommended and give it another go. Sorry for not posting an example... not on the home computer at the moment.

 

[jake337]

Heres 1600 with a d90. It can't be worse than this.

 

[KmH]

I recommend you read the following http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/linear_gamma.pdf.

Noise reduction and image sharpening are 2 sides of the same coin. Hopefully you are shooting in Raw and not just JPEG, because JPEG has so much less editing headroom than Raw.

You say you have Lightroom and Photoshop, but don't mention what release levels you have. Of course, both Photoshop Camera Raw and Lightroom use the same edit rendering egine - ACR, so the following 2 books will help with either of them:

Real World Camera Raw with Adobe Photoshop CS5

Real World Image Sharpening with Adobe Photoshop, Camera Raw, and Lightroom (2nd Edition)

You might also look over this link: Sharpening 101

 

[Destin]

Excessive Noise on a D7000 at iso 800? Either your camera is defective, you aren't using it right, or you're the pickiest person I've ever met.

I'm betting, along with everyone else, that you're underexposing in camera causing the noise to be much more prominent.


Also, you said that you had to lighten up the images in post.. this can also add noise to the photo, and make the pre-existing noise more visible. Especially if you're shooting .jpg and not Raw.

 

[ghache]

This was a test shot of a new lens.

0.04 sec (1/25)

f/2.8

46 mm

iso 3200

0.04 sec (1/25)

f/2.8

46 mm

iso 3200

with no post processing. There is some noise but nothing that makes the pictures non useable.

 

[Destin]

This was a test shot of a new lens.

0.04 sec (1/25)

f/2.8

46 mm

iso 3200

0.04 sec (1/25)

f/2.8

46 mm

iso 3200

with no post processing. There is some noise but nothing that makes the pictures non useable.

I'm sorry, that's effin incredible. My D80 looks worse than that at 400, and not much better at 200.