Help with Noise Ninja

[Turnerea]

I just started taking my first shots with my new RebelXTi, and I wanted to try and do some noise reduction on the image below. It was getting dark so I bumped up the ISO so I could still handhold for another few shots, and i wanted to see if I could bring out the detailed colors in the duck- maybe there is just too much noise, but I'm using the profile for my camera on the NoiseNinja website, and am following the help guide with the software, but nothing is happening.... can't get any reduction.

I downloaded the image (RAW) to Lr, then burned a JPG copy from that, and that is what I'm using to try and do the noise reduction. The software wouldn't open the RAW file- is that my problem??

Thanks for any help

 

[Drake]

I maybe wrong, but it looks like even after you bumped up the ISO, the duck was still very underexposed. When you bring out details from shadows, you can end up with lots of noise. As for Noise Ninja, it the image might be a problem for it. The amount of noise differs. There is very little (none?) noise in the water and a lot of it on the duck. The auto detection of noise in Noise Ninja scans the image (most likely) the water part and finds no, or just some of the light noise, leaving the heavy noise on a duck (which is a ery tiny part of the image) untouched. I don't use Noise Ninja (I've got Neat Image), but I think you should mess with the settings a bit more.

 

[toofpaste]

OMG! Holy Noise Batman!

 

[Resin42]

I had a look with CS3's own noise reduction and it does take the noise down slightly but not much. The problem is there's virtually no detail to sharpen in the duck and the reduction only makes this worse. I think you're on to a loser here mate.

 

[Turnerea]

Thanks everybody- guess I overestimated what Noise Ninja could do

 

[manaheim]

Thanks everybody- guess I overestimated what Noise Ninja could do

Well, Noise Ninja works great, but the problem here (as others have said) is you severely underexposed the duck. (mmm... rare duck!)

In fact, if you intentionally OVER-exposed him by just a hair it would have likely reduced any noise you would have had in the shot to begin wtih. Slight overexposure of the primary subject in high iso situations will often make it as if you were using a lower ISO.

 

[josealb]

You could also try to rise the exposure from the raw file before burning the file, and not exporting to jpg but to tiff, which doesn't lose quality in compression, are you sure you applied the noise ninja filter correctly?

 

[Turnerea]

Thanks for the tips- I've tried the PP tips, but to no avail.

I'm not 100% sure on one step in the Noise Ninja process- when you profile the image, what exactly is happening there? It usually creates a box that does not encompass where the noise is at all. I've done one sunset picture perfectly, and the same thing happened after the profile, so I don't think this is a really bad thing, but maybe its making this duck picture worse??

Thanks
Erik

 

[manaheim]

Again, I think the duck pic is underexposed. Noise ninja won't save you from underexposure.

 

[reg]

You guys!

He hacked the Rebel to allow ISO 25600!

 

[manaheim]

You guys!

He hacked the Rebel to allow ISO 25600!

Little early to be drinking, isn't it reg?

 

[toofpaste]

You guys!

He hacked the Rebel to allow ISO 25600!

ROTFL

 

[Turnerea]

Haha no... no super high ISO, though the combination of using ISO 1600 to try and be able to handhold (no tripod available at the time) and pushing the exposure rendered the insane amount of noise. The picture below was taken during the same shoot, but had much more light, and I purposely exposed for the sky..... so less noise in the foreground, though there was some. Ran Noise Ninja on it, and it came out very well, I think.