Noise in PP

[Dionysus]

Everytime I edit past a certain point of saturation/clarity/vibrance in my RAW adjustments...the picture starts to get kind of grainy. This is across the board throughout all ISO's, etc, BUT it will take a lot more editing of an ISO 100 pic to turn it grainy, than an ISO 1600 pic, obviously.

I see lots of pictures all the time that are obviously heavily edited, with out of this world saturation, but with less noise than I have. Am I doing something wrong in my editing that I'm getting this grain, or is it something in my cameras settings, or do some people use a noise reducing program?

Like I said, I shoot in RAW, and edit photos in Photoshop RAW editor, and I use Adobe RGB as my default camera setting, if that helps at all.

 

[Overread]

hmm you could try boosting your contrast up and then your saturation. Contrast can add a lot of the out of this world vibrance to a shot.
Also this limitation is standard - we all get it. First thing is you could try selecitve noise reduction since this effect tends to appear first and most in background areas - heavy noise reduction limited (layermasks or selection leashes) would lessen the effect in those affected areas and let you keep the colours.

 

[Big Mike]

There are certain editing processes that do accentuate and bring out noise. One of the biggest ones (that I see) is increasing the brightness/exposure and contrast (and saturation to some extent).

One of the keys to getting nice clean shots (and getting acceptable shots at high ISO) is to get the exposure right in the first place...so that you don't have to adjust it very much. Shots that are underexposed and 'brought up in post' tend to be the noisy ones.

Further to that, you may actually want to overexpose the shot (without blowing the highlights) because that will give you the most color information in the file, and allow for more freedom when editing. This baiscally increases the S/N (signal to noise) ratio.

Read this: Expose to the Right

And yes, some people do use noise reduction software...and some cameras have a noise reduction setting that can be turned on or off...in some cases adjusted. I don't use Adobe Camera RAW, but there might be a noise reduction option in there as well.

 

[Derek Zoolander]

what is PP?

 

[Sulfur]

Post Production
(At least that's what I call it )

 

[cbryan]

what is PP?

post production

 

[Derek Zoolander]

great, thanks!

 

[Big Mike]

or Post Processing.

 

[Dionysus]

thanks guys, appreciate the info.

 

[tsaraleksi]

You might post some examples of problem images, it would make it easy to see what the problem is I think.

 

[davebmck]

I don't use Adobe Camera RAW, but there might be a noise reduction option in there as well.

There is a noise reduction function there, however the older versions don't work all that great. Fortunately, the new version in CS4 and Lightroom 2 works much better. It is quite suitable for moderate noise reduction, but for serious noise reduction, you're probably better off going to Photoshop and using one of the plug-ins that specialize in that. I like Imagenomic Noiseware Professional.

 

[AlexColeman]

Post-Processing, the process of editing, altering,and correcting your photos after the shoot.

On-topic, some examples would be helpful, also what program are you using for these changes?

 

[Dionysus]

ill have to dig around for examples. ive been using PSE 6 since i started shooting, but recently got CS4, but i'm still trying to learn it and read up on it before i use it solely.