Removing Noise

[poker_jake]

I'm trying to submit this photo for a calender, but am having trouble reducing the noise. This was shot at 3200 ISO during sunset so light was low. I'm using PS5, and would like to preserve what detail is there. Any suggestions?

The uploaded file has been reduced to 3000x2000 res. Would the full 7139x4759 photo printed appear to have less noise?

Here is my first edit reduced to 1920x1280 to help with noise:
JDC_7421 1920 by Poker_Jake, on Flickr

 

[KenC]

The noise doesn't seem at all bad to me, but I can't speak for the expectations of calendar editors (or whoever makes these decisions). The cut-off exhaust from the jet seems more bothersome, at least to me than the noise. If the large file you posted is without any noise reduction, it looks like you could use a fairly low level and knock the noise down significantly without compromising sharpness noticeably, especially if you do some extra sharpening using some kind of edge sharpening technique.

 

[KmH]

I bet you have CS 5 (PS 12 - 2010) and not PS 5 (1998).
Is the original photo a Raw file, or a JPEG.
A JPEG file's compression and limited bit depth will severely limit what you can accomplish with the photo using CS5 or any other rater image editing application.

Did you use CS 5 Camera Raw's Sharpening panel to do the noise reduction?
Or did you use CS 5's Noise filter?

At any rate if you do reduce the noise you will lose some amount of detail. that cannot be avoided.
However. You can mitigate how much detail is lost by judiciously also doing image sharpening.
Note that CS 5 Camera Raw's Sharpening panel has both sharpening and noise reduction sliders.

Also there is a variety of sharpening techniques you can use that can also help minimize loss of detail after having done noise reduction.
You may also want to do edits locally within the photo rather than doing global edits to the entire photo.

Unfortunately there is an issue you can't fix post process without making the image noise more visible.
The photo is under exposed. All that white snow in the scene biased the light meter in the camera to under exposure.
Increasing the exposure will make image noise more noticeable.

 

[The_Traveler]

This kind of regular noise is very well managed by Noiseware (I think there is a trial version)
The resulting image is not razor sharp but certainly good enough for a reasonable-size print

 

[poker_jake]

Yes, it's CS 5. It was originally shot in RAW. I don't use ACR for sharpening or reducing noise, never had good results. For the above photo I initially resized to 1920x1280 (reduced the noise on it's own) then selected the areas I wanted sharpened (F16) and created a new layer. Then I ran a high pass filter over the new layer and selected overlay. Then I merged the two layers resulting in final image. I know it's under exposed, that was a decision I made. The original was about half a stop brighter and I reduced the overall brightness then added some fill light to make it look like it did in real life. I'll give Noiseware a try, thanks.

Here is another example of the conditions, sun was setting allowing the afterburner to become visible, runway lights on, this is a more accurate depiction.
JDC_7398 by Poker_Jake, on Flickr

 

[ahmedzai.sadam]

 

[Didereaux]

Keep in mind that the printing has a much reduced palette, that is why I would bet that when printed it will look just fine. A touch of edge sharpening won't hurt, but the noise level is acceptable. I don't know who is doing your printing, but most outfits will accept any jpeg or TIFF under a certain file size(usually ~25M or so). Also make certain your images are sRGB, and NOT Adobe RGB keep . Few printers use that palette, and even then they charge more to do it. Also let them do any reductions, you pay do the cropping though for the correct aspect ratio...check with the printer as to the correct ratio. DPI at 240 or 300. Higher values of DPI only yield larger files as the printers can only print upto about 300 except for special jobs

 

[Braineack]

Id' be more concerned with the lack of overall sharpness and the motion blur in that shot, over noise.

 

[poker_jake]

The lady got back to me less than 5 min after submission and said it will be in the calender for sure. Thanks for the replies. I didn;t do any noise reduction on the final and just sharpened the plane a little bit.

Id' be more concerned with the lack of overall sharpness and the motion blur in that shot, over noise.

That's going to happen being about a 1000' from the plane in blowing snow. The blurred background is part of the panning the 200mph plane.

 

[Didereaux]

The lady got back to me less than 5 min after submission and said it will be in the calender for sure. Thanks for the replies. I didn;t do any noise reduction on the final and just sharpened the plane a little bit.

Id' be more concerned with the lack of overall sharpness and the motion blur in that shot, over noise.

That's going to happen being about a 1000' from the plane in blowing snow. The blurred background is part of the panning the 200mph plane.

Hah! Congrats! See I told you your noise angst was not needed.

 

[poker_jake]

The lady got back to me less than 5 min after submission and said it will be in the calender for sure. Thanks for the replies. I didn;t do any noise reduction on the final and just sharpened the plane a little bit.

Id' be more concerned with the lack of overall sharpness and the motion blur in that shot, over noise.

That's going to happen being about a 1000' from the plane in blowing snow. The blurred background is part of the panning the 200mph plane.

Hah! Congrats! See I told you your noise angst was not needed.

Thanks, I'm too much of a pixel peeper, and quite critical of my photos.