What are the secrets for clear and sharp photos?

[msaha]

Hello everybody!
Hope you all have a good morning/evening/night

I have an issue with Image quality with both the 1000D and 40D where the sky has grain whatever ISO I use even at 100! this is very bad because I cant sharpen the images in PS as the dots get sharper! :madmad:
also they are affected by the level of contrast I choose.
are they specs of dust on the sensors?
They are just grain not similar to dust!
I have included a 100% sample from the 1000D
Just saying.... ISO is 100..... (I shoot RAW)



See how they appear in a 100% crop picture


Now lets see how it looks with a bit of contrast, clarity, and sharpening.




How can I achieve results that are crisp and clear?
such as these from ►CubaGallery ?
what is the secret?
and thanks for your help

 

[480sparky41 40]

Start with good glass, shoot in raw, use solid post processing techniques.

 

[KmH]

What you see is image noise, not grain. Digital photography has a technical side. The better one's understanding of the technical fundamentals, the fewer mysterious problems one encounters.

Every digital image has some amount of digital noise. When the amount of image noise is low, the noise is barely noticable.

Under exposure makes image noise more visible. Plus the way digital images work, fully 1/2 of the luminosity data is in the brightest stop of exposure, which makes image noise more noticable in the darker stops of exposure. http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/linear_gamma.pdf
http://wwwimages.adobe.com/www.adob...ly/prophotographer/pdfs/pscs3_renderprint.pdf

Editing, particularly a low bit-depth file type like JPEG, also makes image noise more visible, as well as adding JPEG artifacts if the editing exceeds the very limited editing headroom JPEGs have.

JPEG was designed as a finished, ready-to-print file type. Headroom for editing outside the camera was not designed into the JPEG file type.

By the way JPEG stands for - Joint Photographic Experts Group. JPEG - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[msaha]

Start with good glass, shoot in raw, use solid post processing techniques.

I use good Sigma 10-20mm glass, I shoot in RAW, I use ACR and DPP.

What you see is image noise, not grain. Digital photography has a technical side. The better ones understanding of the technical fundamentals, the fewer mysterious problems one encounters.

Every digital image has some amount of digital noise. When the amount of image noise is low, the noise is barely noticable.

Under exposure makes image noise more visible. Plus the way digital images work, fully 1/2 of the luminosity data is in the brightest stop of exposure, which makes image noise more noticable in the darker stops of exposure. http://www.adobe.com/digitalimag/pdfs/linear_gamma.pdf
http://wwwimages.adobe.com/www.adob...ly/prophotographer/pdfs/pscs3_renderprint.pdf

Editing, particularly a low bit-depth file type like JPEG, also makes image noise more visible, as well as adding JPEG artifacts if the editing exceeds the very limited editing headroom JPEGs have.

JPEG was designed as a finished, ready-to-print file type. Headroom for editing outside the camera was not designed into the JPEG file type.

By the way JPEG stands for - Joint Photographic Experts Group. JPEG - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The problem is that I shoot RAW and barely process the images until this is visible
thanks for the links

 

[BlueMeanieTSi]

I prefer to use other sharpening filters outside of what is in photoshop. Also try using a noise reduction plugin before sharpening.

 

[Groupcaptainbonzo]

I can'treally tell from these, but you could be over sharpening.Digital images are by their nature a little soft, and require a bit of "Unsharpe Mask" (the amount that the image can take differs from shot to shot and is less on smaller formats than on bigger) if you over sharpen you can get this effect.

 

[KmH]

Image shapening and noise reduction are the 2 sides of a single coin. While USM (UnSharp mask) is there for use, there are many alternative sharpening techniques available for use. Plus, many subscribe to the notion that sharpening is a fairly technical, 2 or 3 step process. - Real World Image Sharpening with Adobe Photoshop, Camera Raw, and Lightroom (2nd Edition)

 

[unpopular]

I prefer to use other sharpening filters outside of what is in photoshop. Also try using a noise reduction plugin before sharpening.

At ISO 100, you shouldn't need NR.

How are you metering these? Are you using any techniques similar to ETTR? Instead of Unsharp Mask, try Highpass on Overlay, taking care not to sharpen noise. Apply more than once if needed. Always apply sharpening at the very end, and never at the begining.

 

[BlueMeanieTSi]

That is a lot of noise in the first example if it was shot at ISO 100...

 

[unpopular]

^^ I know.

It almost looks like ISO 400. I am also wondering if there is any Auto Expose compensation in the RAW processor left turned on?

What software are you using for RAW conversion?

 

[The_Traveler]

Attempting to sharpen large areas of color that have no detail, like a cloudless sky, is a losing situation because you can only encourage processing artifacts.

Sharpen what needs sharpening and don't sharpen what doesn't.

Lew

 

[Dao]

In situation like this, I usually do selective noise reduction.

See here for more details.

JuzaPhoto - Noise Reduction

 

[msaha]

Thanks everybody
Personally I have no idea why this happens to the image.

I use Adobe Camera RAW plugin for sharpening my images. Hmmm...​

unpopular

you seem to have another way, but it is ISO 100 I shouldn't see noise right? this made me wish to have ISO 50....
I am using Adobe Camera RAW for my processing.
Can the temperature affect image noise? because the temperature is about 40C+.....
But not to this point (the first image is unprocessed)
Thanks​

 

[msaha]

In situation like this, I usually do selective noise reduction.

See here for more details.

JuzaPhoto - Noise Reduction

Thanks!

 

[BlueMeanieTSi]

ACR automatically applies sharpening to entire image when you use it. I turn that off and sharpen myself.