Reducing Noise & Speckles in Elemnts 6

druhl

I have to confess up front that I made quite a number of amateurish mistakes with a series of photos taken at a recent wedding anniversary celebration. I'd be grateful for any and all comments / suggestions regarding the posted photo (EXIF data included) - thanks. The image was re-sized but otherwise unedited in this version.

MY set up that night: Canon XTi, Canon EF-S 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6 IS, Canon 430EX external flash. The majority of shots taken that night were candids of the guests shot hand held at ISO 1600 with the IS on. The posed photos were taken with a tripod and remote release. I wish I had taken even a second to think about that before I started releasing the shutter... The two biggest mistakes I'm aware of are failing to reduce the ISO and switching the IS off. I did shoot in RAW



I understand that the high ISO resulted in the noise. I'm not as certain about the effect of leaving the IS on. These aren't the sharpest photos I've ever taken and suspect using the image stabilization on a stabilized camera contributed to the lack of sharp focus.

I would like to print 8X10s if possible but my post production efforts with Noise Ninja and PS Element 6 are not encouraging. Allowing Noise Ninja to analyze the image did a better job than applying the XTi ISO 1600 profile but still left considerable noise and worse (both methods) left quite a few white speckles in the darkest areas of the photo.

I'm sure it's no small request but I'd appreciate anyone with the patience to share a few ideas about set up and post production suggestions.

Thanks!

Donn

BinaryFx

Donn, due to the resizing, most of the porblems with noise have been removed from the image posted. Can you crop out a small section at original size? It would be best to have some detail and not just a flat area, as the goal is to reduce noise without removing detail.


Stephen Marsh

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~binaryfx/
http://prepression.blogspot.com/

TonyCooper

I really don't see a problem with noise in the image...the important part of the image anyway. The image cries out to be cropped, though.

Crop to just outside the left and right of the piano, just a bit over the top of the flowers, and just a bit below the feet and the photo will be much improved. I can't be more specific about the crop because it will depend on the ratio you want for the printed version.

For an 8" x 10" crop, you have to go wider on the sides to get the height. That reflection in the window on the right must go if you have a program with a clone tool or similar. I'd blur the light fixture, too.

druhl

Here's an otherwise unretouched crop of the original (actually posted a XXXL).





Tony the crop I've been working with (not the sample above) is pretty much as you've described. It eliminates the light fixture but leaves the reflections in the glass. I haven't worked on that part of the photo yet but am fairly confident I can do an acceptable job with the clone tool.

The images I've posted so far have had no post production (aside from the resizing in the first and cropping in the second) applied to them. In my attempts at post production so far the problem has been that described by Stephen - by the time I've processed out enough noise and white speckles from the darkest areas of the image (primarily clothing) to make an acceptable 8X10 I've lost an unacceptable amount of detail I'm going to try duplicating the layer, processing one for the darkest areas and one for the detail then selectively combine the two. That's the last thing I can think of. It may be I'm just not going to get an 8X10 out of these images. What I have gotten out of them is a lesson - it's much easier to get it right before you open the shutter.

Having said all of that, my aim in posting was to get a second, more experienced opinion. Is there some technique or idea I'm missing here? I remain anxious to hear your ideas.

Thanks again

Donn

pathfinder

Druhl,

Were these images shot in RAW or as jpgs?

The noise seems higher than I would expect for ISO 1600 with a Canon XTi, as seen here This makes me suspect that this image was under exposed at the time of shooting. Shooting at high ISOs, like 1600, requires great care not to under expose the image as most of the noise is in the darker quarter tones of the image.

Your suggestions of selective de noising on a layer, and then using a mask to control the areas and the amount of de noising is excellent, and how I frequently do noise reduction. This image however needs stronger stuff.

I downloaded the first image you posted, and it was only 800 x 1200 pixels. Your closer crop I like, but the technical quality of the image is poor. (To print an 8 x 10 you need approximately 300 x 10 inches or 3000 pixels on the long dimension of your image, and 8 x 300 or 2400 pixels on the short dimension. )

I made a 2nd layer of the image, ran the upper layer through NoiseWear in Portrait mode, ran Unsharp Mask at Amount 24%, Radius 22, Threshold 2 and then did a luminosity fade to about 90%. I then painted out the reflection in the window in the upper right corner by selecting the area and painting with a brush with black ink in normal mode. I cropped the image more tightly ( you may or may not agree with my choice ) and ran it through NoiseWear a 2nd time, uprezzed it a bit, and then uploaded it here. I suspect this approach might help the original file. I prefer NoiseWear to Neat Image slightly.

Here is my result



For comparison, here is an image straight out of my camera ( 40D ) at ISO 1600 - no sharpening, no processing whatsoever other than exporting from Lightroom with its defaults. I did shoot it in RAW. Compare the noise to your image.

druhl

Thanks Pathfinder

After viewing your results and reading your work flow I went back to work encouraged that a better image could be had. The one thing I had most overlooked was luminosity. It was an 'of course!' kind of moment when I read that in your post. I don't know if there's a way to reduce luminosity in PS Elements 6. The image was shot in RAW. After opening it I duplicated the layer and took the top layer to Noise Ninja. Honestly I have mostly relied on the camera profiles or allowing the software to profile the image and decide. By playing with the various adjustments, especially luminosity, I was able to get a much better base image to work with. It's not as good as yours in my opinion but I'm happy with what I achieved.

You pushed my learning and I appreciate that very much.

Thanks again!

Donn

pathfinder

Glad to be of help!