Heron at the 'Hermitage'

Karl2301

This photo was taken in relatively low light as is the case this time of year when the days are short. It was taken on 0.5 second exposure at F5.6, ISO 100 with no post processing except a crop to remove excessive clutter of the photo. Having reviewed the photo once uploaded, I've noticed it looks very grainy which the original does not. The photo has had to be minimized to a low resolution in order to be uploaded to the site and I've noticed it does not look as good. Any suggestions? Other photos on the site do not appear grainy when I'm assuming they too have to be reduced in file size. Thanks for looking.
Click the link for the original: http://photograffix.smugmug.com/gallery/965758/1/44455550/Large

Rohirrim

Beautiful shot of the Heron.

I'm not sure I totally understand your question, but when I look at the Original size shot, not the Large, I can see some "grain" in it. I believe that this is most likely digital noise from shooting in low light. It's not very bad though.

If this is what you're seeing a couple ways to minimize this is to run a remove noise filter in Photoshop. Sometimes if you run the filter on the channel thats more affected it works better. You can also use a Noise removing program like Noise Ninja. Noise is often made worse by sharpening, so if you do a selective sharpening of only the bird and leave the background alone that may also help.

I hope this helps,

Karl2301

Rohirrim wrote:

Beautiful shot of the Heron.

I'm not sure I totally understand your question, but when I look at the Original size shot, not the Large, I can see some "grain" in it. I believe that this is most likely digital noise from shooting in low light. It's not very bad though.

If this is what you're seeing a couple ways to minimize this is to run a remove noise filter in Photoshop. Sometimes if you run the filter on the channel thats more affected it works better. You can also use a Noise removing program like Noise Ninja. Noise is often made worse by sharpening, so if you do a selective sharpening of only the bird and leave the background alone that may also help.

I hope this helps,

Hi Steve,

Thanks for your comments. I'm not familiar with Digital Photo Processing Software at present so I'll try out your suggestions to try and enhance the image.

The question I guess revolved around the fact that crunching the image down for upload seemed to degrade the image and didn't seem to do it justice. Having seen other peoples uploads which seem quite sharp I was disappointed in the image on display which is why I posted the link to the original. Your explanation of shooting in low light makes sense which probably explains the quality. Thanks again for taking the time to comment. Regards Karl

Harryb

Very nice shot Karl. You did very well with a difficult exposure.

Karl2301

Thanks Harry

Harryb wrote:

Very nice shot Karl. You did very well with a difficult exposure.

Thanks for your encouraging comment. Having viewed your impressive collection of photos your comment is very much appreciated. This shot was very opportunistic as my wife and I weren't 'shooting' wildlife that day. We spotted the Heron near to the river bank in an area which wasn't very accessible due to the high sided river valley. I feel lucky to have got the shots as the Heron was very nervous and twitchy as it watched this nut clamber down to the waters edge with all his camera gear. Thanks again Harry. Regards Karl