Basic Help with Neat Image Needed!

[sparty314]

Hi,

I am experimenting with the demo version of Neat Image, and I am very impressed. However, I have a few basic question that I am hoping someone can help me answer:

1. I want to reduce noice and also tweak color, saturation, use USM, maybe even do a little cloning. Should I run neat image *first* and then open its output image in photoshop? Or, should I use photoshop first, and then use Neat Image as my *final* step?

2. I noticed that when I save my JPEG files from Neat Image, they are only about 500kb in size. (My images are large/fine JPEGs from a 10D. Usually, they are 2-4Mb straight from the camera.) There doesn't seem to be a place to adjust the compression. Is there? Am I going to be disappointed if I try to print these 500k files? (Usually I save my images as JPEG at max quality (12) from photoshop elements and they are usually about 4 Mb.)



Thanks for any help!

[Riccardo]

You can use Neat Image as a plugin of Photoshop.
It is allways a bad idea saving many time in IPG because every saving is a loss of quality.
Image JPG to be processed in Neat Image should be 24 bit RGB (8 bits/channel)
When you click on Save as and select jpg, then another window will open to select % of compression.

Ciao

[msnow]

Hi,

I am experimenting with the demo version of Neat Image, and I am very impressed. However, I have a few basic question that I am hoping someone can help me answer:

1. I want to reduce noice and also tweak color, saturation, use USM, maybe even do a little cloning. Should I run neat image *first* and then open its output image in photoshop? Or, should I use photoshop first, and then use Neat Image as my *final* step?

2. I noticed that when I save my JPEG files from Neat Image, they are only about 500kb in size. (My images are large/fine JPEGs from a 10D. Usually, they are 2-4Mb straight from the camera.) There doesn't seem to be a place to adjust the compression. Is there? Am I going to be disappointed if I try to print these 500k files? (Usually I save my images as JPEG at max quality (12) from photoshop elements and they are usually about 4 Mb.)



Thanks for any help!

Different people get different results in the workflow but I usually find it best to sharpen last, therefore I would use nose reduction prior to that step. I use it first most of the time.

I can't answer your question about the compression since I shoot RAW and safe to 16-bit TIFF out of Photoshop. If I needed JPEG I would save it from the TIFF.

[sparty314]

When you click on Save as and select jpg, then another window will open to select % of compression.

I am using the free demo version of NI. I am willing to pay for a "real" version, but not until I play with it a little, and take some of the images to the lab to be printed at 8 x 10.

When I select save as and select jpg, I do not see the other window where I can choose % of compression. It just automatically chooses for me. I don't see anywhere in the documentation or website that that feature is disabled.

Any thoughts?

[sparty314]

Thanks, all for your help. I still maintain that the answer to my question is not in the documentation. But, I did find it in a forum hosted at NI's website. Sure enough, the demo version has the compression setting disabled. So, I payed for the home version, and now I have some experimenting to do!