Noise???

Damo77 wrote in post #18287002
I can't see anywhere you've mentioned this - what software do you have?

LR and PsCC.

Merlin_AZ wrote in post #18287323
LR and PsCC.

Wonderful! Either of those will do a fair job.

As some other folk have mentioned, noise is worst in dark areas, and this sure does seem like a dark photo. So even though this is a jpeg file, open it in a raw interface (either LR or ACR) and brighten the photo first, before tackling the noise. The brighter view will allow you a better look at the noise.

@goatruckus: Those shots confirm that it is in fact artifact from Sony processing in camera.
@TeamSpeed: JPG only, no RAW sadly. Can't reshoot. My brother and his family left town the next morning. I never saw the plants coming out of her head until the next day since I was busy setting up the tripod and timer, but it's OK. I cloned them out.
@Damo77. I looked at the recommendations on your site, but I guess I don't understand what the difference cropping first vs. cropping last just before saving the file matters.

I appreciate everyone's thoughts.
I think I'll try to do the best I can, short of destroying too much sharpness and quality (if I could use that term with my shots) trying to limit the noise as best as I can. My parents definitely want it on metal and not on canvas, which could mitigate the noise, but oh well.
With their vision at their ages, I don't think they'll notice too much noise anyway printed at 20x30.
We'll see how it goes.
Again, thanks everyone for their time.

Merlin_AZ wrote in post #18287331
@Damo77. I looked at the recommendations on your site, but I guess I don't understand what the difference cropping first vs. cropping last just before saving the file matters.

Cropping is a problem for all sorts of reasons, but they're not pointedly relevant to this thread. Primarily, the problem is that you resized.

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Merlin_AZ wrote in post #18287331
With their vision at their ages, I don't think they'll notice too much noise anyway printed at 20x30.
We'll see how it goes.

At that size, the noise won't be any problem at all. By that I mean that it will not detract from your parent's enjoyment of the print whatsoever. It really isn't nearly as bad as it seemed to be when we first saw the super-extreme crop of the knee cap.

I think that when you get your 20" by 30" print, you will wonder why you were ever even concerned about the noise at all.

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Tom Reichner wrote in post #18287336
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At that size, the noise won't be any problem at all. By that I mean that it will not detract from your parent's enjoyment of the print whatsoever. It really isn't nearly as bad as it seemed to be when we first saw the super-extreme crop of the knee cap.

I think that when you get your 20" by 30" print, you will wonder why you were ever even concerned about the noise at all.

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It's just that when I saw that unusual noise, it worried me to some extent since ACR couldn't do that much with it. I'm used to seeing the typical grainy stuff, but this was totally different, especially going to 20x30.
goatruckus basically proved it's Sony's JPG engine that's the issue.
I wish I could have gotten it better diffusely lit, shot in RAW, and composed it a little tighter.
All things to continue to learn with.
I really appreciate the comments.

Merlin_AZ wrote in post #18287354
ACR couldn't do that much with it

It couldn't do much with it because you'd resized. It'll handle it ok on the un-resized file, I promise.

Damo77 wrote in post #18287369
It couldn't do much with it because you'd resized. It'll handle it ok on the un-resized file, I promise.

Respectfully, I disagree.
I opened up the original file in ACR and tried.

Merlin_AZ wrote in post #18287569
Respectfully, I disagree.
I opened up the original file in ACR and tried.

So did I. May I see yours?

The unbreakable law in photograph is TANSTAAFL. "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch."

Sometimes there was too much liberty taken when the shutter was released to get an excellent picture by any means in post-production.

RDKirk wrote in post #18288217
The unbreakable law in photograph is TANSTAAFL. "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch."

Sometimes there was too much liberty taken when the shutter was released to get an excellent picture by any means in post-production.

Please explain and/or decode.

P.S. I do get the first bit.

DaviSto wrote in post #18288224
Please explain and/or decode.

P.S. I do get the first bit.

Can't fix every bad photo in photoshop.

Damo77 wrote in post #18288127
So did I. May I see yours?

May we see yours with an explanation of how you achieved it.

Was the original image in its entirely posted somewhere? If not, then how could anybody other than Merlin open up the original in ACR?

Time to get this out and see what happen...