Image noise...

This thing has been bothering me and still does..
This is the scaled down image: (1600px) from raw ...

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/Fve9​1L

Not seeing ANY noise from here. Can you post the .cr2 somewhere?

I looked at this photo at 2:1 on 22" monitor. I don't see ANY noise. Are you referring to the blurry background?

Hey Tom,
Look at the second image, the 100% crop. Check above the ears of the cat in the blurry background.
Can you see all that luminance noise?

I definitely see noise, but it isn't "bad noise" at all. . In fact, I just don't think that digital cameras - any of them - are capable of recording images such as this one with no noise whatsoever, unless some sort of noise reduction software or some sort of in-camera processing is employed.

But you are right in saying that there is noise in this photo. . To me, it is readily visible. . But it's not bad at all, no matter how strict one's standards are.


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Methinks OP is unnecessarily overly sensitive to the presence of digital noise, when you need to enlarge to 100% (generally speaking, about 40x magnification) to even see it.

This is about 10% of the frame from ISO 400 film from 50 years ago

Chrizz wrote in post #18545269
Hey Tom,
Look at the second image, the 100% crop. Check above the ears of the cat in the blurry background.
Can you see all that luminance noise?

I can see it.

I have seen noise like that in ISO 100 before, cameras do all sort of sensor sensitivity tweaking internally, the noise in certain ISO is not fixed.

Did you change exposure or curves in raw conversion?

Ok, If I look very closely, I can see some noise. IMHO, noise is not the problem here. If you printed this photo at 11"x17", my guess is you'd never notice it. Looking at THAT section of photo, at THAT size, from THIS distance, is going to look bad. Period.

I can take properly exposed photos with my 6D, view them at 2:1, from 12" away, and see a ton of noise. Zooming in to judge photos is an exercise in futility; nothing will look good. Properly exposed ISO 3200 photos from your T1i will look just fine at 8"x10". Presentation matters. Unless you are going to print this photo at 24"x36", and view it from 1 foot away, it is just fine. Nobody will ever notice noise in this photo at normal size and viewing distance.

Use a brush on the BG and apply NR a bit more aggressively.

Pekka wrote in post #18545275
I can see it.

I have seen noise like that in ISO 100 before, cameras do all sort of sensor sensitivity tweaking internally, the noise in certain ISO is not fixed.

Did you change exposure or curves in raw conversion?

In camera raw: exposure +0.40.

Bassat wrote in post #18545278
Ok, If I look very closely, I can see some noise. IMHO, noise is not the problem here. If you printed this photo at 11"x17", my guess is you'd never notice it. Looking at THAT section of photo, at THAT size, from THIS distance, is going to look bad. Period.

I can take properly exposed photos with my 6D, view them at 2:1, from 12" away, and see a ton of noise. Zooming in to judge photos is an exercise in futility; nothing will look good. Properly exposed ISO 3200 photos from your T1i will look just fine at 8"x10". Presentation matters. Unless you are going to print this photo at 24"x36", and view it from 1 foot away, it is just fine. Nobody will ever notice noise in this photo at normal size and viewing distance.

I sometimes see some HQ images with no noise whatsoever, i just keep wondering what the cause is...

Increasing exposure in post-processing will always increase noise. Better to over-expose the raw and back off in post. That said, I don't think this photo is noisy to start with.

For those who can't see noise, I am posting the following samples for comparison.

The first file is a small section of the image posted by the OP.

The second file is similar to what this section of the photo would look like if there were no noise.

Chrizz wrote in post #18545269
Hey Tom,
Look at the second image, the 100% crop. Check above the ears of the cat in the blurry background.
Can you see all that luminance noise?

Why in the world would anybody look at an image like this and then complain about noise? This is just beyond me.

Take an image from a $30,000 camera and do the same thing. Guess what will happen..........

Let's look for problems.....I'm sure we can find something somewhere.

OMG........look at this....what am I gonna do???!!

Noise tolerance is individual and quite variable. If one's tolerance for noise is low, best practice dictates learning how to expose to the right, and process accordingly. Underexposing, and pixel-peeping is going to lead to extreme dissatisfaction.

I am quite tolerant of noise, admittedly. Even knowing that, I've posted ISO 6400 shots from a 60D that looked good. Ditto ISO 102,400 from my 6D (lots of work, there!). I don't shoot that high, but the gear is more than capable, if deployed properly.

Tom Reichner wrote in post #18545290
For those who can't see noise, I am posting the following samples for comparison.

The first file is a small section of the image posted by the OP.

The second file is similar to what this section of the photo would look like if there were no noise.

Hosted photo: posted by Tom Reichner in
./showthread.php?p=185​45290&i=i261081963
forum: General Photography Talk

Hosted photo: posted by Tom Reichner in
./showthread.php?p=185​45290&i=i169216843
forum: General Photography Talk

Can you see the difference now?

When there is grain in an image, that is noise. . The real scene that was photographed did not have grain in it. . Such grain does not exist in real life - it is created by devices that we use to create images, such as cameras. . I think that if one sees a photo and does not see any noise, then perhaps they have been subconsciously conditioned to accept it as boing normal, and therefore they kind of "tune it out" without even realizing it.


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Reducing that minor level of noise to that degree is going to obliterate detail in the final result.