High ISO Noise Reduction

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I have a total rookie question, but was hoping someone could help me anyway. On my new 5d Mark II, it has 4 levels of noise reduction, but the order of their magnitude is unclear to me. For instance, the default setting is "standard" and the next option is "low", so my question is which is lower? My guess is that the order is as follows: 1) None, 2) Low 3) standard (default) and 4) High, but I would like confirmation. Also, what is the disadvantage to using "high" noise reduction? Does it lower the 3.9 fps? Thanks for your help.

garywc33 said:

I have a total rookie question, but was hoping someone could help me
anyway. On my new 5d Mark II, it has 4 levels of noise reduction,
but the order of their magnitude is unclear to me. For instance, the
default setting is "standard" and the next option is "low", so my
question is which is lower? My guess is that the order is as
follows: 1) None, 2) Low 3) standard (default) and 4) High, but I
would like confirmation. Also, what is the disadvantage to using
"high" noise reduction? Does it lower the 3.9 fps? Thanks for your
help.

Click to expand...

Please don't take this as a smart-a** answer but... you are in the perfect position to answer these questions for yourself and other non-5DII owners.

Take the same low-light, high ISO shot with each of the 4 NR settings, bring the four images up side-by-side in Photoshop and do a critical comparison.

Independant noise reduction test of many tools

http://www.michaelalmond.com/Articles/noise1.htm
http://www.michaelalmond.com/Articles/noise_conc.htm

top 3
noise ninja http://www.picturecode.com
neat image http://www.neatimage.com also a free version
PC http://www.focusforensic.shorturl.com/ free denoiser

Digifan..

From my own test and other, the in camera noise reduction results in lower sharpness and the images look very waxy.

I for one turned it off and plan to post process with better software. Depending on what your workflow and if you post edit, you may choose to have this feature on or not.

garywc33 said:

--
I have a total rookie question, but was hoping someone could help me
anyway. On my new 5d Mark II, it has 4 levels of noise reduction,
but the order of their magnitude is unclear to me. For instance, the
default setting is "standard" and the next option is "low", so my
question is which is lower? My guess is that the order is as
follows: 1) None, 2) Low 3) standard (default) and 4) High, but I
would like confirmation. Also, what is the disadvantage to using
"high" noise reduction? Does it lower the 3.9 fps? Thanks for your
help.

Click to expand...

I used noise nija 20 years ago and find my images very blury after processing in this tool.

since then I used Lightroom, but the noise reduction performance is not ok.

It looks like the best price/performance noisereduction is DPP:

noise ninja http://www.picturecode.com
neat image http://www.neatimage.com also a free version

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Canon EOS 40D Fw. 1.0.3
Canon EOS 5D Mark II Fw. 1.0.6
Sigma 10-20mm f1:4-5.6 HSM DG
Canon EF 16-35mm f1:2.8 L USM II
Sigma 18-50mm f1:3,5-5,6
Sigma 30mm f1:1.4 HSM DC
Canon EF 50mm f1:1.4 USM
Canon EF 70-200mm f1:2.8 L IS USM
Canon EF 75-300 f1:4-5.6 IS
Canon EF 85mm f1:1.8 USM
Kenko 1.4x Teleplus Pro 300
Canon Speedlite 420EX
Canon Speedlite 580EX II

citidon said:

From my own test and other, the in camera noise reduction results in
lower sharpness and the images look very waxy.

Click to expand...

+1....totally agree!

I have the same experiences too....so I turn this off 100% of the time.

Cheers!

Danny Tuason

citidon said:

I for one turned it off and plan to post process with better
software. Depending on what your workflow and if you post edit, you
may choose to have this feature on or not.

garywc33 said:

--
I have a total rookie question, but was hoping someone could help me
anyway. On my new 5d Mark II, it has 4 levels of noise reduction,
but the order of their magnitude is unclear to me. For instance, the
default setting is "standard" and the next option is "low", so my
question is which is lower? My guess is that the order is as
follows: 1) None, 2) Low 3) standard (default) and 4) High, but I
would like confirmation. Also, what is the disadvantage to using
"high" noise reduction? Does it lower the 3.9 fps? Thanks for your
help.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

--
http://www.pbase.com/dtuason

'A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have.'

Gerald Ford

Disable = no NR
Standard is in between low and strong ("medium")
Low is less NR than standard.
Strong applies the most NR, higher than standard.

I am very impressed at how well they have done the NR - it's way more pleasing to me than when I tested the D700. Even with strong selected, it doesn't smear the image the way the D700 does.

bill