Noise - Is it just me?

Back in the day, I shot lots and lots of Tri-X pushed to 1600 and lots of EastmanColor pushed as far as I could. Grain was just part of the equation, and often the grain pattern was almost as important to the emotion of the shot as the subject was. From reading these forums, it seems as though noise is something to be eradicated, even at the cost of begging off shooting situations where a high ISO will be required.

Is this attention to noise something unique to digital-only photographers, or is it also a concern to those who made the transition from film to digital? I know that these forums can make certain molehills look like mountains, so maybe the noise issue is an example.

Comments?

Joe Moche said:

Back in the day, I shot lots and lots of Tri-X pushed to 1600 and lots of EastmanColor pushed as far as I could. Grain was just part of the equation, and often the grain pattern was almost as important to the emotion of the shot as the subject was. From reading these forums, it seems as though noise is something to be eradicated, even at the cost of begging off shooting situations where a high ISO will be required.

Is this attention to noise something unique to digital-only photographers, or is it also a concern to those who made the transition from film to digital? I know that these forums can make certain molehills look like mountains, so maybe the noise issue is an example.

Comments?

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Grain is grain but digital noise produces ugly colored splotches which only detract. While some are bothered more by noise than others, usually it is to be avoided or minimized. Third party noise reducing software sells well.

I am not responsible for my opinions.

I think that most of the people here who complain about noise never shot film, or at least never shot high speed film. Just like you, I used to push Tri-X to 1600, and loved the results, including the grain. I am amazed at how noise-free modern DSLRs are. My 50D can get results at 6400 that far surpass Tri-X at 1600, or even 800. When I do B&W conversions, I frequently add grain. I particularly like DxO's Filmpack conversion to Tri-X.
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Alastair
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Photography is part art, part science, and that was also true in the film days as well.

Those biased more towards art tend to be more interested in the image itself, not the technical details and analysis. They are willing to accept an image that has some technical flaws, their reasoning being that it has little or no effect on the artistic statement of the image.

Those biased more towards science tend to analyze the image more closely and critique the fine details. This is not to say they can't also appreciate the artistic side as well, but their attention cannot be totally diverted away from analyzing the technical details of the image. Their goal is to achieve an image with as few technical flaws as possible, which is not inconsistent with the goals of the photographic industry as a whole. If nobody cared about image quality the concept of an "L" lens wouldn't exist.

While some may view the analysis of lens and noise performance as excessive, it leads to improvements in the equipment and technique that produces better image quality for all of us.

Joe Moche said:

Is this attention to noise something unique to digital-only photographers, or is it also a concern to those who made the transition from film to digital? I know that these forums can make certain molehills look like mountains, so maybe the noise issue is an example.

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I also started in film. As I recall, even back then photographers were obsessed with getting sharp images with minimal grain. I remember many articles and discussions about how to develop film in ways that minimized grain and kept contrast under control. My favorite film was TMAX 400, and I rarely went to higher ISO and never push-processed my film.

I am thrilled with the high ISO capabilities of new cameras.

Film is different. The grain is part of the medium - it's the physical / chemical part of that form of photography. It's consistent and can be manipulated with its processing - it's an underlying componenet of the photo, just like the surface a painter uses.

Digital is different - noise is the inability of the sensor / circuitry to produce a clean signal to noise ratio (high enough signal, low enough "noise") that will give you an accurate representation of the image you want to record. It's not always consistent or representative of what you are recording. "ISO" is simply the gain or amplification that is applied prior (or perhaps after - I don't know what the circuit looks like) to the A/D (analog to digital) converter. As you amplify the signal, you also amplify the inherent electronic noise in that signal. Sooner or later that noise becomes part of the image - and you don't want it.

From digital I want as clean an image as possible. If I want to emulate film, there Photoshop and plenty of plug-ins to simulate film grain.

When a manufacturer releases a camera that has "excellent high ISO capabilities", I think the camera's ISO range should be the image range where you get a clean - noise free image.

It would be great to have a standardized metric to evaluate cameras. I suspect, however, there are too many variations of criteria to come up with something measurable (what kind of light, high key versus low key photos, etc) and agreeable to the manufacturers.

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Carbonman

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dwalby said:

Photography is part art, part science, and that was also true in the film days as well.

Those biased more towards art tend to be more interested in the image itself, not the technical details and analysis. They are willing to accept an image that has some technical flaws, their reasoning being that it has little or no effect on the artistic statement of the image.

Those biased more towards science tend to analyze the image more closely and critique the fine details. This is not to say they can't also appreciate the artistic side as well,

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Yes it is. A lot of the naval gazers in this forum would argue endlessly about the chemical composition of Monet's paints and completely ignore the artistic.

dwalby said:

but their attention cannot be totally diverted away from analyzing the technical details of the image. Their goal is to achieve an image with as few technical flaws as possible,

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The OPs point: film grain was often a contribution to the artistic merits of the photograph and was not considered a "technical flaw." The question: Why digital photography techies insist on treated any and all noise as a "technical flaw?"

dwalby said:

which is not inconsistent with the goals of the photographic industry as a whole. If nobody cared about image quality the concept of an "L" lens wouldn't exist.

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The lens doesn't produce noise. The IQ characteristics from an "L" lens are sharpness, color, brokeh, low distortion, etc. Lens review sites don't do noise tests on lenses.

dwalby said:

While some may view the analysis of lens and noise performance as excessive, it leads to improvements in the equipment and technique that produces better image quality for all of us.

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You really haven't answered the OPs question at all.

dwalby said:

Joe Moche said:

Is this attention to noise something unique to digital-only photographers, or is it also a concern to those who made the transition from film to digital? I know that these forums can make certain molehills look like mountains, so maybe the noise issue is an example.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Carbonman said:

Film is different. The grain is part of the medium - it's the physical / chemical part of that form of photography. It's consistent and can be manipulated with its processing - it's an underlying componenet of the photo, just like the surface a painter uses.

Digital is different - noise is the inability of the sensor / circuitry to produce a clean signal to noise ratio (high enough signal, low enough "noise") that will give you an accurate representation of the image you want to record.

Click to expand...

If film grain is an underlying component of the photo, just like the surface a painter uses, then the exact same applies to digital noise. Some film had different grain characteristic than other film. Digital noise is an underlying component in the same way film grain is/was. Film grain could potentially interfere with the "accurate representation of the image you want to record" just as much as digital noise.

Carbonman said:

It's not always consistent or representative of what you are recording. "ISO" is simply the gain or amplification that is applied prior (or perhaps after - I don't know what the circuit looks like) to the A/D (analog to digital) converter. As you amplify the signal, you also amplify the inherent electronic noise in that signal. Sooner or later that noise becomes part of the image - and you don't want it.

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The OPs question: Why film grain and digital noise are treated and viewed so differently?

there is some psychology involved in this matter too. This ongoing discussion reminds me about the analog vs digital music arguments way back when. The first time I listened to a music CD, I was soooooo happy because I didn't even heard the supposed "metallic" or "artificial" sound that CD's had then; I just heard the music and perfect silence between songs. Even people who didn't have a musical training, nor perfect hearing and even less a "good" sound system, insisted they heard the music all wrong. I used to buy classical music records, and after only just one play, all those annoying noises began to appear, particularly where you could hear them better: at the lower volume passages. Very, very annoying.

Then came all those cleaning paraphernalia to keep the records clean, and those very, very costly high-end record players (that even defied gravity) and speakers. Where are these people today? Listening to their iPods.

So, for me, and I admit it, it would be ideal not to have noise at all. Absolutely none. Maybe the technology is too young yet, or maybe it's physically impossible (I don't know, I'm not a scientist), but, as a photographer who don't care much about the mechanical or scientific part of it, I still prefer no noise. I can accept that some people liked grain, or that maybe it didn't matter for them (and even that there are people who still prefer film), but for the most part I think that pictures with grain that have become icons have grain because the photographer couldn't help it. I may be OC, but again, like the example about music, I would be happier without noise in photography too (after all, both imperfections are called the same).

I think that part of the grain/noise inequality stems from a difference between displaying images on monitors and prints.
Noisy images in print do not look as bad as noisy images on the monitor.
Rgds

Welcome to the world of 100% magnification.

Back in the film days, NOBODY looked at "100% crops" beause there was no such thing.

You had your contact sheet and a loup. You picked the images you wanted, and you printed them.

Sometimes you would print large. But the vast majority of the people complaining about noise with digital cameras are looking at 100% crops despite never having made a 40-inch-wide print (that being a ballpark figure for how big a print you would have to make to get the equivalent of a 100% crop - although the specifics vary with your camera and monitor).

You could be a very experienced photographer and never print above 8x12. And that meant you never looked at your image bigger than 8x12. And that meant that the kind of noise most people are complaining about today at ISO 800 and 1600 was essentially invisible.

But today any hack can push a button, look at "100% view" and see all sorts of noise which is irrelevant to their image, and complain complain, complain. Despite the fact that today's high-ISO images are orders of magnitude cleaner than what you could get in the film era, it's now easier to find irrelevant details, and so people whine about them.

Carbonman said:

When a manufacturer releases a camera that has "excellent high ISO capabilities", I think the camera's ISO range should be the image range where you get a clean - noise free image.

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Two points:

First of all, this is what Canon (and, I believe, other manufacturers) are doing with "Extended" ISO options. After all, my 50D doesn't actually go to 12,800. It goes to 3200, with "H1" and "H2." Clearly that is an indication that I should expect reduced performance from those settings. You seem to be advocating that Canon shouldn't even give me those options, which is bizarre.

Second, "a clean - noise free image" is a very subjective thing. How are you printing? How much NR is acceptable? What's your target output size and format? I mean, if shoot ISO 100, and shoot, say, a sky, or a white wall, and look at it 100% ... you will see some noise. Not a lot, but it's there, there WILL be some random variation in color and tone. Therefore, you can't just say "clean - noise free image" in a void. You have to define your parameters. And once you're defining your parameters you're making a subjective evaluation, which means that by definition other people will want something slightly different.

I mean, I OFTEN shoot at ISO 3200 or 6400, wide open, 1/6th of a second, without a tripod, of people. Given these contraints, I'm - and my subjects - are very happy with a little bit of noise. A set of camera-manufacturing decisions which took away the ability to shoot at ISO6400, because it's not a "clean, noise free image," would take away my ability to get some of the shots I need to get.

Except electronic noise is not nearly as predictable. Depending on your lighting, what the AF system is doing, temperature, color component of the light, etc you will get widely varied noise.

Film grain was far more predictable and dependable, in my opinion. Depending on how hard you pushed the film and the processing, you could control the grain very well and consistently.
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Carbonman

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nikor said:

The OPs point: film grain was often a contribution to the artistic merits of the photograph and was not considered a "technical flaw." The question: Why digital photography techies insist on treated any and all noise as a "technical flaw?"

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I understood his point, but "often" does not mean always. I've seen grainy film enlargements that looked terrible, and did not contribute to the artistic sense of the image at all. Digital noise has a different appearance than film grain, so comparing the two as if they are the same thing is also not accurate. Saying that either one contributes artistically to an image is a very subjective claim, in SOME cases SOME people will consider them to have an artistic effect on the image, in many other cases they will not.

nikor said:

nikor said:

which is not inconsistent with the goals of the photographic industry as a whole. If nobody cared about image quality the concept of an "L" lens wouldn't exist.

Click to expand...

The lens doesn't produce noise. The IQ characteristics from an "L" lens are sharpness, color, brokeh, low distortion, etc. Lens review sites don't do noise tests on lenses.

Click to expand...

You missed my point, yet still confirmed it in the process. If photography is simply an art, with no concern for technical qualities, then why are all the lens characteristics you mention so familiar to even the most artistic of photographers??

I agree with the OP comment that excessive noise concerns have little or no effect on the artistic merits of a particular image. I simply suggested that all photographers have SOME interest in image quality, we just don't all agree on where the practical limit is. The fact that we don't agree doesn't mean some of us are right, and the others are wrong.

I'm not at all advocating to not have those ISO offerings, on the contrary - I want higher ISO offerings. I'm simply saying it would be nice to have a standard "rating system" for digital ISOs - just like film used to be rated.

TMax 400 is rated at ISO 400. Properly exposured, you would essentially get a "noise free - fine grained" image. That's not to say that you can't push the film higher and get a grainer image at a higher effective ISO. Also, TMax 100 is going to have "less noise" than the TMax 400 film. Again, you can push it, with a sacrifice in "noise".

My 1DsMk2 is essentially noise free up to ISO 800. From 800-1600 there is visable noise that is introduced into the image. In my "fantasy digital rating scheme", my camera would be rated as an ISO 800 camera - clean to 800 - I'm not sure what the criteria to measure "noise" would be, but I think you get the idea. The camera, though, is pushable up to ISO 3200 - albeit with noisier images.

The new 1DMk4 might be a ISO 3200 rated camera - clean images up to 3200. You can "push" the camera up to ISO 102K - but with a sacrifice in image quality.

That way I could look at the ratings and say, "The Mk4 is rated two stops higher than my Mk2", which would mean the images at 3200 on the Mk4 are as noise free as the images on my Mk2 at 800.

I hope that makes a little more sense.
--
Carbonman

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dwalby said:

I understood his point, but "often" does not mean always. I've seen grainy film enlargements that looked terrible, and did not contribute to the artistic sense of the image at all. Digital noise has a different appearance than film grain, so comparing the two as if they are the same thing is also not accurate. Saying that either one contributes artistically to an image is a very subjective claim, in SOME cases SOME people will consider them to have an artistic effect on the image, in many other cases they will not.

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There are two related things going on here.

The first is that grain is part of a particular aesthetic, and that aesthetic has been arbitrarily declared "good" by some people. Digital noise, on the other hand, may be objectively less of a problem (it may obscure less of the image) but it doesn't fit that aesthetic, and so it must be "bad."

The second is that, over the years, people learned how to work with grain - but of course there were 50, 60 years or photographic knowledge going into how to make grain work for you, and not against you. Our eyes were trained to accept grain, so we see it less ... but now it's been replaced by digital noise, which we haven't trained ourselves to view in as forgiving a light.

You saw something similar happen with the transition from vinyl music to CDs. CDs have their own unique mixing challenges, although they absolutely do offer better fidelity than LPs. So early in the transition, the best way to handle mixing for CDs was not known, and often they were mixed in a way that didn't maximize their strengths. But there was also the aesthetic component: the extra compression and mastering required to make an LP work (and it often required a lot of subtle dynamic range adjustments) - and CDs didn't have that. Even though it was giving you LESS absolute fidelity, it was an aesthetic, and that aesthetic was considered good. And it took a while for people to accept that CDs actually did sound better, because they didn't have that same set of forced aesthetic choices. (I read once that something like 95% of the rock albums made from the late 60s to the mid 80s went through the hands of one of 8 or 9 "masterers" in the transition to vinyl. OF COURSE that's going to affect what you think music is "supposed to" sound like, and you'll miss it when it's gone).

"Different" is often seen as bad, even when it's objectively better, until everyone adjusts. Probably 30 years from now, kids who have spent their whole lives looking at digitally-produced images will find film grain distracting in the same way that we are annoyed by noise.

Hi. I'm not a professional photographer but my eyes knows how to appreciate beauty of pictures produced by photographers. I've never used films and this is my first time to own a DSLR camera. However, I was exposed to photography at an early age. My brother used to bring me to his work where they do a lot of film photography.

Anyways, I love grain on pictures and I totally agree with Dr. Leonard. The noise you see in digital pictures are actually called artifacts or like in jpeg, quality loss. I also believe that grain should only be applied based on the mood of the portrayed on the picture.

I may be wrong but that's how I see grain.

Noise? .... yes, we should fix them.

I don't see the world through grain, I don't like pictures that see the world through grain, film or digital.

Film grain was one of those things where the industry decided they couldn't do anything about it, so they just decided to call it artistic.

Joe Moche said:

Back in the day, I shot lots and lots of Tri-X pushed to 1600 and lots of EastmanColor pushed as far as I could. Grain was just part of the equation, and often the grain pattern was almost as important to the emotion of the shot as the subject was. From reading these forums, it seems as though noise is something to be eradicated, even at the cost of begging off shooting situations where a high ISO will be required.

Is this attention to noise something unique to digital-only photographers, or is it also a concern to those who made the transition from film to digital? I know that these forums can make certain molehills look like mountains, so maybe the noise issue is an example.

Comments?

Click to expand...

I too shot lots of film back in the day. Pushing Tri-X resulted in grain. It was there and you really could do a whole lot to eliminate it. If I wanted less grain I used the specific films that were fine grained and didn't push them. But in many instances there was grain and we accepted it as part of the process.

Many users of digital cameras start using their wondrous machines at ISO 100. These cameras produce mostly noise free photographs. And we are happy. Then we push up the ISO and expect the same noiseless images. Anything less is no good. So the battle begins -- how to produce less noise all through the ISO range.

I accepted grain in film because I had to. Yes sometimes it was like art. But I never thought it added all that much to an image. Now with my digital cameras I prefer as little noise as possible. I don't have to have noise and I don't want it.

In the old days, there were some who would ONLY shoot Kodachrome with ISOs below 100, because they couldn't live with the higher speed film - they never touched Ektachrome because images were just too noisey (grainey). Most of us who shot slide film shot Ektachrome because of the extra speed and extra flexibility.

With B&W film, some would never shoot Tri-X because it was just too noisey. Others loved Tri-X and push-processed it one or more stops.

There's the same divide today with digital, except that many new to photography expect a lack of noise in their images. They can shoot at ISO 200 and slower and be happy (or get full frame if they want to stretch to ISO 400). The rest of us love that we can shoot at ISO 6400 when needed.
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Jeff Peterman

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