FZ1000 ISO 6400 - Comparison of five noise reduction software programs

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

Disclaimer: I am not a noise reduction software expert. Prior to today, most of these programs I have not used in years. My normal noise reduction software is ACR. That may change soon.

Below is my comparison of five noise reduction software programs. These were compared by starting with a FZ1000 ISO 6400 RAW image. The actual noise reductions were done on a jpeg crop. The Neat Image trial would only process a 1600x1600 file maximum. Topaz, DXO, and Neat Image are trial subscriptions.

With Adobe ACR and Topaz, my goal was to adjust the sliders to get rid of noise without sacrificing detail. Of the two, to me, Topaz was more difficult because the preview window was not that accurate. Or, it could be user error.

With DXO (not Prime), Neat Image, and Nik Dfine, I let the program decide. DXO had an adjustable slider but I found the auto output fine.

I probably could have messed with Topaz a little more to bring out a touch more detail. I chose three separate settings, exported the files, then got tired of not being able to see an accurate preview window. With DXO, using a RAW file and Prime would probably have resulted in better output, based on comments I have read about DXO Prime.

So, here you go. Click on original size for a bigger view, then click on that image with your mouse for an even larger view.

Below is the original image I processed in case someone wants to mess with it and re-post.

Jeff Greenberg · Nov 8, 2018

Thanks. Any conclusions & obvious rankings?
(asked elsewhere, too)

Erik Ohlson · Nov 8, 2018

Offside said:
Disclaimer: I am not a noise reduction software expert. Prior to today, most of these programs I have not used in years. My normal noise reduction software is ACR. That may change soon.

Below is my comparison of five noise reduction software programs. These were compared by starting with a FZ1000 ISO 6400 RAW image. The actual noise reductions were done on a jpeg crop. The Neat Image trial would only process a 1600x1600 file maximum. Topaz, DXO, and Neat Image are trial subscriptions.

With Adobe ACR and Topaz, my goal was to adjust the sliders to get rid of noise without sacrificing detail. Of the two, to me, Topaz was more difficult because the preview window was not that accurate. Or, it could be user error.

With DXO (not Prime), Neat Image, and Nik Dfine, I let the program decide. DXO had an adjustable slider but I found the auto output fine.

I probably could have messed with Topaz a little more to bring out a touch more detail. I chose three separate settings, exported the files, then got tired of not being able to see an accurate preview window. With DXO, using a RAW file and Prime would probably have resulted in better output, based on comments I have read about DXO Prime.

So, here you go. Click on original size for a bigger view, then click on that image with your mouse for an even larger view.

Below is the original image I processed in case someone wants to mess with it and re-post.

Good job - Thank You !!

I often wonder if my Topaz Denoise 5 is still up to snuff, and you have reassured me.

Back in 2005, when I was totally new to Digital, we took "One helluva' trip", from California to Tahiti & by ship to Pitcairn island (observed a total solar eclipse nearby) to Easter Island, and several locations in Peru, including Machu Picchu & Lake Titicaca.

On the bus from Cuzco to lake Titicaca, going fast on poor roads, I decided to just set my little Minolta X-50 to maximum ISO (400 !! ) for maximum shutter speed (no manual settings) and point the camera out the window & a bit forward, pressing the button whenever I saw something interesting.

Pretty noisy.

After reading a lot on DP Review, I got Topaz De-noise 5 several (?) years later.

Here is a shot I took while the bus was stopped, waiting to go thru an intersection In the town of Juliaca, which consisted of a huge puddle - the "rules", as always in Peru, at that time, were: keep inching ahead until you finally block cross-traffic, and GO. Next to us was one of the few actual, modern cars we saw in those parts - he snuck across with our bus to protect him:

fc3c2cbbb7ed4949a94de06b20db2229.jpg.png

Straight out of Camera - unprocessed and full size. Lots of ISO & Chroma noise. Look at the car's paint and window, and the grill on the distant truck.

And here, with Topaz Denoise 5, level 35 - no other processing:

Looks a lot better: paint & glass smooth; minimal detail lost in the truck grill. Further "reduction'" levels, up to "100" just soften details with no improvement in IQ.

This compares favorably with your results - I don't think I'll be spending any money searching for more

--
"Measure wealth not by things you have but by things for which you would not take money"
www.flickr.com/ohlsonmh/ [email protected]

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

Erik Ohlson said:
Offside said:

Disclaimer: I am not a noise reduction software expert. Prior to today, most of these programs I have not used in years. My normal noise reduction software is ACR. That may change soon.

Below is my comparison of five noise reduction software programs. These were compared by starting with a FZ1000 ISO 6400 RAW image. The actual noise reductions were done on a jpeg crop. The Neat Image trial would only process a 1600x1600 file maximum. Topaz, DXO, and Neat Image are trial subscriptions.

With Adobe ACR and Topaz, my goal was to adjust the sliders to get rid of noise without sacrificing detail. Of the two, to me, Topaz was more difficult because the preview window was not that accurate. Or, it could be user error.

With DXO (not Prime), Neat Image, and Nik Dfine, I let the program decide. DXO had an adjustable slider but I found the auto output fine.

I probably could have messed with Topaz a little more to bring out a touch more detail. I chose three separate settings, exported the files, then got tired of not being able to see an accurate preview window. With DXO, using a RAW file and Prime would probably have resulted in better output, based on comments I have read about DXO Prime.

So, here you go. Click on original size for a bigger view, then click on that image with your mouse for an even larger view.

Below is the original image I processed in case someone wants to mess with it and re-post.

Click to expand...

Good job - Thank You !!

I often wonder if my Topaz Denoise 5 is still up to snuff, and you have reassured me.

Back in 2005, when I was totally new to Digital, we took "One helluva' trip", from California to Tahiti & by ship to Pitcairn island (observed a total solar eclipse nearby) to Easter Island, and several locations in Peru, including Machu Picchu & Lake Titicaca.

On the bus from Cuzco to lake Titicaca, going fast on poor roads, I decided to just set my little Minolta X-50 to maximum ISO (400 !! ) for maximum shutter speed (no manual settings) and point the camera out the window & a bit forward, pressing the button whenever I saw something interesting.

Pretty noisy.

After reading a lot on DP Review, I got Topaz De-noise 5 several (?) years later.

Here is a shot I took while the bus was stopped, waiting to go thru an intersection In the town of Juliaca, which consisted of a huge puddle - the "rules", as always in Peru, at that time, were: keep inching ahead until you finally block cross-traffic, and GO. Next to us was one of the few actual, modern cars we saw in those parts - he snuck across with our bus to protect him:

Straight out of Camera - unprocessed and full size. Lots of ISO & Chroma noise. Look at the car's paint and window, and the grill on the distant truck.

And here, with Topaz Denoise 5, level 35 - no other processing:

Looks a lot better: paint & glass smooth; minimal detail lost in the truck grill. Further "reduction'" levels, up to "100" just soften details with no improvement in IQ.

This compares favorably with your results - I don't think I'll be spending any money searching for more

You are welcome. I use to use Topaz years ago. Same with Neat Image.

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

Jeff Greenberg said:
Thanks. Any conclusions & obvious rankings?
(asked elsewhere, too)

I replied in the Sony thread with a DXO Prime raw example.

I'm wrong? How to reduce RX10m4 noise (examples)

Hello, I'm new here and new with Sony RX10m4 Cyber-Shot camera. I love sports and do some job with that. Some times I take ice hockey game picture. I know, that this game need not less 1/800 sec., but I can't use that, because even with ISO-3200 is a lot of noise in the picture and faces not...

www.dpreview.com

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

This is a Sony RX10 IV ISO 6400 image that was being discussed in the Sony Cybershot forum. I guess it's the nature of the image that makes it more difficult to process with noise reduction. The DXO Prime image is adding an enhancement but I can't see where to turn it off. Auto levels performed on each one.

Jeff Greenberg · Nov 8, 2018

Why does only DXO Prime coloring look much closer to probable reality?

--
shoot first, apologize as needed, smile...

kohinoor · Nov 8, 2018

In DXO under "View" you can show all palettes ... then you can see which enhancements are active and turn the unwanted off.

kohinoor · Nov 8, 2018

Below a comparison of DXOprime (left) vers Topaz as per your files:

At this high magnification one can also see the different nature of DXOprime. -It doesn't smare the noise away but rather turns it into very fine grain. This leads to a higher quality file after NR and in further processing this leafes more leeway before unwanted effects such as posterisation occure.

It is true that DXOprime needs a lot of processing power and time (depending on computer capacity) but one can let the software do the processing in the background and meanwhile do any other task ore surf the net....

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

Jeff Greenberg said:
Why does only DXO Prime coloring look much closer to probable reality?

It's was doing a RAW white balance and auto coloring. When I turned all the extra settings off, it is still adding enhancements.

Offside · Nov 8, 2018

kohinoor said:
In DXO under "View" you can show all palettes ... then you can see which enhancements are active and turn the unwanted off.

I've un-ticked everything in Edit>Preferences and everything but Noise Reduction in the Essentials list of items. DXO is still adding warmth to the image.

fotomotovfr · Nov 8, 2018

Offside said:
Below is the original image I processed in case someone wants to mess with it and re-post.

Using the method I learned for LR:

M_digicapt · Nov 8, 2018

kohinoor said:
Below a comparison of DXOprime (left) vers Topaz as per your files:

At this high magnification one can also see the different nature of DXOprime. -It doesn't smare the noise away but rather turns it into very fine grain. This leads to a higher quality file after NR and in further processing this leafes more leeway before unwanted effects such as posterisation occure.

It is true that DXOprime needs a lot of processing power and time (depending on computer capacity) but one can let the software do the processing in the background and meanwhile do any other task ore surf the net....

The DXO result is markedly better. I don't mind the grain...

alcelc · Nov 8, 2018

Offside said:
Disclaimer: I am not a noise reduction software expert. Prior to today, most of these programs I have not used in years. My normal noise reduction software is ACR. That may change soon.

Below is my comparison of five noise reduction software programs. These were compared by starting with a FZ1000 ISO 6400 RAW image. The actual noise reductions were done on a jpeg crop. The Neat Image trial would only process a 1600x1600 file maximum. Topaz, DXO, and Neat Image are trial subscriptions.

With Adobe ACR and Topaz, my goal was to adjust the sliders to get rid of noise without sacrificing detail. Of the two, to me, Topaz was more difficult because the preview window was not that accurate. Or, it could be user error.

With DXO (not Prime), Neat Image, and Nik Dfine, I let the program decide. DXO had an adjustable slider but I found the auto output fine.

I probably could have messed with Topaz a little more to bring out a touch more detail. I chose three separate settings, exported the files, then got tired of not being able to see an accurate preview window. With DXO, using a RAW file and Prime would probably have resulted in better output, based on comments I have read about DXO Prime.

So, here you go. Click on original size for a bigger view, then click on that image with your mouse for an even larger view.

Below is the original image I processed in case someone wants to mess with it and re-post.

Or you might try the following:

Burst mode (I suppose M might be enough),
ISO highest as your camera can go,
Any shooting mode (e.g. I prefer A, set to slightly over expose for better shadow noise control, says EC 1/3ev etc),
Take 5~7 shots usually could be alright (less than 2" handholding),
Do Median Stack in Photoshop.

I had good clean shots looking like base ISO from the above method. Might worth to try it out.

--
Albert

kohinoor · Nov 8, 2018

Offside said:
kohinoor said:

In DXO under "View" you can show all palettes ... then you can see which enhancements are active and turn the unwanted off.

Click to expand...

I've un-ticked everything in Edit>Preferences and everything but Noise Reduction in the Essentials list of items. DXO is still adding warmth to the image.

Klick "Apply Preset" in the upper right corner. There is one preset called "No Corrections". This will give you a completely uncorrected RAW. If then you activate only the noise reduction it won't do anything else.

Offside · Nov 9, 2018

kohinoor said:
Offside said:

kohinoor said:

In DXO under "View" you can show all palettes ... then you can see which enhancements are active and turn the unwanted off.

Click to expand...

I've un-ticked everything in Edit>Preferences and everything but Noise Reduction in the Essentials list of items. DXO is still adding warmth to the image.

Click to expand...

Klick "Apply Preset" in the upper right corner. There is one preset called "No Corrections". This will give you a completely uncorrected RAW. If then you activate only the noise reduction it won't do anything else.

Thanks. That worked.

bill hansen · Nov 9, 2018

Is your camera on a tripod for shooting that procedure?

alcelc · Nov 9, 2018

bill hansen said:
Is your camera on a tripod for shooting that procedure?

Not necessary since mostly editing software, like Photoshop, will do the alignment work.

Because of using burst, and ISO6400~25600 generally permits using faster shutter speed (ambient lighting condition dependent), such that the fast sequential shooting plus relatively faster shutter speed can keep possible movement minimal among the shots.

I do it handheld. On GX85, which originally can produce acceptable clean SOOC image with slightly over exposure up to ISO3200, I can get better than ISO200 SOOC result (NR=0 on photo style use) from stacking of 6~7 ISO25600 images.

Might worth to try it. Fun to use on relative still target (remain still for 1" or so).

--
Albert

Jeff Greenberg · Nov 9, 2018

Link to tutorial on stacking very high ISO noisy images
to create single near noiseless image...?
Thanks in advance.

alcelc · Nov 9, 2018

Jeff Greenberg said:
Link to tutorial on stacking very high ISO noisy images
to create single near noiseless image...?
Thanks in advance.

FZ1000 ISO 6400 - Comparison of five noise reduction software programs

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