A Fish, A Dog & Topaz DeNoise
Sorry I tried to get a bit more creative on the title but this is what I came up with.
I’ve been a little absent from this blog this week but I’m still trying to catch up with work after my trip to Houston last week. Actually the next couple of weeks will be a bit hectic so I may not be up to my usual schedule. In addition to today’s post on this site I’ve also posted a recap of my experience at the Paw Print Divas Pet Photography workshop on myPhoDOGraphy by Edith site. Click here to see that post and get a look at some of our furry models.
There are shooting situations we all find ourselves in when we just don’t have enough light to capture the image we want. When that happens we increase our ISO to allow us to increase our shutter speed. Luckily today’s DSLRs can handle high ISOs without much noise but even a little noise can be annoying in some images. Topaz DeNoise has been my go to noise reduction software for quite some time now but Topaz Labs just released an update that’s made DeNoise even better. The new interface enables you to bring back the detail in your images and the results are quite amazing.
I took this image at Ripley’s Aquarium and as you know the lighting isn’t great and I shot this with an ISO of 1250. After using DeNoise and bringing back some of the detail the image is pretty clean.
Here’s a before and after of an image I processed using DeNoise. This is Jesse who was being coy and hiding behind a big tree. My ISO was only 640 but I didn’t want any noise to distract from Jesse so I ran the image through DeNoise then brought back some detail. The difference is subtle but its there. Click on the images to enlarge.
Topaz DeNoise is regularly $79.99 but if you use coupon code “mardenoise” it’s 50% for the month of March. Click here to purchase or download a trial.
Before
After
Very Kewl,,,,,, 🙂 reminds me of years ago i used to do underwater photography 🙂 . Q
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March 14, 2014 at 7:47 am
Thank you.
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March 14, 2014 at 10:37 am
Good exemple of before and after, this plugin seem to do wonder on pictures. Great work, Edith!
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March 14, 2014 at 8:00 am
Thank you very much Anne.
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March 14, 2014 at 10:38 am
In general, do you reduce noise at the beginning of your processing or at the end?
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March 14, 2014 at 8:32 am
It really depends. If I have a lot of noise in the image I’ll reduce the noise first to see how it looks. I always duplicate the layer though and run DeNoise on a new layer. If the image has a little noise I’ll make my adjustments first and then decide whether it needs the noise reduction.
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March 14, 2014 at 10:40 am
Lovely shots!! I really love Topaz Denoise. I use Nik Efex for everything else but nothing can beat Topaz for noise reduction imho. 🙂
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March 14, 2014 at 11:00 am
Thanks laura. I agree with you. It does a fabulous job.
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March 14, 2014 at 2:09 pm
Both great but love that dog.
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March 14, 2014 at 11:12 am
Thanks Mark 🙂
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March 14, 2014 at 2:10 pm
It’s good software Edith. Smashing photos!
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March 14, 2014 at 12:47 pm
Thank Adrian.
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March 14, 2014 at 2:10 pm
I love the face of Mr. Fish!
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March 14, 2014 at 8:31 pm
Thanks Phil.
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March 14, 2014 at 9:49 pm
Looks really good Edith! Have you compared it to Lightroom’s noise reduction? I haven’t had a chance to try out Topaz DeNoise yet but I really love their other plugins. I have used Lightroom for a long time with decent results but always on the lookout for something better.
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March 14, 2014 at 10:31 pm
Hi Michael. I have tried out LR noise reduction and its OK. I think DeNoise does a much better job.
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March 14, 2014 at 11:25 pm
Thanks for letting me know. I will definitely check it out!
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March 15, 2014 at 12:47 am
Thanks Michael.
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March 16, 2014 at 11:45 pm
I spent several hours trying DeNoise this past weekend, but I wasn’t seeing any significant (or subtle) difference between DeNoise and Adobe’s Camera Raw Noise Reduction function. So considering that DeNoise is $79.99, I passed on buying it. I do have several of Topaz Labs programs (Adjust, Clean, Simplify, Details) and will probably have a few more before I’m done experimenting with all of them.
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March 18, 2014 at 4:15 pm
Thanks for your comments Russel. I really do like DeNoise and (for me) I’ve found that its worked wonders. It’s actually 50% off until the end of this month so only $39.99 which is a pretty good deal.
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March 18, 2014 at 6:21 pm
Great before/after examples Edith – especially the pup! I use the Nik Dfine tool and am very happy with it. How would you compare it to Topaz?
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March 18, 2014 at 9:33 pm
Thanks so much Tina. I’ve never used Nik Dfine so I can’t compare the two. I can tell you that I really like DeNoise and it works beautifully. You can always download a trial and check it out. If you do I’d be interested to know how you would compare the two.
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March 18, 2014 at 11:58 pm