Noise – You CAN See It…
Digital Noise – What it is and How to Correct it
In photography, the term
digital noise refers to visual distortion. Noise can distort the
visual detail of your photo and can give it a grainy appearance. Noise looks
like tiny colored pixels or specks in your photograph.
3 Things that can affect
digital noise – higher ISO settings, sensor size and long exposures. Once you
can pinpoint where the noise is coming from, you can take steps to avoid it.
But, there are times when may not be a
bad thing, it can give an image an artistic appearance
These are a few ways you can
prevent large amounts of noise:
Lower the ISO: Higher
ISOs produce more noise, so it helps to shoot with the lowest ISO that you can
while still maintaining proper exposure. Most of the newer DSLR cameras can
shoot at higher ISOs without producing noise.
Try opening up the aperture
first and slowing down the shutter speed down to the minimum acceptable speed
for the subject you are photographing before increasing ISO.
Larger Sensor: The
size of a camera’s sensor plays a large role in the final image quality,
including the level of noise in a photograph. Your camera’s sensor contains
millions of “photosites,” or light-sensitive spots used to gather and record
the information brought in through your camera’s lens. Larger sensors have the
ability to gather more information. Crop-sensor cameras produce more noise in
images at increased ISOs than full-frame cameras. Therefore, the larger your camera’s
sensor, the better the image quality and less noise.
Expose Properly: When
a photo is exposed properly, there is less introduction of noise into the
image. By getting your exposure right in camera, you can avoid unnecessary
noise. Exposing your images properly in camera goes a long way to
preventing undesirable noise.
Correcting Noise
Some cameras have built in
noise reduction, which could be helpful. There are times when high ISOs are
necessary and noise can be easily corrected in post-processing. In Lightroom’s
Develop Module, you can reduce the appearance of noise in your images by using
the Luminance slider in the Details panel. Simply move the slider to the right
to reduce noise, using caution to not take it too far. Too much noise reduction
can result in loss of detail in your images, giving them a “plastic” look.
There are many downloadable
apps available that will calculate depth of field, exposure and light meter
apps; lots of them are FREE. These can help calculate proper settings and
thereby reducing noise in your images.
All Photographs in this post/blog © Cheryl Howard
Comments
Post a Comment