[Leica] Comparison of 4 noise reduction programs

[Don Dory]

Howard,  I am coming to believe that the software is very variable based on
the images rendered.   It is why my original post made little comment.   I
have found that different images from the same camera are rendered very
differently at so far random results.   That is why I have three different
programs other than lightroom.

Now,  whatever you do,  do not shoot with the. 11 monochrome.   Folks here
at LSI are showing amazing images at 80000 ISO.

On Sun, Apr 23, 2023, 2:48 PM Howard Cummer via LUG <lug at leica-users.org>
wrote:

> Hello Don and Howard.
>
> I don’t know if you frequent the Leica Camera Forum (l-camera-forum.com <
> http://l-camera-forum.com/>) at all, but if you do
> you might look at the topic “Leica Q2 (a noisy camera !) Your views
> please. At the end of page one discussion
> I posted a Q2 photo of a friend cooking at ISO 6400 where the noise level
> is appalling. I used DxO to clean it
> up and posted that photo as well. Have a look if you like and can.
>
> I haven’t used LR enhance so I can’t comment in its effectiveness, but I
> have found with the Q2 the best
> noise reduction image / enhance program, by far, is DxO extreme.
> Previously I used stand alone Topaz Noise
> Reduction and Topaz Sharpen with varying degrees of success (faces too
> plastic in some cases for my taste).
> When Topaz Ai was introduced I transitioned to that and was more satisfied
> until trying DxO.
>
> So, in sum Don, I find your results at variance to my experience. I’m not
> trying to start a fight here, I’m just sayin’.
>
> I should add Don, that although I don’t comment on a frequent basis, I
> very much enjoy your many posted photos, illustrating life today.
>
> Cheers,
> Howard
> > On Apr 23, 2023, at 8:03 AM, lug-request at leica-users.org wrote:
> >
> > Message: 10
> > Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2023 18:45:59 -0500
> > From: Don Dory <don.dory at gmail.com <mailto:don.dory at gmail.com>>
> > To: Leica Users Group <lug at leica-users.org <mailto:lug at leica-users.org>>
> > Subject: Re: [Leica] comparison of 4 noise reduction programs
> > Message-ID:
> >       <
> CA+3n+_mc8eg1JFVcbZ6+Cmjj78iad4n_XVRe_ozjuKxuZwh4jA at mail.gmail.com
> <mailto:CA+3n+_mc8eg1JFVcbZ6+Cmjj78iad4n_XVRe_ozjuKxuZwh4jA at mail.gmail.com
> >>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> >
> > Howard, the algorithm in Topaz frequently has an issue with letters.   As
> > to DxO, I was at the middle level of effect with two higher levels
> > available.   I chose not to go there as I thought an intermediate level
> > would be a better comparison.   I found that if I mess with Topaz I can
> get
> > a good result but that involved fueling with the masks Abbott balancing
> > strength and clarity.
> >
> > I purposely picked a very poor image to show what the extreme would be.
>  I
> > can say that on images shot around 12000 ISO with some contrast in the
> face
> > DxO dies a better job than the Adobe product.   It's why I have all
> three.
> >
> >
> > Others have commented on the stand alone Topaz products,  I find their
> > DeNoise works very well on moderate noise if you don't need sharpening: I
> > will choose it when speed is important.
> >
> > On Wed, Apr 19, 2023, 5:59 PM Howard L Ritter Jr via LUG <
> > lug at leica-users.org <mailto:lug at leica-users.org>> wrote:
> >
> >> Don, the stunning superiority of the LR Enhance image in terms of
> >> sharpness of the subject?s hair, face, sweater, and nametag (or
> >> alternatively, the comparative lousiness of the other results) beggars
> >> belief. I have to wonder whether something didn?t go wrong. Among the
> >> three, only in the TopazAI is her face in focus, while it?s not even
> close
> >> in the other two. Something other than noise level is involved in the
> >> differences in resolution and focus. I can?t imagine there being any way
> >> that the level of detail in the LR image could have been recovered from
> a
> >> primary image as out of focus as the other two would suggest, even with
> a
> >> dedicated sharpening program, let alone merely a noise-reduction
> program.
> >>
> >> For example, in the LR image, look at the leftmost strand of hair, which
> >> goes from highlighted to darkly silhouetted against the background
> figure
> >> as it sweeps upwards. In the other images, there is not even the merest
> >> suggestion of this latter part, only the uniform blur of the background.
> >>
> >> Look at her nametag and ribbon. In three images, including Topaz AI, the
> >> printing isn?t even recognizable as such. But in the LR image, her name
> is
> >> not only recognizable, not only easily readable, but actually sharp,
> even
> >> down to the presence of the demarcation that shows her last name is
> >> ?Martin? and not ?Martln?. And it?s puzzling that the TopazAI image,
> which
> >> has the face in so much better focus than the Topaz DeNoise and the DxO,
> >> doesn?t do any better on the nametag.
> >>
> >> How can this be? Did one program perform magic, or did the other three
> >> actually degrade details?
> >>
> >> Can you post the unprocessed image for comparison? That would be
> extremely
> >> interesting.
> >>
> >> ?howard
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information