Thanks Lotus - this one preserves the richer colour, but I still think I would prefer to print the original. This one looks a bit smeary and plasticky. We didn't worry about grain in the old days, in fact, I remember going to some lengths to make sure that grain was crisp in my black and white prints. I also don't think this kind of NR will do much to help out with the horizontal streaks, since they are quite large scale objects.

brainiac wrote:
cogitech wrote:
...Bibble... I'd love to have your RAW file to play with, so I can demonstrate how effective it really is.

OK - I'm very interested in that. It's a 28 meg file. I am uploading it now but it will probably take some time. The link is below, but please everyone don't kill my server.
http://cyberphotographer.com/c/20080628costa/838.CR2

Lost track of this thread. Downloading soon.

brainiac wrote:
24Peter wrote:
Now I suppose if you're purposely underexposing by two stops to get a faster shutter speed so your subject isn't blurry, you don't have much of a choice.

That's exactly it. Set iso 3200 and -2 exp comp, and you are now really shooting at 12800. Images will look very underexposed on the camera, but push two stops in your raw developer, and you have a nicely exposed shot like the one I showed above. It really is exactly the same thing as shooting at iso 12800, as your shutter speed and aperture are what they would be with that iso.

>But why not just get a camera that does what you want natively?

In my case, looking at the 5D and 1D3, and Canon's long-standing lead in sensors if not in noise-reduction, I decided that the 1Ds3 would very likely match the D3's famous high iso performance, so I went ahead and bought one instead of waiting for a D3. I figured Nikon's full-frame chip had probably caught up with the 2005 5D, and the rest is noise reduction. Luckily, it worked out for me, and I don't need to get a Nikon for high iso performance.

There is also the small matter of (full-frame 14 bit) 21 megapixel, which makes it the current king of everything image quality related, unless low iso clunky medium format appeals. It has 9 million more pixels than a D3, which, apart from anything else, makes cropping a pleasure. Although it narrowly beats the D3 at iso 12800, at iso 200 it stomps all over it.

The EOS-1D Mark III would be even better - by about 1-stop.

This is a bit of a crop from my 1D to get my foot out of the shot but it's @ ISO 3200 straight from ACR. I'd call it more than usable. Full exif and full size available here too.

OK. Here's a quick demo. The WB was difficult on this shot, but anyway:

RAW developed in Bibble Pro 4.10 with:

- Bibble Ev set at 0
- "Really low" tone curve
- Sharpening at 150 out of 400
- Sensor correction enabled (auto dead/hot pixel removal)
- Sean Puckett's "Sharpie" plugin enabled
- Sean Puckett's "Shady" plugin enabled and set to Ev to +1.75 , smoothness 1, colour 0.258
- Everything else basically at defaults

Output from Bibble to TIFF and run through Neat Image. Auto profiled.

Output from Neat Image to TIFF and then cropped/resized, small levels tweak, etc. in PS7(WINE).

brainiac wrote:
Thanks Lotus - this one preserves the richer colour, but I still think I would prefer to print the original. This one looks a bit smeary and plasticky. We didn't worry about grain in the old days, in fact, I remember going to some lengths to make sure that grain was crisp in my black and white prints. I also don't think this kind of NR will do much to help out with the horizontal streaks, since they are quite large scale objects.


I tried again and created a new profile for it in Neat Image. It looks a bit better, smoother, less noise grain, less plasticy with more detail. It's actually fairly similar to cogitech's attempt above, but has less magenta:

...and here is the same processing, but without any Neat Image (or any noise reduction, for that matter:

I think Richard's dust & scratch trick produces the most natural looking results.

Either way, a very usable camera at ISO 12800.

cogitech wrote:
I think Richard's dust & scratch trick produces the most natural looking results.

Either way, a very usable camera at ISO 12800.
I agree on both counts.
I want one as a "back up" to my 1DIII.

And here's the image converted with Aperture, without any NR or other steps applied. Just eyeballing the WB and exposure...

I don't see the big deal here... There's no question the 1Ds MkIII is an awesome camera, no one doubts it (except maybe the dark side folks

Just for curiousity sake, I also tried the following pic at 3200 with a -2 Exposure, which would yield the 12800 ISO, heres what I got, straight out of the camera with NO post-processing except for exposure increased in photoshop:

Camera: Canon EOS 5D
Exposure: 1/6400 sec
Aperture: f/1.2
Focal Length: 85 mm
ISO Speed: 3200
Exposure Bias: -2 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire

Thanks guys - it's really interesting to see the different raw processing outcomes. For the sake of easier comparison I gather them below.

ISO 3200, -2EV exp compensation, DPP +2EV, no NR, no sharpening, slight dust and scratches in photoshop:

So far I'm still digging my DPP version, though Aperture comes closest to improving on it. Neat Image seems to just make the image more plasticky. If I'd wanted that look I would've bought a D3! ;-) I don't think it would improve a print. It's interesting how Aperture has retained the colour of the plectrum better than all of them. Maybe stan didn't push it so far.

epuja wrote:
I don't see the big deal here... There's no question the 1Ds MkIII is an awesome camera, no one doubts it (except maybe the dark side folks

Just for curiousity sake, I also tried the following pic at 3200 with a -2 Exposure, which would yield the 12800 ISO, heres what I got, straight out of the camera with NO post-processing except for exposure increased in photoshop:

Camera: Canon EOS 5D
Exposure: 1/6400 sec
Aperture: f/1.2
Focal Length: 85 mm
ISO Speed: 3200
Exposure Bias: -2 EV
Flash: Flash did not fire

brainiac wrote:
So far I'm still digging my DPP version, though Aperture comes closest to improving on it. Neat Image seems to just make the image more plasticky. If I'd wanted that look I would've bought a D3! ;-) I don't think it would improve a print. It's interesting how Aperture has retained the colour of the plectrum better than all of them. Maybe stan didn't push it so far.
I agree with your taste, and considering that Aperture managed that with no extra work, it seems like really useful software as an investment. Might have to consider it, even before I can afford a 1Ds3! Could be good with 1D3?

Thanks epuja. By my reckoning the only shadowy area of your shot, on the left, looks pretty chopped up. The rest of the frame is brighter, so noise and streaks will be less apparent there. Also, detail looks low. I suspect that if my guitarist shot had been taken with a 5D, the shadow areas would be patchy to the point of ruining the picture. I use both cameras regularly, and I reckon that in difficult low light conditions my 1Ds3 is about a stop better than my 5D. However, you only see that if you downrez the 21 megapixel file to 13 megapixels before comparing them.


The above image is not the original -- It is smaller - hence the 'choppiness', I can post a 100% crop later today.

I would be very interested to compare the same resolution (i.e. downrezd 21mp image, or uprezd 5d image?)

I have no doubts the 1dsMkIII is better quality..its a fabulous camera.

RobertP wrote:
Lookin' good. Your image doesn't really have any bad color noise, and it has great detail, so I honestly don't mind the luminance noise, especially at that ISO.

Most NR software would probably make the image lose some of that "crispy" sharp look to it, so I'd keep it the way it is. You have a winner.



Yeah, PS and LR do fine with color noise. It is the Lum noise that catches us all in the end. When someone develops the algorithms to piece back together an image at 12800 ISO like it was taken at ISO 50, that will be like the guy who invented donuts (and how many donut shops do you see going out of business [Krispy Kream excluded]?).

Would we want that, 12800 ISO at the rate of 50? I've got a great ISO 800 B&W print hanging on the wall that I pulled through noise reduction in LAB color mode: clean as a whistle. Know what? I miss the noise...

Emile Gregoire wrote:
Would we want that, 12800 ISO at the rate of 50? I've got a great ISO 800 B&W print hanging on the wall that I pulled through noise reduction in LAB color mode: clean as a whistle. Know what? I miss the noise...


We would definitely want the option, but not the requirement (i.e. reduce opacity slider).

simonella_viru wrote:
...what do you think is a fair comparison between a super-mega-pixel camera like the 1ds3 and a camera like the d3 that has about half of the pixels?


Print them as a photographer would, not as a pixel peeper would.

32067dlm wrote:
simonella_viru wrote:
...what do you think is a fair comparison between a super-mega-pixel camera like the 1ds3 and a camera like the d3 that has about half of the pixels?


Print them as a photographer would, not as a pixel peeper would.

that's a very obtuse, shallow response. it's akin to saying:
- why don't you go out and shoot pictures
- why don't you switch to nikon

you're out of context of the discussion. people on this forum tend to look for technical, empirical reasons for why product-A is better than product-B. "pixel peeping" is one way to compare.

not everything is printed medium. there is something called the Interweb...

simonella_viru wrote:
32067dlm wrote:
simonella_viru wrote:
...what do you think is a fair comparison between a super-mega-pixel camera like the 1ds3 and a camera like the d3 that has about half of the pixels?


Print them as a photographer would, not as a pixel peeper would.

that's a very obtuse, shallow response. it's akin to saying:
- why don't you go out and shoot pictures
- why don't you switch to nikon

you're out of context of the discussion. people on this forum tend to look for technical, empirical reasons for why product-A is better than product-B. "pixel peeping" is one way to compare.

not everything is printed medium. there is something called the Interweb...

Actually it's about the only way to do it. Just keep printing larger and larger until one of them falls apart. The main advantage to more mega pickles is larger prints. Other than that there's not a lot of difference between the 1 series bodies.

simonella_viru wrote:
not everything is printed medium. there is something called the Interweb...

Why do you need 20+ megapixels for web use?

Gary Petersen wrote:
simonella_viru wrote:
32067dlm wrote:
simonella_viru wrote:
...what do you think is a fair comparison between a super-mega-pixel camera like the 1ds3 and a camera like the d3 that has about half of the pixels?


Print them as a photographer would, not as a pixel peeper would.

that's a very obtuse, shallow response. it's akin to saying:
- why don't you go out and shoot pictures
- why don't you switch to nikon

you're out of context of the discussion. people on this forum tend to look for technical, empirical reasons for why product-A is better than product-B. "pixel peeping" is one way to compare.

not everything is printed medium. there is something called the Interweb...

Actually it's about the only way to do it. Just keep printing larger and larger until one of them falls apart. The main advantage to more mega pickles is larger prints. Other than that there's not a lot of difference between the 1 series bodies.

no way! it's not the ONLY way to compare. as discussed earlier, you can up-scale, down-scale, etc. you CAN print, but you don't have to. also, taking printing out of the equation allows for a more fair comparison.

All though not ISo 6400 only 3200 I have shot many at 3200 and above with incredible results if you nail the exposure. These have had zero noise reduction applied and only tweaked levels, curves and added a little USM.







1d MK III ISO 3200 24-70 at 2.8. Original and 100% crop