I have seen some of my shots at 1600 ISO look fairly noisy for indoor gym at the kids high school. I always shoot raw and have High ISO noise reduction to normal. Do any of you use the High setting and if so do you see a big degradation in image quality?
i shoot with a D3s so i cannot commit on the D4 but I would think ISO 1600 is nothing for this body. i find when i expose to the right i can push it up to ISO 8000 with no worries. i shoot with noise reduction on normal.
I agree with Grantland's d3s experiences. I've not used a d4, but ISO 1600 on the d3s is not all that different than ISO 200, to my eyes, assuming that the exposure is correct and not needing any push in post.
I'd have given almost anything to have had d3s performance about 7 years ago, when I was trying to shoot high school indoor sports with the d200.
FWIW, I use the low NR setting for high ISO shots, Jorge, on both the d3s and d800, among others. So, I can't answer your question as to how much the image deteriorates at the high NR setting. Sorry.
Hope you get someone to better answer your question.
Jorge Torralba wrote:
I have seen some of my shots at 1600 ISO look fairly noisy for indoor gym at the kids high school. I always shoot raw and have High ISO noise reduction to normal. Do any of you use the High setting and if so do you see a big degradation in image quality?
Thanks
Yes, and Yes. I didn't like it and keep it turned off. I can clean up any noise with software. But, I have compared my D3s and D4 images for noise at various ISOs and found not practical difference, though the D4 seems a little better.
I have one B roll image shot at ISO 8K. Any noise didn't seem to be a problem. This jazz club is not as poorly lit as a gym. Also, seeing noise on these posts is difficult, but, the image you see looks clean at 100%.
If you shoot raw it doesn't really matter what your NR settings are unless your using Nikon software to process. And even then, you can probably choose what setting you want after the fact. LR doesn't read the NR setting.
Nathan Padgett wrote:
If you shoot raw it doesn't really matter what your NR settings are unless your using Nikon software to process. And even then, you can probably choose what setting you want after the fact. LR doesn't read the NR setting.
You are correct. The image I posted did not have any noise reduction applied.
I shoot at ISO 6400 with my D4 and can barely see the noise. I turn off all noise reduction and deal with it in ACR-if necessary. A comment on noise. If you have a strong well framed image (note that in the image of the two musicians, above, the drummer is OOF) noise is really not important. Focus and composition is very important.
I have shot a concert recently and I used ISO6400 and even 12800 most of the time without a problem. There is some noise if you look at some details but nothing to worry about. As said above, a correct exposure is very important but I assume you know that very well.
Jorge Torralba wrote:
I have seen some of my shots at 1600 ISO look fairly noisy for indoor gym at the kids high school. I always shoot raw and have High ISO noise reduction to normal. Do any of you use the High setting and if so do you see a big degradation in image quality?
Thanks
Jorge...
Post up a sample... let's see the issue.
Here is a D4 shot at 1600, JPG... minimal editing.
Shot looks weird: bad compression? Maybe post some 100% crops of iso 1600, will be much clearer in my opinion. For the few times I was able to use the D4, it handled noise with ease up to iso 12800 (you don't even notice any noise when it's for web at that iso speed).
Here's an image shot on my D4 at ISO 6400, High ISO NR turned OFF in camera. I did use a touch of noise reduction in post . . . I use Capture NX2 to process my images
You are looking at noise in an OOF image. Look at all the noise in the cat woman BG. If you have a good, of interest, in focus image in the FG you don't see the noise. Then you can apply crushing noise reduction the OOF BG only (by selection)-if you must.
Go back and look at the OOF areas from other cameras. I think you will find a variation of the same look. I can post a D800E image at ISO 1600 that show similar OOF.
SoundHound wrote:
You are looking at noise in an OOF image. Look at all the noise in the cat woman BG. If you have a good, of interest, in focus image in the FG you don't see the noise. Then you can apply crushing noise reduction the OOF BG only (by selection)-if you must.
also remember that the image I posted has been beat down pretty good to begin with so there is compression loss in there.
