What could the cause of noise be?

M

McNyat

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Ciaran
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Hi all,
I have recently bought a friends computer that has lightroom 3 which I have found to be great.... except for one thing. There is alot of noise in the pics that i process using the programme. I have spent alot of time researching this and tried tweaking the various settings, with little success. When i can get the lowest levels of noise the images arent very sharp.
Can anyone advise me as to what the best 'preset/start-up' settings are and how I can save them so that when I start-up Lightroom they will be set that way?
Any help with this would be great.:shrug:
 
Obvious question: What ISO were you shooting at? Can you put up some examples of the noisy shots?
 
The classic causes are high iso (as said above) and under exposure, or a combination of both. Try and expose to the right so your nearly clipping the highlights, but just not quite clipping, Can you upload a raw file for us to see?
 
McNyat said:
Can anyone advise me as to what the best 'preset/start-up' settings are and how I can save them so that when I start-up Lightroom they will be set that way?
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Best startup settings for low noise will depend on the ISO used. Except for one - set the Exposure to zero. Most people who complain about noisy images will have underexposed during shooting, then wind up the 'Exposure' setting in LR. This is a sure-fire way to generate lots of noise.

Ironically, it's normally fear of noise that makes people underexpose - because they're too scared of using high ISO.

As for saving values to be applied as defaults. In the 'Develop' module hold the 'Alt' key down and the buton in bottom right changes from 'Reset' to 'Set Default'.
 
Thanks for the replies. I will try to upload some of the pics later. The iso's wern't high - 200 - 400 and in some instances 800.
Any other thoughts?
 
From your initial post, it appears you think that Lightroom is generating the noise

Are you generating the same levels of noise when edited in other programs as the software should not have any bearing on the noise created whilst taking the photos (unless you have some weird preset that is applied to all imported photos)

All the editing does is amplify (by adjusting exposure for example) of correct noise (if using noise reduction in LR for example)

Also, are you shooting RAW or JPEG??
 
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The shots were taken in raw mode. I also feel that there is a preset in LR that is creating the noise as when I use the supplied Cannon Raw software (Digital photo professional) the same problem is non existant.:help:
 
McNyat said:
The shots were taken in raw mode. I also feel that there is a preset in LR that is creating the noise as when I use the supplied Cannon Raw software (Digital photo professional) the same problem is non existant.:help:
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There is nothing in LR will add noise, buy you could be adding grain, whats that slider at?
 
Do you have noise reduction turned on in camera? I believe the manufacturers software can pick-up the settings you have used in the cam when you import into the PC. I know this works with Nikons and D-Lighting, so maybe the same with Canon NR?
 
Are you (or the preset) applying an sharpening in lightroom, agressive sharpening can make the noise a lot more visible?

If you can upload a raw file we can compare it in photoshop and lightroom and see if theres anything obvious going on.
 
Thanks guys, didnt get a chance yesterday evening. will upload later on.
 
swanseamale47 said:
Are you (or the preset) applying an sharpening in lightroom, agressive sharpening can make the noise a lot more visible?

If you can upload a raw file we can compare it in photoshop and lightroom and see if theres anything obvious going on.
Click to expand...

Tried to upload a raw file but couldnt get it done. Is a raw file not too large to upload? :shrug:
 
If this is a legal copy of Lightroom? If so, why not just un-install it, delete the existing catalogue, remove the Lightroom folders, reboot and re-install it? Nothing in Lightroom will be adding noise unless you've told it to, so I feel something's gone awry. Rather than track things like this down, I just nuke it, and start again. Usually faster.
 
boyfalldown said:
There is nothing in LR will add noise, buy you could be adding grain, whats that slider at?
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? oh yes there is if you lighten the shadows you will get lots of noise and if you up the exposure to far the same also many other adjustment can add it....That is why its best to shoot to the right.
 
Chaz Photos said:
? oh yes there is if you lighten the shadows you will get lots of noise and if you up the exposure to far the same also many other adjustment can add it....That is why its best to shoot to the right.
Click to expand...

That makes sense to me now as i applied a fair amount of fill light to many photos. I assume that if the shots are slightly over exposed, darkening them down would not have the same destructive effect?
 
Chaz Photos said:
? oh yes there is if you lighten the shadows you will get lots of noise and if you up the exposure to far the same also many other adjustment can add it....That is why its best to shoot to the right.
Click to expand...

thats a whole different issue. The exposure, or any of the other sliders in the basic section do not add noise,
 
jacob12_1993 said:
They do if the image is underexposed and you try and boost the exposure with the exposure or fill sliders. :)
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No, they don't add it - they just make it more visible ;)
 
jacob12_1993 said:
They do if the image is underexposed and you try and boost the exposure with the exposure or fill sliders. :)
Click to expand...

as above they do not add noise. They increase (or decrease) exposure or other parts of the histogram, but they do not add noise. They may make it more visible, but thats not the same as adding it
 
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