[Rondec]

My wife God love her found this thread and changed the settings before I had a chance to point her this way, However she says the pictures are now appearing darker than before she changed them. Yes less noise but not as crisp are we missing something?

JJ

It shouldn't make any difference with regard to exposure -- just fiddle with that using your EV compensation setting. Crispness/sharpness will decrease in relation to the amount of noise reduction that you use. I personally find that in camera noise reduction tends to be heavy handed and takes away too much detail, but if you want to use jpegs, than you have to use at least a little noise reduction on photos over 800 iso, anyway.

[jerryleejr]

My internet connection isnt the best I will try and post some examples in a new thread.

JJ

[pentax user]

iso 6400 raw to jpeg by pentax digital camera utility 4
100% crop
no any noise reduction applied

[bigdave69]

When I need to be rid of the noise at higher ISO settings, Lightroom 3 ( and Photoshop CS5) work miracles! Both programs have come miles to rectify this problem.

[GoldenRGuy]

When I need to be rid of the noise at higher ISO settings, Lightroom 3 ( and Photoshop CS5) work miracles! Both programs have come miles to rectify this problem.

With jpeg or RAW?

[Michele85]

Forgive me if I am repeating something that has been discussed (I am fairly new at reading the boards), but so far, I have not found an answer to my question. I have a K-7 I bought a little over a year ago, and before that I had the *istDS.

I recently took some pictures at ISO 400, and to me they seem to have a lot of noise. I had the High-ISO noise reduction set to high and for it to start at 400 ISO. However, to me, they look very noisy compared to some ISO 200 pictures I took on my *istDS. I am really not happy with them at all.

Neither picture has been post processed or anything (although normally I would brighten the first one a bit). The first one of the boy and girl is from the K7 and I did slightly crop it and then resize for uploading using PSE6. The second one was not cropped and was resized for uploading the same way.

Obviously, I am feel quite inexperienced in this area and I am wondering what the difference is? I really dislike pictures that aren't crisp and clear.

Thank you!!

[kh1234567890]

When I need to be rid of the noise at higher ISO settings, Lightroom 3 ( and Photoshop CS5) work miracles! Both programs have come miles to rectify this problem.

Silkypix 5 is not all that bad either. K-7 ISO 3200 :




And K-7 ISO 2500 :

---

Last edited by kh1234567890; 05-16-2013 at 03:20 PM.

[chipvn]

I've been using Adam's settings for quite a long time but still hope that I could have better result because I’m a lazy casual JPEG shoot.





I ran around the net to find out the best way to bring the K-7 JPEG high ISO noise performance as close to the RAW performance as possible. After found out some and also did some experiments to optimize, I found out the best compromised settings for me in low light situation:

• Jpeg mode: Portrait with:
  • High/Low key compensation set to -4. You will need to apply about +1Ev compensation to bring the picture back to normal exposure.
  • Fine Sharpness 2 and set to -2.
• NR medium and start at ISO400

This setting will have significant lower JPEG high ISO noise while remain quite an amount of detail.

Here are some examples with above settings - just resized using FastStone Image Viewer Program (Lancroz2 filter).

No #1: using DA40Ltd | ISO1600| f3.5 | 1/25s
No #2: using FA35/2 | ISO2500| f2 | 1/15s
No #3: using DA40Ltd | ISO3200| f2.8 | 1/10s
No #4: using DA40Ltd | ISO6400| f2.8 | 1/15s

[kh1234567890]

That last one is unbelievably good for a K-7 at ISO6400 !

[chipvn]

That last one is unbelievably good for a K-7 at ISO6400 !

Hi KH,

Yah, I also don't think that I could get that result before I took it as well.

Personally, after did some testing on different setting, I think the main problem for K-7 native poor high ISO capability is the High/Low Key adjustment (which doesn't have on K20). It seems that Pentax properly boost the brightness of the picture too much by the firmware (which might turn to boost noise as well) rather than the actual exposure from the sensor. By turning down the High/Low key to minimum (-4) and applying exposure compensation (real exposure to the sensor), the Jpeg high ISO noise is much better. By doing so, the noise is much lower so I could apply NR to medium to maintain fine detail cause I sometime found out that apply NR to Strong clear noise but also clear fine details as well.

[chipvn]

Just to provide some quick comparison for different K-7 NR settings. This is my quick test:

All Taken with body on the table and FA35/2 lens at f4 - Manual focus - 2s mirror lockup to minimise the focus difference and blur.

#1. Full picture @ISO200 - Ev Compensation +0.7:

#2. 100% Crop @ISO200 - Ev Compensation +0.7- for you to see the detail texture of the box:

#3. 100% Crop @ISO3200 - Ev Compensation +0.7 with NR Off:

#4. 100% Crop @ISO3200 - Ev Compensation +0.7 with Pentax Default NR (NR Medium start @ISO800):

[chipvn]

#5. 100% Crop @ISO3200 with Adam's NR settings:

#6. 100% Crop @ISO3200 with High/Low key -4 and Ev compensation to +1.3 - NR Low & Start at ISO400":

#7. 100% Crop @ISO3200 with High/Low key -4 and Ev compensation to +1.3 - NR Medium & Start at ISO400" (My Best Compromised):

#8. 100% Crop @ISO3200 with High/Low key -4 and Ev compensation to +1.3 - NR High & Start at ISO400": This is extream when you really hate noise

[asp1880]

Hi KH,

Yah, I also don't think that I could get that result before I took it as well.

Personally, after did some testing on different setting, I think the main problem for K-7 native poor high ISO capability is the High/Low Key adjustment (which doesn't have on K20). It seems that Pentax properly boost the brightness of the picture too much by the firmware (which might turn to boost noise as well) rather than the actual exposure from the sensor. By turning down the High/Low key to minimum (-4) and applying exposure compensation (real exposure to the sensor), the Jpeg high ISO noise is much better. By doing so, the noise is much lower so I could apply NR to medium to maintain fine detail cause I sometime found out that apply NR to Strong clear noise but also clear fine details as well.

All recent Pentax DSLRs choose a rather low exposure at low light levels, probably to make the images appropriately dark. Noise is reduced by setting an ample exposure, I also use as much as EC +1.3 at ISO 6400. Taking brightness down again using high/low key is a neat trick. I've considered it but never got around to trying it. I will try that soon.

Regards,
--Anders.

[milesy]

so a question here - how are you supposed to know how much EV to add to a photo in camera to ensure proper exposure and limit the amount of noise.....because if i adjust the settings to adams settings wouldnt i either get too bright or too dark images and still have to muck around with the RAW images to get the photo just right?

[chipvn]

I don't think Adam's setting make the picture under or over exposed cause it is only impact on the Noise reduction setting. If your pictures are under or over exposed by applying that setting, you might want to check how your metering mode working.

My settings is, indeed, need to apply Ev compensation. (about +1Ev comparing to your normal setting or Adam setting). How much total Ev is enough is another story and you need to check your Histogram to ensure that your picture is probably metered and exposed.

This is how I do to have proper exposure.