About Noise, Grain and Scanning

[lulalake]

This is what I do.

About the picture: It’s a long and kind of funny story, too long for this post so I’ll get to that in a different post.

Here’s the shot: It’s taken on a bright morning with Portra 800 ASA film, Jupiter-9 lens, I chose this speed film so I could get very fast exposures, They were shot from 1/350th to 1/1000th sec at F11- F22 depending on the lens. I used a Canon AL-1 QF with a M42 adapter. So I’m using a low contrast film, low contrast lens (with a yellowish color cast).



It was scanned on a Nikon Coolscan V ED at 4000 DPI. The original scan was “flat” with no tweaking other that manual focusing on the hair dryer in the fellow’s hand and resizing.

The Scanner comes with two pieces of software bundled in the Nikonscan software, Kodak ROC (restore original color)and GEM (Grain-Noise reduction software). These are my favorite grain noise reduction softwares.

Here’s a 100% blowup of the original shot, no tweaking




Next I show a scan with the color adjusted using ROC.



Then I show a scan with the color adjusted and the grain reduction software added.




Almost done:

I ALWAYS sharpen scans, “raw” scans are always a bit unsharp. I use The Light’s Right Studios sharpening scripts (not the actions). They are very useful and very subtle, one or two pixels wide sharpening and here is the result.



Here is the end result: (also spotted to remove processing dirt and dust)



The result is pretty subtle except for the color but the small enhancements work for me.

Cheers

Jules
_________________
Heisenberg may have slept here.

[Orio]

Very good noise reduction, indeed.
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ХОРИОС-61 ( ώρεος ) : Lens sana in corpore sano

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LENSES: Russian, Zeiss, Leitz, old Nikkors.
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"Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. " (George Orwell)
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[lulalake]

Thanks Orio,

You can google KODAK GEM (The noise grain reducer). There's a free trial download for the plug-in.

It seems Kodak was really going after film grain as it works very well on scanned images.


Jules
_________________
Heisenberg may have slept here.

[F16SUNSHINE]

Nice post Jules. I will try your process as it looks quite effective. Maybe your friend should research a commercial sandblaster. Certainly it would be easier on the wifeys hairdryer
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Pentax: Spotmatic,SpotmaticF,MX,6x7
Yashica FR, FX3, 124G
Asahi:SuperTak4/17,1.4/50,SMC1.4/50 1.8/55,3.5/55(67), 2.5/105(67)
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[lulalake]

[maddog10]

I would like to see the full size, color corrected shot (before noise reduction). I am always afraid to do too much noise reduction, afraid I might reduce more than just noise.

Looks like an excellent result!
_________________
Michael Hill

DSLR: Nikon - D3, D80, D40 Canon- 5D
Film: Nikon - F5, F2, F, EM, FG, FE, Nikkorex Contax - G2 Mamiya - M645 Olympus - OM1 Praktika - LTL PLC3 Pentax - Spotmatic SP Yashica Electro 35 GSN Zenit - B
Nikon Mount Lens: Nikkor - 2.8/20 2.8/24 2/28 2.8/28 3.5/28 2/35 2.8/35 1.4/50 1.8/50 2/50 1.8/85 2/85 2.5/105 2.8/135 3.5/135 2.8/180 4/200 4.5/300 Micro 2.8/55 Micro 4/200 Zoom 3.5/36-72 3.5/43-86 4/70-210 Sigma - Zoom 2.8-4/35-70 Soligor - 3.5-4.5/28-80 4.5/80-200 5.6/95-310 Tamron - SP 2.8-3.8/35-80 SP 3.5/70-210 3.8-4/80-210 Vivitar - 3.8/19 2.8/28 (Series 1) 3.5-4.5/19-35 (Kiron) 3.5/70-210 Zenitar - 2.8/16
Contax Mount Lens: Carl Zeiss - Biogon 2.8/21 Biogon 2.8/28 Planar 2/45 Sonnar 2.8/90 Yashica - 4.5/70-210
M42 Screw Mount Lens: CZJ - Flek 2.8/20 Flek 2.4/35 Tessar 2.8/50 3.5/135 Focal - 2.8/28 Helios - 44-2 2/58 44M 2/58 44M-4 2/58 40 1.5/85 Industar - 50-2 3.5/50 Jupiter - 37A 3.5/135 Meyer Optik Gorlitz - Domiplan 2.8/50 MIR - 24M 2/35 1B 2.8/37 Pentacon - 2.8/29 1.8/50 2.8/135 Pentax - SMC 3.5/135 SMC 4/200 SMC 5.6/400 Rexatar - 6.3/400 Rokinon - 3.5-4.5/35-135 Sears - 2.8/28 2.8/135 4.5/90-230 Soligor - 2.8/105 3.5-4.5/28-80

[lulalake]

Thanks Michael,

Sure. Here it is color corrected full size no noise reduction. (Converted to .jpg from .tif)

http://tinyurl.com/4nqkjg

I'll leave it up for a while. It's biiiig 4.5 megs


Jules
_________________
Heisenberg may have slept here.

[maddog10]

Thanks Jules.
I just wanted to see if noise reduction would even be needed. The color correction is the main thing that was need for the photo. I like the version without the noise reduction, but I can see where a slight reduction can make an improvement. Thanks for posting this series.
_________________
Michael Hill

DSLR: Nikon - D3, D80, D40 Canon- 5D
Film: Nikon - F5, F2, F, EM, FG, FE, Nikkorex Contax - G2 Mamiya - M645 Olympus - OM1 Praktika - LTL PLC3 Pentax - Spotmatic SP Yashica Electro 35 GSN Zenit - B
Nikon Mount Lens: Nikkor - 2.8/20 2.8/24 2/28 2.8/28 3.5/28 2/35 2.8/35 1.4/50 1.8/50 2/50 1.8/85 2/85 2.5/105 2.8/135 3.5/135 2.8/180 4/200 4.5/300 Micro 2.8/55 Micro 4/200 Zoom 3.5/36-72 3.5/43-86 4/70-210 Sigma - Zoom 2.8-4/35-70 Soligor - 3.5-4.5/28-80 4.5/80-200 5.6/95-310 Tamron - SP 2.8-3.8/35-80 SP 3.5/70-210 3.8-4/80-210 Vivitar - 3.8/19 2.8/28 (Series 1) 3.5-4.5/19-35 (Kiron) 3.5/70-210 Zenitar - 2.8/16
Contax Mount Lens: Carl Zeiss - Biogon 2.8/21 Biogon 2.8/28 Planar 2/45 Sonnar 2.8/90 Yashica - 4.5/70-210
M42 Screw Mount Lens: CZJ - Flek 2.8/20 Flek 2.4/35 Tessar 2.8/50 3.5/135 Focal - 2.8/28 Helios - 44-2 2/58 44M 2/58 44M-4 2/58 40 1.5/85 Industar - 50-2 3.5/50 Jupiter - 37A 3.5/135 Meyer Optik Gorlitz - Domiplan 2.8/50 MIR - 24M 2/35 1B 2.8/37 Pentacon - 2.8/29 1.8/50 2.8/135 Pentax - SMC 3.5/135 SMC 4/200 SMC 5.6/400 Rexatar - 6.3/400 Rokinon - 3.5-4.5/35-135 Sears - 2.8/28 2.8/135 4.5/90-230 Soligor - 2.8/105 3.5-4.5/28-80

[lulalake]