Neat image trials (1 Viewer)

Having read about this piece of software on here I though I would try it on one of my pictures, I decided to sue the Ring necked parrakeet image below, here is the original pic.

Taken with CP4500 LCE adaptor and Optolyth TBS80 scope.

And this is the edited version, I'm not sure which I prefer, do others agree that the second image appears to have lost a bit of clarity?

I must say I have no other editing software available to me at this time, which may have helped improve the image, but its over to you lot now to give your oppinions.

Nice image, Ashley. Begs question how do you think it could be improved?

Close up, your first image has fairly obvious jpeg compression (blockiness) which your use of Neat Image has successfully reduced in the second. However, taking the magnifier off your original picture and viewing it as it's meant to be, the jpeg compression is not, I think, intrusive. Also I'm with you and Kevin: in removing it I believe you have lost much of the "sense of texture" in your original. I think the Neat Image documentation does warn that images can start to look "plastic" at higher noise reduction levels.

Problems come if you decide, for example, you want to try to sharpen the original: perhaps you might wonder whether you could more strongly emphasise the contrast between the texture of the feathers and the tree trunk by doing so. Doing a sharpen might manage to make this emphasis, but you may also find the blockiness has started to become intrusive. Neat Image may, or may not come to the rescue at this stage by managing to reduce the jpeg and perhaps other digital "noise" you've introduced by your sharpen, without losing the intended sharpening. I say "may" because I'm not sure removing jpeg blockiness is its strength; I found it terrific with my scanned photographs where jpeg didn't come into the equation until the final save in Neat Image.
( For a more informed view on the available noise reduction programs, a review is at : www.michaelalmond.com/Articles/noise.htm )

Incidentally, wonder if you tried experimenting with Neat Image's own sharpening options at bottom right under the noise filter settings tab.

The $64000 dollar question has to be whether you have a less compressed version of your picture that will allow you to experiment more freely. On the subject of experimentation, you might be interested to take a look at www.tucows.com/preview/194967.html where you can download a freebie image editor called irfanview. It's 821KB so hopefully not too painful to download.

Bestest regards.

Neat Image, Irfan view etc.

Hi,

The real value of NeatImage is to remove "noise" from digital images. Noise appears as a granular appearance when part of an image is cropped and then enlarged, or when an image is shot at a hight iso speed, or when poorly lit and then adjusted in a software program. Neat image itself has a number of optrions, so you have to read the instructions carefully to avoid overdoing the smoothing out. I think the noise reduction, if used carefully, gives a better result than Photoshop 5 or Elements2 (I have both).

Irfan View is a freeware program primarily to view, store and catalog images on the computer, but it's pretty versatile, ans you can use it for slide shows etc. There are also some basic editing tools, including changing the brightness ("gamma"), contrast, and sharpening. If used carefully, in no more than 10% increments, the shapening tool is excellent - again, as good as unsharp mask in Photoshop. However, all the tools in this program only apply to the whole image. As in Photoshop, sharpening should be applied as the last manipulation, particularly after re-sizing an image.

Try your parakeet again, using IrfanView to slightly increase the contrast, decrease the gamma, and then sharpen by about 10%. Then apply NeatImage to just minimally remove digital noise. Save as a "filtered-bmp" file (which NeatImage does by default) and re-save as a .jpg, and if necessary, re-sharpen by no more than 10% again in IrfanView.

Hope this helps.

If the intention is to try to emphasise textures, Richard's suggestion of using increase contrast sounds a good one. I think sharpening may create more hassle than it's worth because of the jpeg compression. So, to go completely against your initial intentions in this thread, I've done a revision simply with a bit of "burning in" of shadows which emphasises the wood texture, I think. No Neat Image at all, at all.

Hi,

I tried what I suggested on the parakeet pioc, and here's what I got, using NeatImage demo and Irfan View only. One point I found is that if the pic is too large it's going to look pixelated anyway, so you may have to reduce the size even more to make it look sharp. One way to avoid that is to shoot with at least a 3 mgpx camera, in fine or max. mode, and if you reduce the size to 640 x 480, use the View -> Display -> Fit window to image option in IrfanView.

Excellent Richard. Just shows what can be done with a couple of freebie software packages and a large skill bundle . I did try your suggestions but didn't like what I was seeing in Irfanview. Either your use of Neat Image saved the day or, more likely, it was down to me being heavy-handed again.

Was thinking, it's a good job Andy Bright isn't following this thread. He'd probably be down on me for not correcting the blue patch on the tree trunk above the parakeet in Photoshop (given that that's presumably v. difficult in Irfanview) That's chromatic aberation isn't it?

re: NeatImage trials

Hi,

You're right - that blue patch should be edited out in Photoshop, and yes - it can't be done in IrfanView. But I don't think it's due to chromatic aberration, I think it's an artefact from sharpening. Actually, I would be very interested in what an expert such as Andy Bright or Nigel Blake thought of this thread.

Thanks for all the comments/suggestions, it certainly gives me more to think about.

Ashley, not sure if you already tried this, but with Neat Image you can adjust the settings in the third window. I have found that going lower (i.e., lower percentage) can still remove noise without the loss of detail.

Just to add to rb_stern's comments, noise is also a function of the camera itself, with lower MP cameras having more problems with noise, generally speaking. I don't know, or perhaps remember, which camera you have.

Hi Ashley,
Since you mentioned neat image a while back I have been messing about with it and am finding it invaluable in alot of my pictures. (Especially ones taken at iso200 and with the 3x teleconverter)
It does seem to be absolutely brilliant at removing the "noise"
on iso200 pictures.
Ive found that by keeping the noise level estimations (on the third tab) to as close to 0 as possible that my pictures dont blur at all. (Maximum Ive tried is 10 so far and then it started blurring.)

Here is my recent ggs picture taken at iso200.

Here same image filtered through neat image.

The blue/purple colouration is colour fringing and can be removed in Photoshop, as can chromatic aberration. Not sure about the other packages though, as I've not used them.

Andy Bright did an excellent tutorial on his website on how to remove these faults using Photoshop, which I have printed off and have followed to great success on one or two of my photos that had these problems. Maybe your other software has some similar setting that enable you to do the same thing.

The link is http://digiscopingukbirds.homestead.com/Digiscopingwithphotoshop.html, which was mentioned in the Digiscoping forum under 'Impoving your photos in-computer'.