Why don't I own noise ninja again????

[KeepsakeGirl]

So, my clients loved the book I put together. Only 3 edits to the entire thing and they didn't change design, just wanted more pics of grandma than I thought they would (i was trying to balance out relatives, but I guess grandma is more special ) .

Anywho, they asked what happened to the images we took very late that night. This is one of them. It was taken in front of a little pond that had amber, lavender and blue lights shining off the water & walls. Needless to say, it looked alot like LAVA. I converted to sepiaD because she asked me to..BUT there is too much noise. i tried to clean up in PS, but it looks yucky. Any suggestions since I don't have noise ninja but I may be purchasing soon since I"m getting more requests for nighttime outdoor weddings...

Here is the large file ...

http://keepsake-images.net/test/firekiss-sepiaD.jpg

btw, i will be cropping out most of the firepit unless someone can tell me how to make it less appalling.

[brad]

It would be better to have the original (pre-sepia) image to choose from, but here is a quick Noise Ninja auto profile on the image you supplied.. the first one is the before, the second is after...

[Wendy]

If you need to do something with this in a hurry and don't have Noise Ninja yet, you may want to try Neat Image. They offer a free version of it. Here's a quick version using Neat Image set to auto profile and noise reduction at 50%. Both of these have been run through NI. The second is the 100% crop.

[Holly]

I also gave it a go:

[bullsparade]

I think it would be easier if we were working with the pre-sepia image. I think it is usable as it conveys emotion which is really what an image is about. Holly has a pretty good softer version that eliminates alot of the problems and conveys the feelings. The rest of us (I didnt post mine becuase it looks alot like Brad and Wendy's) have cleaned it up as much as we can by running it through the filter (NN and NI).

On images like this that I have had. I have had mild successes due to my lack of "pixel" knowledge, when I have spent time working in channels before I put it in Noise Ninja. One person who might be able to give us some background on this is Gordon. When I have gone in and adjusted luminosity in various channels and isolated the channel with the most noise and adjusted for it...then passed it through a filter program like Noise Ninja, the results have been much better. Since I really didnt know what I was doing and was working off of a theory, I have a hard time replicating it.

Gordon, do you have any input or background to how or why adjustments in luminosity/chroma channels prior to Noise Ninja made such a difference?

(Hopefully he will read this thread. If not, you might want to PM him and see if he has some insight.)

[Gordon]

Well, typically the blue channel has the most noise and skin pertubations, so in some cases throwing away that entire channel away can help. Particularly if you are heading towards a B&W representation a mix of just the red and green channels (channel mixer, monochrome, maybe 80% red, 20% green) can be effective. As can just using the red channel, though it tends to give people too much of a healthly glow for my liking. There are also other techniques like replacing the blue channel with the red or green channel to maintain colour.

On the very infrequent times I use anything like noise ninja (don't like the softening effect they have and don't have a huge dislike for grain anyway) I tend to use them in a profile driven way so do as little adjustment to the input image as possible - so that the image parameters match the profile parameters that are being applied.

Certainly fiddling with channels to reduce the contribution from the blue channel might well improve the pictures and improve the likelyhood of good noise reduction.

[DPetito]

Background is more in focus than your subject. You will need to clear up some of the noise before any sepia or selenium effect. I would suggest a blurring and darkening of the background and a highlighting of the focal point-the kissers. Here is my effort.

[Badge]

I use the noise reduction in elements 4 and my results are pretty good. What is the advantage of using one of the special noise reduction programs

[Holly]

Keepsakegirl...were any of these what you were looking for??

[84NETgal]

I think all of the suggestions here are great--hopefully they've been able to help you find what you're looking for. I second the view that the brick wall is in focus rather than the couple--quite distracting, but could be easily fixed by applying a faux blur that is blurrier than the actual couple (focus is all relative)

[plugsnpixels]

Speaking of noise reduction plug-ins, I did my own quick comparison on a film scan and found Noise Ninja the best option:

http://www.plugsnpixels.com/misc/noisechart.jpg

The wedding couple might also benefit from a plug-in such as FocusFixer:

http://www.plugsnpixels.com/focusfixer.html

[jchooper12]

Here is my go at it.