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Submitting High ISO images?


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So, not wanting to suffer a 28 day 'punishment' I wonder if it is worthwhile to submit wildlife images that have been taken at higher (1000) iso's? They do of course contain some noise but are otherwise sharp and clean images. Should I try a little denoise or will this be worse? Should I just not submit these images at all to Alamy?

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I have submitted images up to 1600 ISO, but have always brought them down to 3600x2400 to keep the sharpness. None have ever failed. I do noise reduction in Camera Raw and I think Lightroom also is good for reducing noise in photos.

 

Jill

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Noise can take various forms,

 

If you look in Contributor Information - Reasons for failure - Noise,  only Chroma Noise is mentioned.  Luminance noise which gives a grainy effect but without the colours (usually purple and green) seems to be acceptable.

 

I use  4/3rds and Sony 1" sensor cameras neither of which are as good as larger sensor cameras in respect of noise.  I do sometimes go as high as ISO 1600, but try to overexpose a little if I do so.

 

I try to remove noise in PP using Lightroom.   There is often some graininess from luminance noise, but, so far, I have never had a failure.  I do not submit images which show any colour noise.

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Steve, be careful what you submit. Alamy's example of noise in their submission guidelines is very coarse. It doesn't really give a clear indication of how much noise they are willing to accept. I've been surprised by a couple of low ISO images failing QC due to minimal amounts of noise.

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Steve, it does depend on a couple of things: accurate exposure (or more importantly, not under-exposed) and which particular camera sensor you're using seem paramount.

 

My high ISO stuff (up to and including ISO 5000) for Alamy is shot mostly on a Nikon D700. No post-production noise reduction used, ever, and I've never resized down. One caveat: if I ever did see any chroma-noise, I'd not submit.

 

Works for me.

 

dd

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I'd like to think that a degree of common sense is applied. If the shot depicts an evening scene and could only be taken hand held, then there is going to be some noise, even with noise control applied, and hopefully QC will accept that. On the other hand I have occasionally seen noise in a bright blue sky at low ISO and have had to use the noise reduction tool in LR to deal with it.

 

I have, on occasion, selectively used noise control, even a heavy handed approach will not damage a dark evening sky, while the relatively brightly lit subject only requires a nominal application.

 

I have found that, using the Sony NEX 6, an evenly lit scene that requires ISO 1600 will probably be fine, but significantly lifting the shadows from any ISO value can cause problems, including really objectionable chroma noise.

 

On a related topic, I recently processed a straightforward low ISO shot involving a yellow painted vehicle. I generally boost the saturation very slightly as a part of my workflow, but doing so in this instance caused the yellow colour to break down, Fortunately I took a look at actual pixels and was able to backtrack.

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Possibly telling gran how to suck eggs here, in which case apologies.

 

In PS, in my case an antique CS4, select deer's head using lasso tool leaving a decent margin around so as to capture hairs. Use refine selection to soften the line, the amount depends upon image size, but 20 worked with that small image, you would need more with the original. Select inverse and use Filter Noise. Given that there is no detail in the background you can step up the blur and reduce sharpening etc. Looks much better.

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While we're on this subject, what is the consensus on this one (see link to 100% crop below)? It was shot at ISO 1250 with a Sony NEX-6. I think the sharpness is OK, and the background looks nice and smooth to me. But I've learned the hard way that I'm really lousy at spotting noise, perhaps because I tend to like slight graininess in images. Thanks in advance.

 

http://cdn.c.photoshelter.com/img-get/I000073FbxTNYQIc/s/860/860/Vancouver1402061.jpg

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While we're on this subject, what is the consensus on this one (see link to 100% crop below)? It was shot at ISO 1250 with a Sony NEX-6. I think the sharpness is OK, and the background looks nice and smooth to me. But I've learned the hard way that I'm really lousy at spotting noise, perhaps because I tend to like slight graininess in images. Thanks in advance.

 

http://cdn.c.photoshelter.com/img-get/I000073FbxTNYQIc/s/860/860/Vancouver1402061.jpg

 

The noise wouldn't bother me, but the goose looks a little soft. It would be one of those I would debate about. Maybe I have been trashing shots I shouldn't have.

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While we're on this subject, what is the consensus on this one (see link to 100% crop below)? It was shot at ISO 1250 with a Sony NEX-6. I think the sharpness is OK, and the background looks nice and smooth to me. But I've learned the hard way that I'm really lousy at spotting noise, perhaps because I tend to like slight graininess in images. Thanks in advance.

 

http://cdn.c.photoshelter.com/img-get/I000073FbxTNYQIc/s/860/860/Vancouver1402061.jpg

 

Background looks noisy to me John, I would be inclined to deal with it, but who knows?

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While we're on this subject, what is the consensus on this one (see link to 100% crop below)? It was shot at ISO 1250 with a Sony NEX-6. I think the sharpness is OK, and the background looks nice and smooth to me. But I've learned the hard way that I'm really lousy at spotting noise, perhaps because I tend to like slight graininess in images. Thanks in advance.

 

http://cdn.c.photoshelter.com/img-get/I000073FbxTNYQIc/s/860/860/Vancouver1402061.jpg

 

Background looks noisy to me John, I would be inclined to deal with it, but who knows?

 

Yes, who knows? As mentioned, I'm not very good at identifying noise. Thanks.

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While we're on this subject, what is the consensus on this one (see link to 100% crop below)? It was shot at ISO 1250 with a Sony NEX-6. I think the sharpness is OK, and the background looks nice and smooth to me. But I've learned the hard way that I'm really lousy at spotting noise, perhaps because I tend to like slight graininess in images. Thanks in advance.

 

http://cdn.c.photoshelter.com/img-get/I000073FbxTNYQIc/s/860/860/Vancouver1402061.jpg

 

The noise wouldn't bother me, but the goose looks a little soft. It would be one of those I would debate about. Maybe I have been trashing shots I shouldn't have.

 

Thanks. It looks OK to me. But guess I'll just pop this one in my "send elsewhere" file. After all, it's not like there's a shortage of Canada geese images on Alamy...

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I will attempt to post an example if I can figure it out here and see what you think of the noise, this was a back lit deer just after sunrise.

 

 

 

Thanks for looking

 

I don't think noise is a failure cause here. I would submit.

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I will attempt to post an example if I can figure it out here and see what you think of the noise, this was a back lit deer just after sunrise.

 

 

 

Thanks for looking

 

I don't think noise is a failure cause here. I would submit.

 

Probably but the risk is 28 days incarceration ;) 

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