Large prints-noise with low ISO

[r._a._haentzler]

<p>I take a fair amount of sports pictures at high school games for parents. Help me out with a question please. On the outdoor events, I am shooting with iso 100 or 200, usually at 2.8, with Canon 7D. Occasionally when I have to do large prints, 20 x 30, I have getting more noise that I think I should. I do use an Imagenomic plug in to reduce the noise. Mainly the prints with the noise are shots where the sun is in fact directly to a degree in the athlete's face. Is this the reason for the noise being present or is that size print just going to have at least some noise. Open for some advice please. Thanks.</p>

 

[Matt Laur]

<p>Can you crop out a 100% view of a piece of the image to show the noise? Do you see the noise when you pixel peep on screen, or only when you print? And, is the noise throughout the image, or only in the shadows? And, is it possible that you're not talking about noise, but about pixelation and other artifacts that are a result of up-sampling the image to having more pixels than it started with? On that note ... how are you creating the 6000 x 9000 pixel file that's actually being printed? Need some more to go on, here, in order to perhaps help. Start with that 100% crop out of the 6000 x 9000 (make the crop no more than 700 pixels on the long side so it will show inline here, in your thread). </p>

[r._a._haentzler]

<p>I didn't notice the noise till it was printed at MPIX, (not suggested a problem with them). I did two of the large prints one of a baseball player with the sun behind him and the soccer gal, with the sun in her face, and the soccer one had the d. noixe or maybe it was pixelation?????? Not sure what that is. The way I created the file was to go to photo shop(I shoot raw), do my thing in there, the noise plug in, then a few other adjustments, then I use unsharp mask, then upload to MPIX and choose what size print I need. Still open for suggestons. Not sure how to insert the image on here sorry.</p><div></div>

[keith reeder]

<p>Well that example is 500 ISO, not 100 or 200, but it's still pretty clean, and should print really nicely up to its native size/resolution - and beyond.</p>

<p>I reckon you're seeing uprezzing artifacts caused by whatever resizing/resampling algorithm your print people are using.</p>

[geoffs1]

<p>Where are you seeing the noise? If it's in the sky (and other uniform areas) then it might be the result of the sharpening.<br>

<br />Can you see it on-screen at 100% or just in the print?</p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>Can you zoom in at 100% in an area that shows the noise, crop out 700x700 pixels, and post that as its own JPG? With the image scaled down like above, there's really no way to see what's going on.</p>

[keith reeder]

<p>Geoff, Matt:</p>

 

<blockquote>

<p>I didn't notice the noise till it was printed at MPIX</p>

</blockquote>

[tom_mann1]

<p>RAH, no one will be able to give you any meaningful / authoritative help until we see one or more 100% crops (as Matt has twice requested). Without them, any statements made are at best educated guesswork. </p>

<p>Tom M</p>

[geoffs1]

<p>Keith: I was just wondering if after the OP noticed the noise on the print whether he was able to see it on-screen (ex. at 100%). If he can't, then no number of posted 100% crops will help.</p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>Seeing the 100% crop will just help reduce variables, that's all. Then the next thing we need to know (like I asked up top) is ... how is the image being made as large as needs to be made? Is the OP up-sampling the image first, or having the lab do it?</p>