URL: www.2morrow.dk/75ppi/coolpix/actions/
Cost: Free
Platforms: PC Only
Version Tested: 1.0
This is a very advanced set of actions offering a choice of three levels
of noise reduction, a base level of noise reduction and two stromger
ISO-noise removal options that can run after the base if needed. It
has the nice feature of putting the cleaned image in a separate layer,
making it very easy to compare the results.
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Digital Deluxe Toolbox did a great job of keeping
sharpness (thanks to an edge mask) while removing both luminance
and chroma noise. I used just the base NR action. |
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This image needed the extra step of the mid-ISO
noise removal which resulted in a beautifully clean image, while
still retaining the detail of the trees without too much blurring. |
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This image also needed the extra mid-ISO NR step
to further cut down the luminance noise in the sky. Sharpness
is mostly maintained, but some blurring is evident between the
mountain edge and the sky. |
Pros:
- The use of an edge mask helps keep the image sharp while still greatly
reducing noise.
- Three levels of NR to choose from.
- Results are placed in a separate layer.
- Seems like it can work on a single layer of a multi-layer image
(complained about the lack of a background layer a few times, but
the results looked fine).
Cons:
- Not sure why the edge between the sky and the mountains in the last
image was blurred so much.
URL: netnet.net/~llueck/NR.htm
Cost: Free
Platforms: Mac & PC
Version Tested: 01/26/2002
This is a another advanced set of actions offering three levels of
noise reduction and a separate hot pixel removal action. The actions
build a separate edge mask for each of the RGB channels and stop to
allow you to interactively define each edge mask. It takes a very long
time to complete - 20 minutes on my PII-300 laptop and used 1.3GB of
scratch space! This is mostly because it doubles the size of the original
image before working on it.
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The medium NR action softened the image too much,
so I had to use the low one. The low one did an acceptable, but
not quite as good, job on the chroma noise.
Settings:
- Red threshold: 228
- Green threshold: 233
- Blue threshold:234
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The low NR action left a little bit of luminance
noise, so I ended up settling for the medium NR action, which
cleaned this image up almost perfectly. The edge masks that the
action builds kept the trees pretty sharp.
Settings:
- Red threshold: 215
- Green threshold: 213
- Blue threshold:213
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For this one the high NR action worked the best,
nicely smoothing the sky (except for some nasty JPEG artifacts),
while retaining the detail in the mountain.
Settings:
- Red threshold: 218
- Green threshold: 215
- Blue threshold:213
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Pros:
- The use of not just one, but a per-channel edge mask, results in
a clean but surprisingly sharp image.
- Three levels of NR to choose from.
Cons:
- As with most actions, can only be used with files that only contain
a single layer.
- Very, very slow.
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