K3ii NOISE

Hi, my K3ii has started to show noise on all my photos to a varying degree. From dull days right through to nice bright sunny days. I restrict my iso setting to 200 max on bright days and yet still there is visible noise. I have a Huawei P30 Lite which takes much "cleaner" photos. That alone frustrates the hell out of me. Anybody out there have any pointers? I have tried various setting with no success but given the dozens of settings to work through the list is too long to list here.
Thanks

Can you link to a full size image with exif intact so we can have a look.

I will try and do that. My laptop is in for repair at the moment. As soon as I have it back I will find a shot and post it.

Mine does as well, although they clean up fine with Nik collection Denoise, comparing against the wife's K5ii the noise is similar at similar ISO's, I'm out with it today so will put it to a stern test

K3ii @ 800 ISO - cleaned up

Here's one such photo. This was on a bright, if overcast, day and is certainly no competition winner. I just spotted the Kestrel (I think) having its lunch in the middle of an allotment so took the picture from where I was. The lens was maxed out at 300 (Pentax 50-300 PLM). I would have liked a better vantage point but I guess you have to take what you have. If you zoom in the noise is noticeable on the twigs that stand up to the left of the bird. I know this is at the extreme of the zoom but I get similar effects even at short zoom across all my lenses. I do like taking pictures of wildlife so using a lens at the extreme is a usual event. Maybe I need to invest in a better quality lens perhaps?

Here's another one. This was taken on a day with clear blue skies and mounted on a tripod. The lens was Pentax 18-135 and taken at 18mm. If you zoom into the greenhouse the noise is clearly visible and there is a fair amount of blurring. The shake reduction was turned off.

Hi Andrew. The reason I asked if you could link to a full size image is that the forum software here wont let you post full size images.

To assess a problem with a picture you need to view it at 100% view. These are too small I am afraid. If I download them and zoom all I will see is pixelation, and I wont be able to detect if there is noise. Can you put the original full size image on a hosting site or even in a dropbox file ?

You should never view any image at beyond 100%. Pixelation occurs when you zoom beyond this level because you are trying to display 1 pixel in the image over many pixels on the display screen....that does not work.

The exposure on these is wildly different - the first is way over-exposed. The second is much better but there's no way to assess the image for noise without having the original file. What ISO would also be helpful.

I use WeTransfer for large files. If I had your email I can send you the 2 pictures I posted earlier.
A.

Hi John, do you have an email? I use WeTransfer for moving large files.
A.

There's nothing out of the ordinary with the photos as viewed here. Heavy cropping will not only show the pixels in a digital photo or grain in a negative but highlight deficiencies in the lens, usually referred to as aberrations, particularly close to the edges of the frame which is where the greenhouse is. Also it will highlight any camera shake.

If Peter's suggestion of providing a link to the whole photo is not easily achievable, another solution you could try is to produce a cropped image to show the issue but limit its maximum size to 1000 pixels which is the PU site limit before it automatically starts to reduce the resolution to 1000 pixels. It does this to provide a usable experience to users with a slow internet connection.

Basically if you wanted the greenhouse to fill the fame, choose a focal length accordingly when you take the photo to avoid magnifying part of the wider view image or accept the quality might suffer some pixelation and lens blurring. I'm sure you've heard of the advice to fill the frame!

You could always consider swapping to a larger format to give more scope in selective cropping before the deficiencies show themselves. K-1, 645... !

Do you have your K-3ii set to its maximum resolution and quality if using jpeg which may help unless you're using raw images.

I will send you a PM with my email

Andrew, thanks for sending the DNG files. I processed them in ACR using an auto setting for exposure etc. I didnt apply any output sharpening but I made a noise reduction edit to one of them. These are full size jpegs so click for the larger versions. They are listed on my Flickr page as private so only viewers of this forum will be able to see them. I will delete them in a week or so, so download them if you want to keep them for a reference.

The one with the bird has a great deal of out of focus areas but I cannot see noise being particularly troublesome. OOF areas will usually show more noise.

The one of the garden is more interesting. There is visible noise in particular on the brown bin and also the shaded part of the shed. I applied a genera noise reduction in Photoshop which reduces it a bit. You can compare the noise reduced one with the other. The original shot is underexposed and I suggest that the brightening of these areas in raw conversion has led to the noise.

Would be interested in anyone else's thoughts ?









and now the NR image

Agree with all these points.

When zooming into a small area of the image, you’ve got less pixels available to play with, so often it’s loss of detail in those areas rather than noise.

Couple that with lens weaknesses like green/purple fringing on high contrast sections and it reduces the detail further.

Wouldn’t compare to a cell phone too much, as that likely has a lot of noise reduction already applied. On a good day, with the right lighting conditions etc, a modern cellphone can be pretty amazing, so they’re not as basic as they once were.

If you are viewing raw files then you will have to tidy these up, as being raw they have the beer minimum of processing applied.

If a jpg file is being used, then double check all the quality options are on max, and if any lens corrections cane applied etc.

+1. Consistent with my experience with a K3. And every digital camera I've owned has produced noise in some circumstances and to some degree. Always possible to get rid of it in post-processing, but at the expense of something else.

Doesn't worry me, though. I've got pictures on the wall that don't look good from very close up but are excellent from normal viewing distance. OK, they're paintings but the point is the same: the artist produced a picture that is good for the way in which it would be normally seen. They simply weren't interested in what it looked like at the level of each mark produced by each hair of the brush. I commend that approach for photography, too.


Sounds an interesting approach to processing - must try it!

Steve