D300 Setup - Noise Reduction on or off?

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DazzGreen

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Darren
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Hi,

On the Nikon D300 - Do you have noise reduction for long exposure and/or high ISO switched on in camera?

I have a Nikon D300. I shoot RAW + JPEG. For general day to day shots I want the camera settings for the best results without any Post Processing. Only if the image is worth it do I spend time post processing the RAW file.

When it comes to post processing if the image is worth it, does the camera do a good enough good with these 2 noise reductions, or can 3rd party apps achieve vastly better results? If so, which ones do you use?

Thanks for your help.
 
Personally I prefer post process hi iso noise reduction, at the higher settings I find generally the cameras own tends to soften the image, and the long exposure noise reduction again I leave it off but do very little long exposure anyway so couldn't really say if ones better than the other.
 
Having borrowed a friends D300 for some night/long exposure shots recently I would definitely turn it off. I got fed up waiting for it to work it's magic and missed some great cloud formations while it chugged away.
 
Most of the image settings relate to how the camera effects JPGs so if you are shooting RAW they don't make any difference. Things such as B&W etc as better done on the computer. I would be surprised if this is not one of them.
 
cowasaki said:
Most of the image settings relate to how the camera effects JPGs so if you are shooting RAW they don't make any difference. Things such as B&W etc as better done on the computer. I would be surprised if this is not one of them.
Click to expand...

I think long exposure NR is different, thats using a blank frame subtraction (I think) thats probably the same raw or jpeg.
 
Now I'm sure the camera isn't running any software. in a CCD noise can be generated in to ways.

Shot noise which is different amounts of photons being detected by the pixels. and in high light it doesn't matter. but in low light its more significant.

a good example I analogy is trying to pour 100 gains of sugar a second from a bowl. and getting a gentle stream

If you try and pour 10 grains of sugar you will get alot of sugar and then no sugar.

the second way a CCD generate noise is when the signal is being digitized. normally the amplifier is in a hurry and you will get an a approximation of the electron count. When you turn on noise reduction it is effectively telling the camera to slow down and count the electrons more accurately.

As noise is random in nature you can not truly reduce the noise, post editing

Hope this rambling post helps some of you! :D
 
ICNR, In Camera Noise Reduction is indeed carrying out a dark frame subtraction. This takes a second exposure of exactly the same length, capturing all the hot pixels, cold pixels, any amp glow etc from the sensor, and then removes that from the actual image (light frame). Dark noise in this case is temperature dependant and thus in camera is done on each shot. In astro photography, you would normally leave ICNR off, that way you can capture more data by getting longer shooting lights, and then capture a sequence of dark frames for removing the noise in stacking processing later.

I'm not sure how High ISO noise reduction works however.
 
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