I recently saw a sponsored advert for Topaz noise reduction software and installed a trial version. Having shot a number of night images using high iso, some as high as 6,400 I thought I would give it a go and compare the results to the inbuilt noise reduction settings in Photoshop creative cloud 2021. I know there’s always the option of taking multiple images and stacking them to even out the noise and produce a cleaner image but this option isn’t always possible, especially when you have objects that move in the image.
*Edit having uploaded the images they have been compressed by my website software but you can still see the effect it has on noise reduction.
Original vs Topaz
Topaz cleaned up the image nicely, especially in the sky area. I’ve printed both images at 12×8 and the Topaz image certainly looks a lot better.
Here’s the original compared to Topaz and Photoshop. You may need to download the full fized images to get the best comparison.
Here is a 100% crop of another part of the image, the white paintwork of the lighthouse is much cleaner using Topaz denoise, Photoshop does a good job but Denoise retains a little more detail and the image is just that extra bit cleaner.
In conclusion from a few tests I’ve run I’m highly likely to purchase the latest version, especially as it can be applied directly to raw images.
If you fancy trying it out yourself, you can download a free trial version from their website.
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