Iso 12500

[karenoliver]

I photographed a parade last night in Chester. I had a flashgun, used F4 and tried shooting with ISO 3200 and ISO 5000. Both were not high enough though and I ended up using High on my 5D which gave me an ISO of 12500. The shots were in focus, no blur but are pretty noisy. I have tried using Nik define but still have noise. Is there anything else I can do?

[PaulMontgomery]

The percieved wisdom is that getting the exposure correct (even pushing the histogram to the right a little will help reduce noise). However, its too late for that now. I use imageonic noiseaware to get rid of noise in my images. I think there's a demo available to download.

[Forseti]

Originally Posted by PaulMontgomery

I think there's a demo available to download.

Not only a demo but also a free version called 'Community Edition' which is very very good. Download available here - scroll to bottom of page: http://www.imagenomic.com/download.aspx

[flake]

I have a question. Why when you were photographing a parade were you using a flash? Either you will illuminate the subject and have the background in shadow, or blitz the foreground. Have I missunderstood this somehow?

Slightly over exposing the image & dragging it back down again will not help because it will decrease the shutter speed, if you can afford to do this then you can lower the Iso!

Were all the images of movement sharp? and what was the actual shutter speed? As I remember Canons DPP has a noise reducer, but there's also noise ninja if you buy it, or use it as a demo.

[karenoliver]

Thanks Paul and Forsetti I will have a look at the software. Flake I used flash just to add some more light and to try and freeze the action. The background was not blown out and I don't think the people were overexposed either. Here is one shot - its ISO 12800 http://www.flickr.com/photos/f18/417...7622851778463/ It doesnt look so noisy in small size, its when I consider making it bigger that the noise kicks in.

[flake]

Having had a chance now to look at the images, and the exif, I see you've used a slow shutter to expose for the background, and used the flash to stop the motion in the subject. This is called 'dragging the shutter' did you do it deliberately, or is it a happy accident?
The background was quite well lit which has allowed you to capture it, but there are a few when the subject isn't back lit and the background is black http://www.flickr.com/photos/f18/417...7622851778463/

As you have a 5D MkII Canons DPP has a few tools built into it which should give an automatic 'best settings' for each setting of the camera, you should give this a try (you did shoot in RAW didn't you?).

[karenoliver]

The background on the b/w shot was deliberatly darkened by me in PS using the paintbrush. I just metered for the background and used flash to fill in the people closer to me, if that makes sense? I do shoot in raw and have never used DPP but will have a look. Thanks very much for your help. I know shooting at such a high ISO is not going to give me noise-free shots but just needed to reduce it as much as I could.