Is this too grainy?

[OrangeBoar]

Just double checking - is this about the level of grain that everyone is experiencing?

Details:
Unedited in any way, but cropped (this is the center of the photo)
ISO 100
1/40 sec.
ND 16 filter
48 mp still photo
Tripod mode

 

[Meta4]

Just double checking - is this about the level of grain that everyone is experiencing?

Details:
Unedited in any way, but cropped (this is the center of the photo)

That depends on how much you have cropped it.

 

[My Drone Adventures]

Just double checking - is this about the level of grain that everyone is experiencing?

Details:
Unedited in any way, but cropped (this is the center of the photo)
ISO 100
1/40 sec.
ND 16 filter
48 mp still photo
Tripod mode

View attachment 109455

can’t tell you from the image attached as it is an extremely compressed jpeg. I think it is 457kb when downloaded. Upload a link to the full res image then we can help better.

thanks

 

[vindibona1]

I can only tell you what I see, but I'm not seeing grain, but I'm seeing lack of detail and perhaps a bit of diffusion, like a mild soft focus filter. How much did you crop the image?

 

[brett8883]

Just double checking - is this about the level of grain that everyone is experiencing?

Details:
Unedited in any way, but cropped (this is the center of the photo)
ISO 100
1/40 sec.
ND 16 filter
48 mp still photo
Tripod mode

View attachment 109455

I did some work on it for you

 

[xunhui]

Blatantly honest? The photo you posted is too grainy in my opinion Once upon many years ago all of my images were intentionally very grainy. Black & white and I wanted a cold, harsh and very industrial look. I don't think the photo you took should be grainy, but rather sharp, clean and to the subject at hand. It doesn't look real, looks rather fake and manipulated.

 

[Meta4]

Details:
1/40 sec.
ND 16 filter

That ND filter definitely isn't helping.
It's only letting 6% of the light through.
Don't use an ND filter for stills.

 

[OrangeBoar]

Unfortunately the original file is too large to load here.
But I've attached a smaller full size image to get an idea on how much it was cropped.

 

[OrangeBoar]

Blatantly honest? The photo you posted is too grainy in my opinion Once upon many years ago all of my images were intentionally very grainy. Black & white and I wanted a cold, harsh and very industrial look. I don't think the photo you took should be grainy, but rather sharp, clean and to the subject at hand. It doesn't look real, looks rather fake and manipulated.

Yeah, not crazy about it either, but wondering if I'm being too picky, or if there are issues with my particular camera/sensor/lens

 

[Meta4]

Unfortunately the original file is too large to load here.
But I've attached a smaller full size image to get an idea on how much it was cropped.

The example you started with is about 3% of the image.
You cannot blow up 3% of a digital image and expect it to be clear and sharp.
There's nothing wrong with your original image.

Take the best digital image out there and blow it up >300% and it would look just a fuzzy.

 

[Meta4]

Yeah, not crazy about it either, but wondering if I'm being too picky, or if there are issues with my particular camera/sensor/lens

If you want to be picky, lose the ND filter and shoot with 100% of the available light, rather than only 6%.

 

[vindibona1]

I agree with Meta4 on his points, particularly the comment about using a ND filter on a still shot. Every piece of glass you put in front of a lens has the potential of degrading the sharpness and clarity. The reason for putting one on for video (as I am just learning) is and entirely different matter to match shutter speed and frame rate. And as Met4 said, there is nothing wrong with the full shot.

@brett8883 What did you do with the image exactly? I liked it. I think I saw the same potential and if I were messing with it I would try high pass filter→soft-light mode to achieve what you did sharpening and enhancing contrast. Alternately I'd try unsharp mask at 10/100/0. Those would be my first two tries to achieve the look. What technique did you use?

 

[OrangeBoar]

The example you started with is about 3% of the image.
You cannot blow up 3% of a digital image and expect it to be clear and sharp.
There's nothing wrong with your original image.

Take the best digital image out there and blow it up >300% and it would look just a fuzzy.

I've done a lot of photo editing and am very familiar with Photoshop. Generally with print you would want to be around 300dpi and with the 48 megapixel file that would be 26.6" x 20" (uncropped). So in theory this would produce a clear printable image. However enlarging to 100% in Photoshop it already starts to look pretty grainy (thus my original question). Normally when I'm working with 300dpi photos, the image will look reasonable at 100% (in Photoshop), and fairly clear without much touch-up.

has anybody here printed a full size image from the MA2 at 300dpi?

Again, I recognize that I may be asking too much from this little guy.

And great tip about the ND filters and photos!

 

[xunhui]

Yeah, not crazy about it either, but wondering if I'm being too picky, or if there are issues with my particular camera/sensor/lens

Just keep playing with it. Photography is not a click and you're finished. It's hours and hours to just get that perfect shot, lighting, color, shadows, lack of content, to much content. But one thing, it is fun and well worth the time. You're doing fine and don't give up, that's the truth. Listen to what everyone says and follow their advice. Then move on to what makes your photos look good. Not everything they say is necessarily correct for your needs. ??

 

[Meta4]

I've done a lot of photo editing and am very familiar with Photoshop. Generally with print you would want to be around 300dpi and with the 48 megapixel file that would be 26.6" x 20" (uncropped). So in theory this would produce a clear printable image. However enlarging to 100% in Photoshop it already starts to look pretty grainy (thus my original question). Normally when I'm working with 300dpi photos, the image will look reasonable at 100% (in Photoshop), and fairly clear without much touch-up.

I put your 2nd image into Photoshop and had to enlarge about 350% to get to your first image.
You'll never get a good, sharp image when you are viewing it at 350%.

 

[boblui]

Unfortunately the original file is too large to load here.
But I've attached a smaller full size image to get an idea on how much it was cropped.View attachment 109458

This photo is 12 Mp which is a resized version of the original 48 Mp version. After playing around with it in photoshop. The crop posted in your first post is a 100% crop of the original 48 Mp picture.

I would say the worm-like noise is what's expected for 48 Mp. It's almost a signature of this sensor. See the following side-by-side comparison with a 48 Mp sample JPG image ( ISO100 ) I downloaded from Dpreview

If you want quality, shoot in 12 Mp.

 

[brett8883]

I agree with Meta4 on his points, particularly the comment about using a ND filter on a still shot. Every piece of glass you put in front of a lens has the potential of degrading the sharpness and clarity. The reason for putting one on for video (as I am just learning) is and entirely different matter to match shutter speed and frame rate. And as Met4 said, there is nothing wrong with the full shot.

@brett8883 What did you do with the image exactly? I liked it. I think I saw the same potential and if I were messing with it I would try high pass filter→soft-light mode to achieve what you did sharpening and enhancing contrast. Alternately I'd try unsharp mask at 10/100/0. Those would be my first two tries to achieve the look. What technique did you use?

I saw that this was a low resolution image so I used Photoshop’s preserve details 2.0 enlargement to blow it up 200x. While this doesn’t give me more details than to begin with it does give me more pixels to work with in the next steps.

I then used Nik Collection Define 2 to get rid of the ugly sharpening done in camera. I then used Nik Collection Output Sharpening which is an intelligent sharpening method.

It’s true you can’t create details that weren’t there but you can maximize the details that ARE present and fix ugly in camera sharpening to a degree.

 

[brett8883]

Unfortunately the original file is too large to load here.
But I've attached a smaller full size image to get an idea on how much it was cropped.View attachment 109458

When you upload the smaller size files are you reducing resolution or jpeg quality? Your cropped image seems to be lower resolution than @Meta4 ’s assertion that it’s only 350% cropped. With a 48MP photo you should be able to crop 400% without losing much detail.

 

[Meta4]

When you upload the smaller size files are you reducing resolution or jpeg quality? Your cropped image seems to be lower resolution than @Meta4 ’s assertion that it’s only 350% cropped. With a 48MP photo you should be able to crop 400% without losing much detail.

The smaller sized file showing a bigger area was 4000 x 3000
Measuring the original image rather than roughly calculating, it comes to 1606 x 954
That's 6% of the original 48MP image area.

 

[eipbroc]

IMHO drone sensors arent at a stage where mass cropping is acceptable.