Is this too grainy?

[Meta4]

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

It's not just drones.
My Nikon 36MP D800 has an excellent sensor, but you cannot crop 6% out of one of its images and make something of it.

 

[TheRock]

Use RAW and crop at 30% max or so and it should still hold up fine. This looks like you cropped out 90% of the image. Fly closer.

 

[Dave Maine]

The math here is straightforward. Take the horizontal pixel dimension of the image and divide it by 300. That will give you the maximum horizontal dimension of a print that will display 300 dpi. No image program can generate additional pixels with more data than the original capture has.

 

[itsneedtokno]

ND FILTERS have a place in daytime stills...

Long exposure.

Just sayin.

 

[Meta4]

ND FILTERS have a place in daytime stills...
Long exposure.

That's a special situation that isn't very common with drone still photography.
Unless you have a particular reason to force a slower shutter speed than is otherwise possible, there is no need to use use ND filters for still photography on a drone.
Throwing 96% of the light away with an ND 16 filter makes no sense for most photography.

 

[brett8883]

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.

So @OrangeBoar instead of reducing the resolution to upload the photo reduce the jpeg quality when you export. This will give us the full resolution image just at a higher compression ratio which is better than a low resolution file

 

[itsneedtokno]

That's a special situation that isn't very common with drone still photography.
Unless you have a particular reason to force a slower shutter speed than is otherwise possible, there is no need to use use ND filters for still photography on a drone.
Throwing 96% of the light away with an ND 16 filter makes no sense for most photography.

You are correct. Drones aren't the most stable platform for taking long exposures.

Other than that, yeah, use your shutter speed.

 

[OrangeBoar]

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.

View attachment 109468

thanks for the comparison boblui, this is helpful and confirms what I was thinking - every photo I’ve taken at 48mp has the same texture. I have not run a side by side with 48mp and 12mp, but it still seems the 48mp is better, just need a little post processing IMO. I’m thinking I’ll print out a poster sized print to see what it really looks like.

 

[OrangeBoar]

So @OrangeBoar instead of reducing the resolution to upload the photo reduce the jpeg quality when you export. This will give us the full resolution image just at a higher compression ratio which is better than a low resolution file

Ok, let's try this again - full sized image (full 48mp) but at a reduced JPEG quality (medium):

 

[brett8883]

Ok, let's try this again - full sized image (full 48mp) but at a reduced JPEG quality (medium):

Thanks but what I was trying to do didn't produce the outcome I wanted so last thing do you have the original DNG of this shot? If so can you upload to Google Drive or Dropbox and share the link? I think I have a way to save this photo if you do

 

[brett8883]

The math here is straightforward. Take the horizontal pixel dimension of the image and divide it by 300. That will give you the maximum horizontal dimension of a print that will display 300 dpi.

I'll assume you meant PPI ( DPI is actually a printer spec not a image spec, any image can be printed at any DPI) but that doesn't account for viewing distance and paper quality. The larger a photo is printed the further back from it you view it.

300 PPI is used for editing digital photography because that happens to be the maximum pixel density the human eye can resolve at 2 feet which is the typical distance from a computer screen is viewed at.

Here's a good video on this subject and I hear many knowledgeable photographers confuse these concepts so don't sweat it. I was even confused about this subject until my printer called me one day and yelled at me for sending him massive 300ppi files to print. He gave me the crash course in this and showed me first hand that once you get to about 150 PPI the prints don't look any better at a higher PPI and depending on the print medium and quality a higher PPI can actually make it look muddied or make your colors look weird and that has to do with DPI and the way printers represent different colors.

 

[Fadly]

I think MA2 12MP photo is better than the 48MP. 48MP in MA2 is more of a gimmick.

 

[TheRock]

I think MA2 12MP photo is better than the 48MP. 48MP in MA2 is more of a gimmick.

Exactly, Use RAW, get closer.

 

[DaveS]

Agree on, "lose the ND", then up the shutter speed, 1/40 is low and motion could introduce blur. if you want to try and take out the grain, I recommend a plug-in from NEAT Video. They have excellent grain removal for Premiere, After Effects and a different plug-in for Photoshop that is less expensive. Neat Video - best noise reduction for digital video

 

[thomashall1993]

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

Did you originally shoot the picture in raw?