Digital BW, The Print

I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce grain 
from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest of 
the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a layer 
mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

Hi,

Copy the  background layer, magic wand the sky, contract it 1-2 
pixels and run Blur-degauss at about 3 and see if that works.  If 
you need less, then reduce the opacity in layers.  Hope this helps.

Paul                                                                 
   --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "marcsien77" 
<marcsien77@y...> wrote:
> I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce 
grain 
> from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest 
of 
> the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a 
layer 
> mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

You may want to try a dedicated noise-and-grain-reduction plug-in. "Neat 
Image" works great for grain reduction. It's available at several price 
points, with the Pro version providing Photoshop plug-in functionality. I 
prefer it to "Grain Surgery", "Quantum Mechanic Pro", or "Applied Science 
Fiction Digital GEM" (great names, eh?) after having tested all four. Very 
effective grain reduction, very controllable, works great on 
black-and-white images, and the latest version works more quickly than 
earlier versions. I also think its price is lower than the other programs 
(though I'm not sure).

I usually duplicate a layer, run "Neat Image" and blend the grain-reduced 
layer with an unprocessed layer to visually adjust for the best compromise 
between grain reduction and the preservation of a certain photographic 
look. For a uniform area like your overcast sky, you may want to select the 
sky, feather the selection, and set "Neat Image" to almost entirely 
eliminate the grain.

http://www.neatimage.com/index.html?v

"Neat Image" is PC only, though I presume that someone probably publishes 
Mac software with similar functionality. Others may want to make Macintosh 
recommendations...

At 01:32 PM 1/24/2004, marcsien77 wrote:

>I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce grain
>from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest of
>the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a layer
>mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

> From: marcsien77 [mailto:marcsien77@...]
>
> I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce grain
> from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest of
> the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a layer
> mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

I generally begin with Select->Color Range to select all the sky, then use
other selection tools to get rid of any other pixels that may have been
inadvertently selected. Then I blur it. I've found that Smart Blur works
better than Gaussian Blur for one reason: even if you carefully select only
the sky, the Gaussian Blur algorithm will pull in some of the color from the
nearby pixels outside the selection area, which will discolor the edge of
the sky. Smart Blur doesn't do this. Unfortunately, in PS CS, Smart Blur is
one of the filters that they didn't get around to upgrading to 16 bits, and
indeed in 8-bit mode it can reduce the noise so much that you wind up with
visible posterization. Use sparingly.

--

Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
Paul                mailto:pderocco@...

> Grain reduction
> 
> I use NeatImage on most of my digital images that will be printed as large 
> format. I find it does an invaluable job of reducing grain and noise, and is 
> easily controllable to give you the effects that you want. I believe you can 
> get a free trial version to test it out yourself.
> 




[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Neat image is a great tool... I bought the plug-in version and find 
that it often works well with digital noise, but have been 
disapointed in its ability at grain reduction...

I have had better luck just de-focusing my scanner and then carefully 
sharpeing... while this is just another filtering technique, it seems 
less tied to the theoretical blur using during unsharp masking and 
seems to give *me* better final results.

...that said, I think it is almost a hopeless task since you have to 
degrade your image so much to actually remove strong grain that you 
can't ever get back a sharp image... of course, if your grain is 
really tight, the image degradation is almost unnoticed... but than 
why bother...

...get the free version of NeatImage and see if it works for you.

and, umm... don't know what you are running, but they still don't 
have a Mac version:(

mark 

...
> > Grain reduction
> > 
> > I use NeatImage on most of my digital images that will be printed 
as large 
> > format. I find it does an invaluable job of reducing grain and 
noise, and is 
> > easily controllable to give you the effects that you want. I 
believe you can 

> > get a free trial version to test it out yourself.
> > 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

for skies, a median filter is sometimes appropriate...

mark

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Paul D. 
DeRocco" <pderocco@i...> wrote:
> > From: marcsien77 [mailto:marcsien77@y...]
> >
> > I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce 
grain
> > from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest 
of
> > the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a 
layer
> > mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.
> 
> I generally begin with Select->Color Range to select all the sky, 
then use
> other selection tools to get rid of any other pixels that may have 
been
> inadvertently selected. Then I blur it. I've found that Smart Blur 
works
> better than Gaussian Blur for one reason: even if you carefully 
select only
> the sky, the Gaussian Blur algorithm will pull in some of the color 
from the
> nearby pixels outside the selection area, which will discolor the 
edge of
> the sky. Smart Blur doesn't do this. Unfortunately, in PS CS, Smart 
Blur is
> one of the filters that they didn't get around to upgrading to 16 
bits, and
> indeed in 8-bit mode it can reduce the noise so much that you wind 
up with

> visible posterization. Use sparingly.
> 
> --
> 
> Ciao,               Paul D. DeRocco
> Paul                mailto:pderocco@i...

Hope this isn't off-group, but here's another way to deal with the problem: go to a 
larger format film and use something like T-Max 100 or even Tech Pan.  I found 
developing T-Max in Pyro works great for scanning negs that may also need to be 
printed in the old wet way.  There is a huge grain difference between my 4X5 neg 
scans and the 6X9 ones I took on a trip this summer, and there is no way to make the 
6X9 ones look like the 4X5 ones, unfortunately.

Jan B.





--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "marcsien77" 
<marcsien77@y...> wrote:

> I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce grain 
> from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest of 
> the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a layer 
> mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

don't know that it is off-group, but it is of course the real answer!

mark

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "Jan Becket" 
<jbecket@l...> wrote:
> Hope this isn't off-group, but here's another way to deal with the 
problem: go to a 
> larger format film and use something like T-Max 100 or even Tech 
Pan.  I found 
> developing T-Max in Pyro works great for scanning negs that may 
also need to be 
> printed in the old wet way.  There is a huge grain difference 
between my 4X5 neg 
> scans and the 6X9 ones I took on a trip this summer, and there is 
no way to make the 
> 6X9 ones look like the 4X5 ones, unfortunately.
> 
> Jan B.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "marcsien77" 
> <marcsien77@y...> wrote:
> > I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce 
grain 
> > from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest 
of 
> > the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a 
layer 
> > mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

Marc,

Download a demo copy of PictureWindowsPro and try the gaussian blur.

Create a mask which avoids getting too close to objects needing to be 
maintained sharp. 

GaussianBlurr 5 - 15 pixels but apply only a small percentage... open 
a preview window and magnifiy to watch the results.

If you can create a mask which does not cause blurring of the other 
part of the photo, sky and clouds look excellent with quite a bit of 
'defocusing'.

PicWinPro uses 16 bit operations for all functions

Good Luck,
Alex




--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, "marcsien77" 
<marcsien77@y...> wrote:

> I would greatly appreciate advice on a PS technique to reduce grain 
> from an almost uniform overcast sky area of a BW image.  The rest of 
> the image is fine so I was thinking of doing something with a layer 
> mask but so far I had no luck.  Many thanks in advance, Marc.

Perhaps a dumb question, but - can I just add a new bottle of FS black 
in my CIS to my old bottle of FS black (before Eboni) - or do I have to 
get new cartridges and clean out the hoses before I do this? Can't seem 
to get a simple answer from MIS.

Thanks,
Barbara White
barbara@...
http://www.worldartphotographs.com

Perhaps a dumb question, but - can I just add a new bottle of FS black 
in my CIS to my old bottle of FS black (before Eboni) - or do I have to 
get new cartridges and clean out the hoses before I do this? Can't seem 
to get a simple answer from MIS.

Thanks,
Barbara White
barbara@...
http://www.worldartphotographs.com


barbara@...
www.barbarawhitephoto.com
www.worldartphotographs.com

Barbara,

>... can I just add a new bottle of FS black 
>in my CIS to my old bottle of FS black (before Eboni) - or do I have to 
>get new cartridges and clean out the hoses before I do this? Can't seem 
>to get a simple answer from MIS.

Don't mix Eboni with the old FS black.  Eboni is very sensitive to all sorts
of things, including dyes.  All the old blacks had small amounts of dye in
them to get an acceptable dmax.

So, if the new FS K is Eboni (and I think it is), I would not mix it into
the old FS K bottle.

(By the way, I still have some of the old FS/VM K, including and un-opened
pint bottle, if someone wants some.)

Paul
www.PaulRoark.com

Barbara,

According to MIS the two inks are incompatible and the carts should 
be replaced.

Good luck,

Don Bryant

--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Barbara White 
<barbara@b...> wrote:
> Perhaps a dumb question, but - can I just add a new bottle of FS 
black 
> in my CIS to my old bottle of FS black (before Eboni) - or do I 
have to 
> get new cartridges and clean out the hoses before I do this? Can't 
seem 

> to get a simple answer from MIS.
> 
> Thanks,
> Barbara White
> barbara@b...
> http://www.worldartphotographs.com