reducing grain in neg scans

[soboyle]

I'm going large with some 35mm B&W negative scans, printing at 13x19, and the grain is getting very pronounced, especially after sharpening. Any thoughts on how to reduce the grain so it is less pronounced? Perhaps a noise reduction program? Other photoshop tricks?

[Richowens]

May I suggest you read Mark Segal's article here on LL.
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/ndq.shtml

He gives a very usefull workflow for color negatives, but it will apply to B&W also. Personally I use Noise Ninja for grain reduction, just fit me better than Neatimage.
Both are excellent programs and do a nice job, once you learn their individual quirks.

Rich

[mikeseb]

I'm going large with some 35mm B&W negative scans, printing at 13x19, and the grain is getting very pronounced, especially after sharpening. Any thoughts on how to reduce the grain so it is less pronounced? Perhaps a noise reduction program? Other photoshop tricks?
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Another lonely film shooter. Can you hear the echoes in here?

I suppose it's too late to suggest shooting MF film?

I have not tried it, but a noise reduction program used prior to sharpening will probably help somewhat.

You should also scan at no higher a resolution than necessary for the final output size you plan. You can work backward from, say, 360pp output resolution to determine the scan resolution that you need for a given size. (I use ImagePrint which defaults to a 360ppi output resolution, hence the 360.) Problem is, that tiny 24 x 36mm image area is just not much to start with! If you are going to 8x10 inch size, that's about an 8x linear magnification factor, which means you need around 2880ppi to start with.

Yours in analog counterrevolutionary spirit,

[Dale_Cotton]

I'm still back in the dark ages with Photoshop 6 so can't help you with features that may be in later versions. Also have no experience with b&w film scans. Nevertheless some of what I've used may still be of use.

Photoshop has several options under Filters/Noise. The least intrusive is Despeckle. Try applying one or two passes to individual channels (red, blue, or green - whichever shows the most pronounced graininess). The Median Cut filter might be worth experimenting with, as well. For heavier artillery, as Rich mentions you can try Neat Image or Noise Ninja on your scan files.

Another approach is simply to avoid sharpening the grain. Bruce Fraser's edge sharpening method may seem a bit daunting: just record it once as a macro then re-use at will.

Mike:

You should also scan at no higher a resolution than necessary

A 4x5 shooter acquaintance and I had this out a few years back. This is what we ended up with:

The detail in a film frame is literally composed out of grain (or dye clouds). The more you magnify the frame - meaning the greater the scan resolution - the more you magnify both its grain and its detail. Conversely, as you suggest using a lower resolution returns less grain ... but also less detail. One of the things that detail does for you is define your edges, IOW creates acutance. So in theory at least, the lower your scan res the more sharpening you'll need to apply to restore acutance, and the more sharpening you apply the more you're further destroying your image.

Whether this is a problem or not depends on the individual image and on your personal tastes. An alternative approach would be to scan at max res, then use intelligent noise/grain reduction, such as Neat Image or Noise Ninja, to eliminate as much graininess as possible in the regions inside the edge boundaries.

If anyone is really serious about scanning, I recommend trying both approaches on a number of images to see which you are happier with. I have had far better luck with the high res scan approach, but others, like you, the opposite. Perhaps it just comes down to how much acutance a person needs in order to feel an image is adequately crisp.

Yours in analog counterrevolutionary spirit

Nice! Unfortunately, I finally succumbed to the digital side of the force last summer, but I wish you well.

[Gordon Buck]

As much as I liked Mark Segal's article - even finding the title interesting and amusing - I made the workflow decision a few years ago to always, always, always scan for absolutely every bit of information that is possible with whatever the scanner is being used.  I save that file with (Raw Scan) in the file name.  Yes, it can be a large file.  In my own helter-skelter workflow, I sometimes go back to that (Raw Scan) and start processing it all over again.  After all, I'm still learning and editing software also continues to improve.

Grain was and is both an art form and a plague on the image.  A few decades ago, seems like I was always trying to eliminate grain and now I'm artificially adding grain to digital images!

But more to the point, my workflow, especially for B/W high speed film, is to scan at the highest possible resolution, 16 bit, and RGB.  Then use Neat Image to make an auto profile but set the filter at "Remove half the noise".  Next, use PK Sharpener Capture Sharpen but usually do not use creative sharpen - certainly do not use any sharpening procedure that works on fine detail, for example, "high pass".  After various other editing procedures, use PK Sharpener for the print size, covert to 8 bit grey scale and print.

[pobrien3]

An excellent Austin TX company, Applied Science Fiction was created by a photographic and electronics genius, Al Edgar.  Al's speciality was creating remakable noise suppression algorithms, the best know of which is called Digital ICE and used in many film scanners.

Another manifestation  of this is GEM, designed for control of grain. Kodak bought the company, and now these tools are sold as Photoshop plug-ins.  Have a squint at ASF GEM.  I've used GEM to good effect - I've often had better reults from it than I got with Noise Ninja and PK

[D White]

I have printed many 35mm chrome scans to 24x36" on a Epson 7600 that I think rock. I have scanned at 4000dpi on a Nikon 9000 and re-sized up to 480dpi followed by sharpening in TLR by thelightsrightstudio, (a free download), that does not emphasize grain as much in my experience. Some images also benefit from Noise Ninja while others look better without or applied selectively. There is grain but not objectionable at any decent viewing distance. These can even look fine compared to my 6x6cm scans or my DsII. On the other end, I have had fun with Tri-X scans with big and sharp grain which looks great in some photojournalistic type images. Not all grain is bad and can be a good part of the image.

I have really liked the smooth look of the DsII but at times a little grain looks more organic than funny little digital artifacts that demand removal by Noise Ninja to look OK.

[mikeseb]

A 4x5 shooter acquaintance and I had this out a few years back. This is what we ended up with:

The detail in a film frame is literally composed out of grain....If anyone is really serious about scanning, I recommend trying both approaches on a number of images to see which you are happier with....[a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=59468\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a]

No argument here, Dale. You said what I was getting around to, with more economy and elegance than I could summon!

[Mark D Segal]

I tested both Neat Image and Noise Image for grain removal, and I found that Noise Ninja was rather ineffective (but excellent for digital noise), while Neat Image does the grain management job very well. This is why I stuck with Neat Image for this purpose and recommended it in my article http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/ndq.shtml.

[Ray]

I'm going large with some 35mm B&W negative scans, printing at 13x19, and the grain is getting very pronounced...
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I've just started a bit of scanning again after a break of several months and noticed that Vuescan has a few more updates available since I last checked Hamrick's site. The latest grain removal filters in Vuescan seem much improved. I've just scanned a few 40 year old Kodak Panatomic X negs on my Minolta 5400 ll and was amazed at how successfully the Vuescan filter, on 'high' setting, removed grain without any noticeably loss in resolution. Even at 200% magnification on screen, comparing filtered with non-filtered, it's impossible to tell if any picture detail has been lost. I can only assume that if indeed some detail has been lost, it was detail that was completely obscured by grain and therefore entirely irrelevant.

Of course, the infra red scratch removal filter still doesn't work with silver based negatives, so there's still a lot of tedious work to be done in PS with the clone/healing brush if one wants to preserve maximum detail. However, the new 'spot' healing brush in CS2 speeds up the job significantly, at the risk of developing RSI of the index finger I suppose   .

[AJSJones]

Of course, the infra red scratch removal filter still doesn't work with silver based negatives, so there's still a lot of tedious work to be done in PS with the clone/healing brush if one wants to preserve maximum detail. However, the new 'spot' healing brush in CS2 speeds up the job significantly, at the risk of developing RSI of the index finger I suppose   .
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You might find the new Epson scanner worth keeping an eye on.  The more expensive version allows wetmount that folks seem to feel is useful mainly for b/w negs. [a href=\"http://www.photo-i.co.uk/News/Feb06/Epson_V700_scanner.htm]Photo-i[/url] is promising a review of the engine ASAP, as is Ken Rockwell.  I'm interested too, but don't have any b/w negs, just hoping for good resolution and high Dmax (even 2/3 of "claimed" would be nice    )