What I see is a reduction in noise (or maybe reduction in granularity is a better description), but without the usual accompanying loss of sharpness or increased smearing you get with simple NR.
Looking at this (and at the OP's recent image in User Critiques), I'm sort of ambivalent about this process, I guess. Any poor soul that's been paying attention to my sort-of-infrequent posts lately knows that I've been on a pretty heavy BW kick, and I've been playing mainly with X-Trans Fuji equipment. Maybe it's just my own personal perspective, but what I'm finding is that, for what I'm shooting right now, I'm enjoying the "filmic" quality of the Xtrans BW files and prints, and I'm not certain that this method isn't resulting in "digitizing" what I am tryong so hard to "de-digitize"
Do I see the smoother tones and transitions, and the resultantincreased sharpening and clarity? Yep - sure do. Do I think it improves the picture? Not quite as certain. Could that opinion just be me putting too much emphasis on imitating the "feel" of something traditional isntead of embracing the advantages of a technique like this? 100% it could be.
I'd be interested in looking at the ultimate difference in my "typical" end result - a 20x30 print on a rough matte paper. Iwonder if the smothenss and the clarity would add to or detract from the fine art look I strive for.
Interesting discussion - thanks for sharing!