A solution for high iso banding

[Besprosvet]

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I really love the rendering of my M246, I don't mind at all the noise at high iso, but I do mind banding.

I read here and there that there is a software from DxO that can deal with the issue. But it's not clear to me if:

- It really works for this kind of banding

- if it's a plug in, a sub function of a software, or a software itself.

Do you have any info?

Thanks

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[TeleElmar135mm]

vor 3 Minuten schrieb Besprosvet:

I really love the rendering of my M246, I don't mind at all the noise at high iso, but I do mind banding.

I read here and there that there is a software from DxO that can deal with the issue. But it's not clear to me if:

- It really works for this kind of banding

- if it's a plug in, a sub function of a software, or a software itself.

Do you have any info?

Thanks

Use the Nik-Software from DXO and in this package Define2. Works for banding and noise very well (plug-in)

Edited March 19, 2023 by TeleElmar135mm

[sometimesmaybe]

16 hours ago, Besprosvet said:

I read here and there that there is a software from DxO that can deal with the issue

i love DxO, but alas PureRaw and DeepPrime XD doesnt work with the monchrom sensor. DxO needs the colour filter to demosaic and denoise. it works a treat on the m240. i've posted some samples in the below m240 thread  

 

 

Edited March 20, 2023 by sometimesmaybe

[Besprosvet]

6 hours ago, sometimesmaybe said:

i love DxO, but alas PureRaw and DeepPrime XD doesnt work with the monchrom sensor. DxO needs the colour filter to demosaic and denoise. it works a treat on the m240. i've posted some samples in the below m240 thread  

 

 

Thank you. So, if you would do debanding on a monochrom sensor which software would you personally use? Given that noise is (way) less of a concern for me

[sometimesmaybe]

9 hours ago, Besprosvet said:

if you would do debanding on a monochrom sensor which software would you personally use?

i actually wouldn't have a clue 🤷‍♂️ i rarely come across the issue, prob because i rarely shoot anything with a solid background (ignorance is bliss and whatnot...)

sometimes i think it's caused by the conversion to JPEG, but that just me speculating... i'm sure other on LUF will have more insight and workarounds 

[Besprosvet]

23 hours ago, sometimesmaybe said:

i actually wouldn't have a clue 🤷‍♂️ i rarely come across the issue, prob because i rarely shoot anything with a solid background (ignorance is bliss and whatnot...)

sometimes i think it's caused by the conversion to JPEG, but that just me speculating... i'm sure other on LUF will have more insight and workarounds 

Thank you for the reply. Define2 doesn't give good results neither on tiff or jpg? The monochrom issue should be avoided in those cases, no?

[sometimesmaybe]

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43 minutes ago, Besprosvet said:

Thank you for the reply. Define2 doesn't give good results neither on tiff or jpg? The monochrom issue should be avoided in those cases, no?

it's my very tenuous understanding (*fact check needed*) that the m246 shoots in 14bit and jpeg images come out as 8bit. lots of the subtle tonality is lost in the conversion to jpeg.

@Gregm61 posted the following workaround in a 240 thread 

 

[John Black]

NIK - Dfine --> Using the "Reduce" tab and there is an option for removing horizontal or vertical banding.  Slide the noise reduction sliders (above the de-band options) to their bull setting.  

NIK's noise reduction is so-so compared to the higher horse-powered apps / plugin's like DXO's Pure RAW or Topaz's AI, so a two step approach might work best.  I'd try de-banding first with Dfine and then rinsing away the luma noise (if it's objectionable) with some other noise reduction.

As noted earlier, Pure Raw is not an option as it doesn't support the M-246 or M10-M.

[Ken Abrahams]

I have the M Monochrome and as I understand the banding issue, it's only when attempting to increase shadow details from an already underexposed image? I have never required other software to resolve banding. 

[Besprosvet]

On 4/3/2023 at 12:07 AM, Ken Abrahams said:

I have the M Monochrome and as I understand the banding issue, it's only when attempting to increase shadow details from an already underexposed image? I have never required other software to resolve banding. 

It happens frequently even with correct exposure when having an even background, like sky turning out to be middle grey. Usually above 8k iso, surely at 12500, dramatically at 25000

[Besprosvet]

On 3/25/2023 at 2:03 AM, John Black said:

NIK - Dfine --> Using the "Reduce" tab and there is an option for removing horizontal or vertical banding.  Slide the noise reduction sliders (above the de-band options) to their bull setting.  

NIK's noise reduction is so-so compared to the higher horse-powered apps / plugin's like DXO's Pure RAW or Topaz's AI, so a two step approach might work best.  I'd try de-banding first with Dfine and then rinsing away the luma noise (if it's objectionable) with some other noise reduction.

As noted earlier, Pure Raw is not an option as it doesn't support the M-246 or M10-M.

Thank you, I'll give it a try.

I'm not bothered by luma noise, just banding, which is really distracting. I'm bulding a body of work and I need sensitivities above 6400 for that kind of photographs. That's why I'm so annoyed, it's not a shot once in a while, the whole project may be affected by banding.

I'd like to avoid getting the M10M, since it's not exactly cheap to afford. For everything else my M246 has enough technology to do everything I need to

[blockhead Green]

On 4/5/2023 at 6:24 AM, Besprosvet said:

Thank you, I'll give it a try.

I'm not bothered by luma noise, just banding, which is really distracting. I'm bulding a body of work and I need sensitivities above 6400 for that kind of photographs. That's why I'm so annoyed, it's not a shot once in a while, the whole project may be affected by banding.

I'd like to avoid getting the M10M, since it's not exactly cheap to afford. For everything else my M246 has enough technology to do everything I need to

Hello, I am wondering how it goes for you.

I am looking to upgrade to m246 from a M9E, and the main concern I have is this very issue. The M9E starts banding around 1000iso, and ruining quite a few only good shots when it happens.

A few users point out that the battery for 246 will last longer than M10M in extreme cold weather, which is also another secret sauce to me as the M9E stop working after 10 mins in -7F.  I would love the high iso capability of M10M becauseI am also planning on shooting F8 with an IR filter or red filter. But it's still more than I am willing to pay. 

It seems like the best way to use high ISO on M246 is to under-expose while shooting 6400 and then raise the exposure in post-processing. 

Do you have any advice or review after having to deal with this problem? I would be interested to hear what you learned.

[jaapv]

On 3/19/2023 at 2:09 PM, Besprosvet said:

I really love the rendering of my M246, I don't mind at all the noise at high iso, but I do mind banding.

I read here and there that there is a software from DxO that can deal with the issue. But it's not clear to me if:

- It really works for this kind of banding

- if it's a plug in, a sub function of a software, or a software itself.

Do you have any info?

Thanks

You cannot expect a 15-year old (in reality 25 year old) CCD to have the noise performance of an up-to-date CMOS. I would not advise to underexpose and raise the exposure (I know the technique but don't believe in it, noise comes from lack of light and the more photons you get on that sensor the better) - I prefer ETTR.

Having said that, present-day postprocessing comes a long way in mitigating the problem.

The first DNG conversion in DXO PureRaw. Export as DNG into ACR. Zero noise reduction, but use Enhance. Open in Photoshop. As first step use Topaz Photo AI, then process further. You could try to add Topaz DeNoise AI in extreme cases but you'd probably run into artefacts by then.  All these steps can be taken -or not- separately, and are user-controllable; room to experiment. 

The results are pretty amazing. DXO-ACR -PS-Topaz Photo AI is basically my standard high-quality workflow as it reduces the total processing time with better results

If DXO does not support M9 DNGs (I believe it should) just skip that step. Or try Adobe’s DNG converter which will neutralize the DNG  

There is one drawback, though  Working this way requires a Silicon Mac or a in a pinch a computer with a hefty amount of RAM 32 or better 64 GB  

The M9M, provided properly exposed, can handle ISO up to 10.000. 

[Besprosvet]

On 1/16/2024 at 1:53 AM, blockhead Green said:

Hello, I am wondering how it goes for you.

I am looking to upgrade to m246 from a M9E, and the main concern I have is this very issue. The M9E starts banding around 1000iso, and ruining quite a few only good shots when it happens.

A few users point out that the battery for 246 will last longer than M10M in extreme cold weather, which is also another secret sauce to me as the M9E stop working after 10 mins in -7F.  I would love the high iso capability of M10M becauseI am also planning on shooting F8 with an IR filter or red filter. But it's still more than I am willing to pay. 

It seems like the best way to use high ISO on M246 is to under-expose while shooting 6400 and then raise the exposure in post-processing. 

Do you have any advice or review after having to deal with this problem? I would be interested to hear what you learned.

Hi,

I don't know who said that, but never underexpose the M246 at very high iso values.

I still have to give a try to any of those AI banding reducer tools. As far as I know -as stated on their website- none of them support monochrome raw files (such a shame...) so I'd have to edit and export the RAWs as rgb color space .TIFF and try how they get handled... too much of an hassle, but I'm willing to try sooner or later. Then I don't know if they recently implemented support for monochrome sensors, I'd have to check.

As I wrote a few posts above, I'm not bothered by the noise level, it's banding that annoys me a lot. So:

Advice n1: you can go up to iso 12500 (even 25000) if the scenery you want to capture has a lot of stuff going on regarding tonal variation: people, stuff, shooting your fiancé at the restaurant, and the like. Somehow the M246 doesn't show -much- banding in those cases. I don't know if it's because there's visually less room for me to notice, or the sensor works just better in this scenario.

Advice n2: try to not go above iso 6400 if there are plain areas like dark grey night skies. Never underexpose, you just pull up banding. You can use iso 12500, but you need to be extra careful. Exposure bracketing with different shutter speeds helps (steady hands required), since the banding output it's a hit and miss in this extreme cases.

Advice n3:  to slightly reduce banding on Lightroom you may want to reduce clarity by a few units (like -5) and reduce the default sharpening from 40 to 20ish. This may not be needed if you use the -clunky- Capture One (I gave up on it). I don't use noise reduction because it just reduces noise while sacrificing shades of grey, banding stays there.

In general, I don't advice the M246 to photographers that have a 'shadow raising' editing style for high iso night shots.

I hope it helps.

[High_n_Dry]

I just purchased the M246 and have noticed the banding in the shadows even with "reasonable" ISO of 6400. However, after doing a quick sweep in Topaz Photo AI, the majority of the banding is gone. The banding is like a rainbow starting at the pedestrian sign, although it's hard to see on this low res pic.

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Edited February 12, 2024 by High_n_Dry

[High_n_Dry]

Here is the pic after Topaz.

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[Besprosvet]

On 2/12/2024 at 5:30 PM, High_n_Dry said:

I just purchased the M246 and have noticed the banding in the shadows even with "reasonable" ISO of 6400. However, after doing a quick sweep in Topaz Photo AI, the majority of the banding is gone. The banding is like a rainbow starting at the pedestrian sign, although it's hard to see on this low res pic.

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This should be just the effect of in camera lens correction, I always have it off. I'll see if I can post an example of what is the banding issue on the M246. That said, did you process a jpg on topaz or a tiff?

Edited February 15, 2024 by Besprosvet

[Besprosvet]

@High_n_Dry

Here is is a shot at 12500 iso, OOC raw + edited.

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Hallo,

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[High_n_Dry]

8 hours ago, Besprosvet said:

This should be just the effect of in camera lens correction, I always have it off. I'll see if I can post an example of what is the banding issue on the M246. That said, did you process a jpg on topaz or a tiff?

You are right. Does this occur mainly in the 246? I don't see this with lens correction on with the M11.

If you process the file directly via LR, it will process and output as a DNG

[High_n_Dry]

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This is just a throw away pic (blown highlights 😃) shot at 12,500 before Topaz Edited February 15, 2024 by High_n_Dry