Smooth out noise while preserving detail

To quickly zoom in from a wide view to 100% magnification tap the ‘Z’ key once. Check out the presence of noise then tap ‘Z’ again to zoom back out.

1 Import photo

Go to File>import. Browse to our supplied Noise_start.cr2 file. As this is a camera raw file we have more colour and tonal information to work with. Click ‘Review for import’.

2 Check metadata

Choose Window>info. This opens a metadata panel that tells us what settings were used to capture the shot. A high ISO speed of 800 will lead to the presence of picture noise.

3 Let there be light

Click ‘Edit’. The Histogram graph is clumped to the left, indicating an underexposed shot. Drag the Light panel’s slider right to reveal missing colour and tonal detail.

4 Look for noise

Brightening this shot reveals noise caused by the high-speed ISO setting. Use the zoom slider to take a closer look at the noise. It’s especially noticeable in the sky.

5 Recognise colour noise

Scroll down to the Noise Reduction panel. By default the Colour Noise slider is set to remove the worst type of noise. Drag all sliders to the far left to contain the noise in the shot.

6 Remove colour noise

Colour noise is easy to remove as this operation doesn’t smooth out details. Drag the Colour Noise slider to the far right (to a value of 1.00) to banish chrominance noise.

7 Reduce luminance noise

If you drag the Luminance Noise slider too far right it will smooth out details. Try a value of 0.38 to compromise between smoothing luminance noise and preserving detail.

8 Fine-tune the settings

The Detail slider enables you to restore some of the image detail that has been smoothed out by the other noise-reduction sliders. A value of 0.47 produces a balance.

9 Copy and paste

Choose Edit>copy Adjustments. Then import our Noise2_start.cr2 file and choose Edit>paste Adjustments. This boosts colours and tones as well as smoothing out noise.