@@toosas I first cull using Photo Mechanic. Then I run all my raw through DxO, then I edit the DNG files with Lightroom. I do not keep the raw files, only the DNG files.
@@TBGTOMPHOTO gotcha thanks. I'm pretty obsessed about keeping the raws, purely because as years went by, old and not really usable super high ISO/blurry raws can now be salvaged beautifully with the latest tech advancements... but I might just make the jump to DNGs if that lets the software do the same
@@Andrea-qg5yk- mind expanding on this? Why process in DXO before processing more in Lightroom? Or is the DXO as you use it just for NR, then Lightroom for exposure and tonal refinement?
That was such an incredibly thorough comparison Unmesh! I'm blown away by Camera Raw - ashamed to say I've actually never tried using their noise removal before. Now that I've seen it in action, I'm off to run a bunch of photos through it! Humbled and honored that you used my embarrassingly noisy photo of Bootsie the Schnauzer in Vegas! :P
I use DXO Pure raw to pre-process all my images. Great noise reduction, as you say, but also great lens correction, vignette correction, and de-Bayering - all in one pass. De-Bayering was where both Camera Raw and Canon DPP were really letting me down. Thanks for a great video!
Recently, I moved to shooting almost exclusively at night. Between De noising solutions and my new full frame gear have really given me a leg up on my artistic explorations. Thanks for sharing these other options, I didn't know they were all that different in practice till now.
I recently discovered DxO PureRaw and i'm in love 😍I use it as a plugin in Lightroom and there's more options than what's being shown here. You can adjust the lens softness compensation, that pretty much controls the sharpness and some other things, then it creates a DNG that's automatically added to your library, allowing you to continue editing it just like the RAW file. For wildlife it's brilliant!👏I haven't used it with portraits, so I can't speak to that...
I have been a Topaz DeNoise user for several years. After your video, I tried DxO PureRAW on 50+ photos with ISO of up to 6400. I tried both in Lightroom, on photos taken with Canon R5II. I found that I preferred DXO over Denoise in about 50% of the photos. However, I discovered that the DXO processes the unprocessed raw file, ignoring any crops and edits in Lightroom, resulting in a much longer processing time (typically 10x longer). In contrast, Denoise retains all Lightroom edits, including cropping. To me, that is a major advantage favoring Denoise.
Try doing the denoise first in DxO. I have my Lightroom set up to look for a specific folder so it imports all upon startup. I have both DxO PureRaw 4 and the latest Topaz Photo AI. It has the advantage of being able to process jpg files.
First, I wish you all the best for this new year. I use adobe stuff to work on my pictures so the best option for me is using Camera Raw, thanks for making this kind of video.
Topaz result is exposure corrected because you applied autopilot and it will do everything the AI thinks that will improve the photo automatically. So It added noise reduction + exposure correction + color correction. Also the each adjustment has different AI model to choose from to suite your case.
Unmesh, great comparison video. You did not even go into the advanced settings DXO PureRaw like you did Topaz. It has a lot more control parameters than ACR. I am an aurora borealis photographer, and ACR adds artifacts in the night sky. DXO performs better for me. Thnaks for the comparison video.
I've been happily using DxO for a year and just got Topaz cuz I thought that some images might look better in Topaz. While both work well for me, I seem to prefer DxO. What did I learn here? A few things, but I didn't even know that Camera Raw has a denoiser. Great info and excellent comparison!
I’m using DXO photolabs. In addition to raw noise reduction, it also does a good job recovering details from slightly soft lenses. Not the greatest workflow-wise but it’s good enough for me.
Agreed, the additional tools in PhotoLab 8 make it so much more usable which considering the trial version is fully working I'm surprised wasn't used instead for this comparison. Lots of in app help next to the controls to get one into the workflow.
Nice comparison! I have DxO and Topaz (latest versions). Always process via DxO for RAW first, then process, otherwise it can be a time-consuming process. Topaz is not bad, but it's not up to DxO at this point. And to be fair, unless you're pixel-peeping, the difference might not be noticeable. I have Lightroom and Photoshop, but honestly don't use it for noise reduction. One thing to note is that with DxO 4, they introduced controls for the amount of sharpening, noise reduction, and a few other parameters. You can vary these by photo, though I generally don't mess with that. If you convert directly to jpegs, there are some nice controls there as well.
That sums up Neo nicely. Tries to do a bunch of different options, instead of focusing on doing the basic functions well. Topaz kept adding unwanted artifacts. After owning CR, C1 (older), Topaz photo Ai, and Neo. I bought and use DXO PR4, very happy with this choice.
I'm still using the now discontinued denoise for non raw photos lol, and is totally adequate. I do use adobe and for raw files their denoise has improved greatly.
I am glad I saw this. I was considering purchasing Topaz. I am just a hobbyist and already have Lightroom and Photoshop. I see no reason to buy anything additional, although I must say the face recovery feature is brilliant. How about performance? I assume you speed it up in the edits but maybe that can be a factor if you are doing large batches ...
In Camera Raw / Lightroom you have to increase the color noise slider up to 5-15 after the denoise process. This takes out a lot of strange color noise artifacts. If you want more natural looking results, turn down the texture slider. It's been heavily used in the process.
I bought dxo pure raw a couple of years ago. It was very expensive but it worked really well. A few months later LR was updated with an AI denoise and I was blown away. I compared side by side and I couldn't tell the difference. Both are extremely good but there are 3 major problems with DXO. First, the price and second the awkward and complex workflow. I use LR so there is a plug in to process the files which is quicker than before instead of drag and drop but no only it takes a lot longer to process but then you end up with a new dng that loses the adjustments on the original raw files. Meaning you have to manually copy and paste settings and most of the time the colors were off. Specially skin tones.. The LR de noise is perfect and it's almost instant on my M4 Max with 60mp sony files. There is a new right next to the original raw and with the same exact settings. LR is better, quicker, easier and Free. So it's a no Brainer. Cheers!
Are you using this program commercially and not afraid of these Ai tools? The company boasts that it trains the Ai tool on billions of images. Not sure if they have licenses and permission from the authors. If it turns out they don't then your photos would not be legal either unless not for commercial use. Better to be skeptical.
Well done as always. You are a pleasure to follow as a teacher. I use Topaz Photo because of the extra features. I will give DxO another look though. Fortunately we can't do much better than Adobe's own offering.
ON1 NoNoise can sometimes deliver a very good result. Worth checking out. Not very impressed with Luminar overall. Often Camera Raw does the best job on Denoising. In some cases Topaz PhotoAI is a better solution due to its extra features. DxO Pure Raw is a good overall solution many times.
Pls note, the image of the kingfisher was shot on MFT camera and underexposed. This is really great result for ACR to retain an original colors of the birds feather I prefer DXO in my workflow for noise reduction as it is 10X faster than ACR/LR NR.
Amazing comparison. Didn't expect that Adobe has improved their algorthms that much. Can you do such a comparison for upscaling and sharpening an image?
if you decrease blend in face recovery of topaz photo ai it will look more natural if rest of image is soft, then it refines just face contures, eyes and lips, sometimes it messes up the hair and makes it oversharpened so I usually do face recovery in separate layer and apply only to certain parts of the face using mask
I use a double denoise process. 1st one in camera raw for global adjustment and 2nd one topaz denoise (the old one) as a plugin i PS for selective denoise. Topaz is used for more agressive cleaning up background more, and my subject will still have good texture intact. Im a wildlife photographer.
Your examples are impressive. We spend a lot of time at classical /and Jazz concerts and the light forces us often to go up to ISO 12,800 at a certain aperture and exposure time. Back in the office we then let the Denoise run the rest of the night with preset values (usually 37%) as batch, throw the CR3 files out of LR Classic in the morning and then select and edit the DNG files. You might ask yourself, why not select first? We do if we have to send results to someone the same night. Photos are simply easier to evaluate and select when they are denoised. For photo #1 of 1000, we might then make another version later with more differentiated denoising and a final edit
Considering CaptureOne does not use any machine learning the results are good, I have used the denoising in quite a lot of situations. But it can't compete with DXO or CameraRAW for sure. For Capture One it's usually better to leave the luminance value rather low, so you get the luminance noise, but not the color noise. This looks better in most cases than those uneven blobs it creates. I have tried a few denoisers myself and fount that PureRAW sometimes created worse artifacts than CameraRAW, interestingly here with the bird it's the other way around. I think that really depends on the version and the raw file (sensor type...). As I want to get rid of the Adobe Suite, I think the best option is to get the DXO Raw converter which has the denoiser built in and use Affinity Photo as PS replacement. It's a cheaper and pretty solid option, but it can't replace everything sadly.
Topaz Photo AI includes both DeNoise and Sharpening. It also includes two lighting options one to adjust lighting balance and the other to adjust tonal balance. Because of the way DeNoise impacts lighting colors you need to include the recommended tonal balance if you are trying to achieve recommended adjustments. It is part of the recommended adjustments process.
But that doesnt change the fact, that its bad at keeping details and not introducing artificial patterns and structures. I own Topaz Denoise Ai, Photo Ai and DXO Pure RAW and DXO consistently gets way better and more natural results.
@@TheTempic Totally agree! I had Topaz Denoise, then moved to Photo Ai, was using that in the past 2 years and recently got DXO PureRAW and i'll never use the other ones again! DXO is so much better, exactly as you said the results are more natural and it retains more of the small details. PhotoAI did some weird stuff...
I had upgraded my Topaz Photo AI about a month ago and was really disappointed with it's performance. As @TheTempic mentioned, it did some really weird stuff to my images plus I got those white dots all over my images just like Unmesh got in this video. Not sure what happened with this latest version but it felt like a total step backwards. I returned it. My older Topaz Denoise app does a way better job.
dxo photolab still the king denoise software for raw image, i,ve tried many software editing, topaz ai was good but color acuracy & detail texture very bad againts dxo, i usually use 2 apps when shoot above 12k ISO , denoise file raw using dxo than finishing using topaz ai
I have a ton of old slides I've been scanning and correcting, and would love to remove the film grain from them from using high ISO slide film. This couldn't have come at a better time.
I have both topaz and dxo, and dxo is the one that I usually use, it also has better distortion correction. There are cases where photo ai gives better results however, so it is always worth to test both in any given situation. I’m not a super fan of denoising ai however, if I can avoid it I do prefer. Capture One does have a pretty obsolete denoising tool, it’s more for selection based denoising, and I never really use it, there’s a feature request open but obviously has been sitting ignored for ages.
I have Topaz Photo AI as well as all the individual apps. For some reason the individual apps seem to give better results. Topaz Denoise leaves weird artifacts whenever I try it. Lightroom's AI Denoise, which I assume is the same as Camera Raw, consistently gives the most natural results. Topaz Sharpen AI is very good and I use it quite a bit. I just got Topaz Video AI and it is the most disappointing app I've ever used.
Nice job with the comparision of products. Your observations square with my own regarding these products. Two additional thoughts, it would useful to talk about how long each of these products takes to denoise a RAW file (realizing that every computer is different). For Canon photographers, there is also the Neural Net Image Processing Tool (subscription required) and I have found it to be as good, if not slightly better, than both Adobe Camera RAW and DXO PureRAW. However, on my computer, it takes about 25-30 seconds per photo with NNIPT versus 3-5 seconds in the other two products. When one is denoising several hundred photos, that is a big difference! Still waiting for DXO PureRAW to support the Canon R1...
Just my opinion but it would rank among the worst. Artifacts galore. Every year I try ON1 because they seem like such an underdog to root for but every year the denoise kills it for me. Feel free to give a free trial a spin. Beyond that the RAW engine isn’t quite on par with Lr or DXO.
If you miss focus a lot, Topaz is the choice It has recover fave feature to bring back out of focus face on top of their raw denoise. But if you don't miss your focus and only need denoise, DXo pureraw is the choice. It all depends on what is the problem you are trying to get rid of
I just use Darktable. Not AI, but great results and it is free. Plus it has a lot more control options like masking based on parameters ( like luminance or colour etc). I think if you process many images, then these AI tools are great. But for amateur photographers with just a few images to do and time, I use Darktable
Considering how great Camera Raw and DXO PureRaw are, DXO as a way better advantage, you can apply the denoiser to a big series of pictures and let it work. With Lightroom and camera raw you have to individually apply it…
i use pure raw 3 and batch convert to ight room. i will sharpen , crop and upscale with photo ai if needed. the sharpen in photo ai can create some terrible sharpening so i keep it on the low side.
I tested Camera RAW denoise in Lightroom versus Topaz deNoise AI, which I had been using before Lightroom’s new denNoise was released. My verdict was that Lightroom was marginally better than Topaz, although a little slower. However, because I am usually processing dozens of high iso stage performance images at a time, Lightroom was clearly the winner, because it allowed me to sort images by metadata (ISO), adjust just one to my liking, and then process all of them at that ISO as a batch. I can go grab a cup of coffee, come back, and two dozen ISO 6400 images will be ready for me to process… or do the same thing with my two dozen ISO 8000 images, etc. As always, thank you for this very excellent video tutorial!
Great comparison video. How are you able to see the effects of applying Camera Raw Denoise AI without the tiny 'enhance' box coming up with its fixed zoom ratio of 250%. Trying to assess how much to move the slider at 250% zoom is practically useless for me. I'm using a Windows 11 PC. Exactly the same problem in Lightroom.
Hi Unmesh thanks for the comparison! I love CaptureOne but unfortunately it lacks AI noise reduction, it would be nice to see another comparison video between software regarding sharpening, in this area I have always found CaptureOne more natural
Thank you for an excellent video. I think Topaz will preserve the colors if you choose a camara specific profile before you export the photo to Topaz from Lightroom Classic as a raw file. Or have you had other experiences?
Hi Unmesh, a very good comparison of these applications. Thanks for your effort and sharing. I like the Adobe engine in terms of the result, but it takes a long time to get there. Unfortunately, this point is neglected in your comparison. The process times you quote here are utopian for me. My experience is as follows: the first image in a session (raw, approx. 45 MB in size) takes approx. 30s. This value increases with each additional image that I process in ACR. After 5 images I am then quite quickly at 2.5 min and more. Sounds to me like a resource that fills up after several uses. Does this depend on a setting in ACR or do special hardware requirements have to be created here? Would you have any further information on this? Thank you.
Stuck shooting performance images in b&w with dim lighting with Fuji. iso runs from 12,800 and up - using DXO Photolab 7 (should have gotten just the RAW because do not like working in Photolab) to do noise control and convert to dng. Results are phenomenal - wouldn't use this on other images, but for stage performance (expecially with Fuji and especially for the b&w)) it's a magic formula. Oddly, even when underexposing two stops, I leave it at 12.800 because I like my corrections better than what the camera does to the RAW.
Camera RAW looks to be consistently great across the board, all the others kept having weird quirks with one image or another. I also like that it can be tuned back. All of these look way overcooked to me. There's nothing wrong with a little noise. Personally, I'll eliminate chroma noise and then just do 1-3 stops worth of noise reduction. Luminar Neo did a very good job of looking natural, but not a great job of preserving colors. Everything looked pretty flat and would need more work to tune the colors.
Camera Raw was updated in October of 2024. It was long overdue, and I think they've set a new standard for noise reduction while retaining the most fine detail and correct color.
Promise I'm not a Topaz phanboy… but, Photo AI has a lot of tweaks available and it makes a huge difference how things are set. It's also unintuitive how the settings interact and you just have to play around until you find out. In most cases I just use Lightroom/Camera Raw because it's more than adequate and quick. When I have an image that I don't like the results of in LR/CR, I run to Photo AI and get better results, but it takes time tweaking the settings. I think it's pretty hard to go far wrong with whichever, Topaz, LR/CR, or DXO.
I am using PureRAW4 in combination with C1. When PureRAW3 (the old version) was around C1 automatically disabled their own denoising on the imported DNG files. With PR 4 C1 wants to add their own denoising on top of the already denoised files. This makes some images look soft. Once the denoising in C1 is set to 0 the files look sharp again.
Your tips are always so useful - thank you. One thing i am frustrated with is the sort preferences under the view tab in LR classic. I set it to "file" each time but it always reverts back to "capture time" next time I open the program. do you know of any way to make it stick permanently to "file"? Thanks.
I use Topaz and I does in fact shift colors on some photos. Also, I've noticed it creates hot spots in the before image that wasn't there in the original and tries to deal with them in the after.
It would be good for you to talk about pricing. Some of these are REALLY expensive. The AI Denoise in Lightroom is very, very good, and included in the program, so is essentially free. Although, Topaz Face Recovery does look very good. Perhaps too good, and maybe verging on unnatural? But it's too much cash. I have the older Topaz Sharpen AI which was a lot cheaper. I don't know why they moved away from that pricing model but it's not worth the outlay IMHO.
Hey umesh sir, Do you think Photo Editing, Photoshop Manipulation, and Digital Art are slowly losing relevance? Will AI eventually take over these fields entirely? What’s your opinion on this? If I were still learning photo editing right now, what would you suggest I do? And what about those who were planning to build a career in this field and earn from it? Please share your thoughts.
Topaz AI with Face Recovery is amazing. I used it for some fotos and was almost magic. But to be fair i used it in combination with PS Neural Filters, "Colorize" and "Photo restoration".
Many thanks for that interesting comprarison. LR/Camera raw and DXO make an incredible job. However, the resulting weights are not at all the same !! For instance, if the native raw is about 55 Mo, the final result with DXO is about 146 MO and unchanged with LR/Camera raw. That must be taken in account.
Capture One is known by users to not be good at noise removal. Many of us do our raw processing in C1 after turning off de noise and sharpening then send a tiff to photo ai to clean up noise and do the sharpening. You left out Iridient from the comparison. Any reason why? Other thing is C1 is aimed at studio professionals and with the lighting right they don't get noise, so its probably not a major issue for them.
I've been using DxO Pure Raw since v.2 and I am hooked. I don't even bother with anything else regarding denoise.
how do you use it in your workflow? what is your main editor? is it a batch process job or? do you keep the originals as well?
@@toosas process everything thru dxo before importing into lightroom. then edit the improved files
@@toosas I first cull using Photo Mechanic. Then I run all my raw through DxO, then I edit the DNG files with Lightroom. I do not keep the raw files, only the DNG files.
@@TBGTOMPHOTO gotcha thanks. I'm pretty obsessed about keeping the raws, purely because as years went by, old and not really usable super high ISO/blurry raws can now be salvaged beautifully with the latest tech advancements... but I might just make the jump to DNGs if that lets the software do the same
@@Andrea-qg5yk- mind expanding on this? Why process in DXO before processing more in Lightroom? Or is the DXO as you use it just for NR, then Lightroom for exposure and tonal refinement?
That was such an incredibly thorough comparison Unmesh! I'm blown away by Camera Raw - ashamed to say I've actually never tried using their noise removal before. Now that I've seen it in action, I'm off to run a bunch of photos through it! Humbled and honored that you used my embarrassingly noisy photo of Bootsie the Schnauzer in Vegas! :P
I use DXO Pure raw to pre-process all my images. Great noise reduction, as you say, but also great lens correction, vignette correction, and de-Bayering - all in one pass. De-Bayering was where both Camera Raw and Canon DPP were really letting me down. Thanks for a great video!
This makes me so happy, since I already have Camera Raw. No need to look at the others just yet.
Recently, I moved to shooting almost exclusively at night. Between De noising solutions and my new full frame gear have really given me a leg up on my artistic explorations. Thanks for sharing these other options, I didn't know they were all that different in practice till now.
Absolutely brilliant idea to have video about how to save damage digital camera .jpg from 90's. Thanks for the great content Unmesh!
I recently discovered DxO PureRaw and i'm in love 😍I use it as a plugin in Lightroom and there's more options than what's being shown here. You can adjust the lens softness compensation, that pretty much controls the sharpness and some other things, then it creates a DNG that's automatically added to your library, allowing you to continue editing it just like the RAW file. For wildlife it's brilliant!👏I haven't used it with portraits, so I can't speak to that...
You are absolutely the best teacher of PS. Thanks for all of your tips tricks and knowledge ❤️👍
I have been a Topaz DeNoise user for several years. After your video, I tried DxO PureRAW on 50+ photos with ISO of up to 6400. I tried both in Lightroom, on photos taken with Canon R5II. I found that I preferred DXO over Denoise in about 50% of the photos. However, I discovered that the DXO processes the unprocessed raw file, ignoring any crops and edits in Lightroom, resulting in a much longer processing time (typically 10x longer). In contrast, Denoise retains all Lightroom edits, including cropping. To me, that is a major advantage favoring Denoise.
Try doing the denoise first in DxO. I have my Lightroom set up to look for a specific folder so it imports all upon startup. I have both DxO PureRaw 4 and the latest Topaz Photo AI. It has the advantage of being able to process jpg files.
Been using DxO for many years, helped me step up.
That's how a test should look like. Thank you for the good work!
First, I wish you all the best for this new year. I use adobe stuff to work on my pictures so the best option for me is using Camera Raw, thanks for making this kind of video.
Thank you for the work you've done, we didn't think that camera raw removes noise so fantastically, the video is amazing, thank you
Topaz result is exposure corrected because you applied autopilot and it will do everything the AI thinks that will improve the photo automatically.
So It added noise reduction + exposure correction + color correction.
Also the each adjustment has different AI model to choose from to suite your case.
Unmesh, great comparison video. You did not even go into the advanced settings DXO PureRaw like you did Topaz. It has a lot more control parameters than ACR. I am an aurora borealis photographer, and ACR adds artifacts in the night sky. DXO performs better for me. Thnaks for the comparison video.
CameraRaw and Dxo 👌
"I was already watching your video, and now you've uploaded a new one-wow!"
I've been happily using DxO for a year and just got Topaz cuz I thought that some images might look better in Topaz. While both work well for me, I seem to prefer DxO. What did I learn here? A few things, but I didn't even know that Camera Raw has a denoiser. Great info and excellent comparison!
I’m using DXO photolabs. In addition to raw noise reduction, it also does a good job recovering details from slightly soft lenses. Not the greatest workflow-wise but it’s good enough for me.
Agreed, the additional tools in PhotoLab 8 make it so much more usable which considering the trial version is fully working I'm surprised wasn't used instead for this comparison. Lots of in app help next to the controls to get one into the workflow.
fantastic as always. thanks so much for all that you share/teach/inspire. yes please, JPG noise removal comparison.
Nice comparison! I have DxO and Topaz (latest versions). Always process via DxO for RAW first, then process, otherwise it can be a time-consuming process. Topaz is not bad, but it's not up to DxO at this point. And to be fair, unless you're pixel-peeping, the difference might not be noticeable. I have Lightroom and Photoshop, but honestly don't use it for noise reduction. One thing to note is that with DxO 4, they introduced controls for the amount of sharpening, noise reduction, and a few other parameters. You can vary these by photo, though I generally don't mess with that. If you convert directly to jpegs, there are some nice controls there as well.
That sums up Neo nicely.
Tries to do a bunch of different options, instead of focusing on doing the basic functions well.
Topaz kept adding unwanted artifacts.
After owning CR, C1 (older), Topaz photo Ai, and Neo. I bought and use DXO PR4, very happy with this choice.
Exactly the comparison video I've been looking for, thank you.
I'm still using the now discontinued denoise for non raw photos lol, and is totally adequate. I do use adobe and for raw files their denoise has improved greatly.
I am glad I saw this. I was considering purchasing Topaz. I am just a hobbyist and already have Lightroom and Photoshop. I see no reason to buy anything additional, although I must say the face recovery feature is brilliant.
How about performance? I assume you speed it up in the edits but maybe that can be a factor if you are doing large batches ...
In Camera Raw / Lightroom you have to increase the color noise slider up to 5-15 after the denoise process. This takes out a lot of strange color noise artifacts. If you want more natural looking results, turn down the texture slider. It's been heavily used in the process.
I bought dxo pure raw a couple of years ago. It was very expensive but it worked really well. A few months later LR was updated with an AI denoise and I was blown away. I compared side by side and I couldn't tell the difference. Both are extremely good but there are 3 major problems with DXO. First, the price and second the awkward and complex workflow. I use LR so there is a plug in to process the files which is quicker than before instead of drag and drop but no only it takes a lot longer to process but then you end up with a new dng that loses the adjustments on the original raw files. Meaning you have to manually copy and paste settings and most of the time the colors were off. Specially skin tones..
The LR de noise is perfect and it's almost instant on my M4 Max with 60mp sony files. There is a new right next to the original raw and with the same exact settings.
LR is better, quicker, easier and Free.
So it's a no Brainer. Cheers!
Fiinally someone who differs between iso and other noise and makes a vide about it. 👌
DxO PureRaw is the best for what I do!
Are you using this program commercially and not afraid of these Ai tools? The company boasts that it trains the Ai tool on billions of images. Not sure if they have licenses and permission from the authors. If it turns out they don't then your photos would not be legal either unless not for commercial use. Better to be skeptical.
Sir! Your every video is amazing I am loving Photoshop just because the way you teach.. Love from Pakistan
Well done as always. You are a pleasure to follow as a teacher. I use Topaz Photo because of the extra features. I will give DxO another look though. Fortunately we can't do much better than Adobe's own offering.
Thankyou for this phantastic comparison!
Is camera raw the same as the denoise in lightroom?
Great video but I wished you had added On1 to the mix
this is a great comparison. you should do another vid to compare the upscaling
I wish On1 was included, otherwise great tutorial!
ON1 NoNoise can sometimes deliver a very good result. Worth checking out. Not very impressed with Luminar overall.
Often Camera Raw does the best job on Denoising. In some cases Topaz PhotoAI is a better solution due to its extra features. DxO Pure Raw is a good overall solution many times.
Pls note, the image of the kingfisher was shot on MFT camera and underexposed. This is really great result for ACR to retain an original colors of the birds feather
I prefer DXO in my workflow for noise reduction as it is 10X faster than ACR/LR NR.
Amazing comparison. Didn't expect that Adobe has improved their algorthms that much. Can you do such a comparison for upscaling and sharpening an image?
if you decrease blend in face recovery of topaz photo ai it will look more natural if rest of image is soft, then it refines just face contures, eyes and lips, sometimes it messes up the hair and makes it oversharpened so I usually do face recovery in separate layer and apply only to certain parts of the face using mask
I use a double denoise process. 1st one in camera raw for global adjustment and 2nd one topaz denoise (the old one) as a plugin i PS for selective denoise. Topaz is used for more agressive cleaning up background more, and my subject will still have good texture intact. Im a wildlife photographer.
Your examples are impressive. We spend a lot of time at classical /and Jazz concerts and the light forces us often to go up to ISO 12,800 at a certain aperture and exposure time.
Back in the office we then let the Denoise run the rest of the night with preset values (usually 37%) as batch, throw the CR3 files out of LR Classic in the morning and then select and edit the DNG files.
You might ask yourself, why not select first?
We do if we have to send results to someone the same night.
Photos are simply easier to evaluate and select when they are denoised.
For photo #1 of 1000, we might then make another version later with more differentiated denoising and a final edit
Neat Image gives best result in my book ; would have been interesting to include it. Thanks for the comparison
Considering CaptureOne does not use any machine learning the results are good, I have used the denoising in quite a lot of situations. But it can't compete with DXO or CameraRAW for sure.
For Capture One it's usually better to leave the luminance value rather low, so you get the luminance noise, but not the color noise. This looks better in most cases than those uneven blobs it creates.
I have tried a few denoisers myself and fount that PureRAW sometimes created worse artifacts than CameraRAW, interestingly here with the bird it's the other way around. I think that really depends on the version and the raw file (sensor type...).
As I want to get rid of the Adobe Suite, I think the best option is to get the DXO Raw converter which has the denoiser built in and use Affinity Photo as PS replacement.
It's a cheaper and pretty solid option, but it can't replace everything sadly.
Topaz was wild 😅 that extra face is crazy 🤣 good thing they let you deactivate it. Looks amazing.
Always awesome content
Thanks for sharing ❤it
Topaz Photo AI includes both DeNoise and Sharpening. It also includes two lighting options one to adjust lighting balance and the other to adjust tonal balance. Because of the way DeNoise impacts lighting colors you need to include the recommended tonal balance if you are trying to achieve recommended adjustments. It is part of the recommended adjustments process.
But that doesnt change the fact, that its bad at keeping details and not introducing artificial patterns and structures. I own Topaz Denoise Ai, Photo Ai and DXO Pure RAW and DXO consistently gets way better and more natural results.
@@TheTempic Totally agree! I had Topaz Denoise, then moved to Photo Ai, was using that in the past 2 years and recently got DXO PureRAW and i'll never use the other ones again! DXO is so much better, exactly as you said the results are more natural and it retains more of the small details. PhotoAI did some weird stuff...
I had upgraded my Topaz Photo AI about a month ago and was really disappointed with it's performance. As @TheTempic mentioned, it did some really weird stuff to my images plus I got those white dots all over my images just like Unmesh got in this video. Not sure what happened with this latest version but it felt like a total step backwards. I returned it. My older Topaz Denoise app does a way better job.
dxo photolab still the king denoise software for raw image, i,ve tried many software editing, topaz ai was good but color acuracy & detail texture very bad againts dxo, i usually use 2 apps when shoot above 12k ISO , denoise file raw using dxo than finishing using topaz ai
Great comparison. Would love to see a comparison for JPGs.
Incredible, love it! Can you tell me how you zoom in and move all the photos in photoshop at the same time? Thank you!
Good job on showing software comparison!!!
I have a ton of old slides I've been scanning and correcting, and would love to remove the film grain from them from using high ISO slide film. This couldn't have come at a better time.
When you make the jpg comparison,then please add Hitpaw Fotorpea and On1 NoNoise. Thanks for all the great video's Unmesh!
I have both topaz and dxo, and dxo is the one that I usually use, it also has better distortion correction. There are cases where photo ai gives better results however, so it is always worth to test both in any given situation. I’m not a super fan of denoising ai however, if I can avoid it I do prefer. Capture One does have a pretty obsolete denoising tool, it’s more for selection based denoising, and I never really use it, there’s a feature request open but obviously has been sitting ignored for ages.
Topaz Denoise works well on High ISO, which I often prefer for my editing. I tried Topaz Photo AI, but it didn't impress me much.
I have Topaz Photo AI as well as all the individual apps. For some reason the individual apps seem to give better results. Topaz Denoise leaves weird artifacts whenever I try it. Lightroom's AI Denoise, which I assume is the same as Camera Raw, consistently gives the most natural results. Topaz Sharpen AI is very good and I use it quite a bit. I just got Topaz Video AI and it is the most disappointing app I've ever used.
I use Topaz Denoise and Topaz Ai - both really good
Nice job with the comparision of products. Your observations square with my own regarding these products. Two additional thoughts, it would useful to talk about how long each of these products takes to denoise a RAW file (realizing that every computer is different). For Canon photographers, there is also the Neural Net Image Processing Tool (subscription required) and I have found it to be as good, if not slightly better, than both Adobe Camera RAW and DXO PureRAW. However, on my computer, it takes about 25-30 seconds per photo with NNIPT versus 3-5 seconds in the other two products. When one is denoising several hundred photos, that is a big difference! Still waiting for DXO PureRAW to support the Canon R1...
What about ON1 No Noise? Where does it stack up?
I find it amazing how bad Topaz did when it seems to be the one that everyone talks about.
Just my opinion but it would rank among the worst. Artifacts galore. Every year I try ON1 because they seem like such an underdog to root for but every year the denoise kills it for me. Feel free to give a free trial a spin. Beyond that the RAW engine isn’t quite on par with Lr or DXO.
+1 for JPEG noise reduction! Work with a lot of photos from prior photographers who have very noisy photos.
Hey there! What about the videos? On my Olympus EM1 Mark III, I’m seeing noticeable noise starting from ISO 5000. 🤔
Great lesson! I updated my PS and Camera raw but I do not have this new version. Does it come with the PS beta?
If you miss focus a lot, Topaz is the choice
It has recover fave feature to bring back out of focus face on top of their raw denoise.
But if you don't miss your focus and only need denoise, DXo pureraw is the choice. It all depends on what is the problem you are trying to get rid of
Thank you for this 2025 raw denoise comparison!!! always welcome and please yes do a jpg standoff as well.
I just use Darktable. Not AI, but great results and it is free. Plus it has a lot more control options like masking based on parameters ( like luminance or colour etc). I think if you process many images, then these AI tools are great. But for amateur photographers with just a few images to do and time, I use Darktable
Considering how great Camera Raw and DXO PureRaw are, DXO as a way better advantage, you can apply the denoiser to a big series of pictures and let it work. With Lightroom and camera raw you have to individually apply it…
Im impressed with Camera raw AI
i use pure raw 3 and batch convert to ight room. i will sharpen , crop and upscale with photo ai if needed. the sharpen in photo ai can create some terrible sharpening so i keep it on the low side.
I tested Camera RAW denoise in Lightroom versus Topaz deNoise AI, which I had been using before Lightroom’s new denNoise was released. My verdict was that Lightroom was marginally better than Topaz, although a little slower. However, because I am usually processing dozens of high iso stage performance images at a time, Lightroom was clearly the winner, because it allowed me to sort images by metadata (ISO), adjust just one to my liking, and then process all of them at that ISO as a batch. I can go grab a cup of coffee, come back, and two dozen ISO 6400 images will be ready for me to process… or do the same thing with my two dozen ISO 8000 images, etc. As always, thank you for this very excellent video tutorial!
Agine great Info. thanks! By the way, you can also do face recovery in photoshop in the Neural filters in the "photo restoration" tab
Just wondering why you chose DxO PureRAW for the comparision and not DxO PhotoLab?
a review on fones for Jpegs would be great. 🙂
Thank you!
Q:
What about pipelining the raw into DxO then into Camera Raw?
Thanks for the video on this topic
We would like a video on jpeg too
Great comparison video. How are you able to see the effects of applying Camera Raw Denoise AI without the tiny 'enhance' box coming up with its fixed zoom ratio of 250%. Trying to assess how much to move the slider at 250% zoom is practically useless for me. I'm using a Windows 11 PC. Exactly the same problem in Lightroom.
Hi Unmesh thanks for the comparison! I love CaptureOne but unfortunately it lacks AI noise reduction, it would be nice to see another comparison video between software regarding sharpening, in this area I have always found CaptureOne more natural
Thank you for an excellent video. I think Topaz will preserve the colors if you choose a camara specific profile before you export the photo to Topaz from Lightroom Classic as a raw file. Or have you had other experiences?
I'm just wondering why they took the bird photo at F/13 and 1/320ss and bump iso that much
Hi Unmesh, a very good comparison of these applications. Thanks for your effort and sharing.
I like the Adobe engine in terms of the result, but it takes a long time to get there.
Unfortunately, this point is neglected in your comparison.
The process times you quote here are utopian for me.
My experience is as follows: the first image in a session (raw, approx. 45 MB in size) takes approx. 30s. This value increases with each additional image that I process in ACR. After 5 images I am then quite quickly at 2.5 min and more.
Sounds to me like a resource that fills up after several uses.
Does this depend on a setting in ACR or do special hardware requirements have to be created here?
Would you have any further information on this?
Thank you.
Could you make a video on Photoshop Camera Raw in detail?
Is there the same thing for video denoise and up scaling?
Stuck shooting performance images in b&w with dim lighting with Fuji. iso runs from 12,800 and up - using DXO Photolab 7 (should have gotten just the RAW because do not like working in Photolab) to do noise control and convert to dng. Results are phenomenal - wouldn't use this on other images, but for stage performance (expecially with Fuji and especially for the b&w)) it's a magic formula. Oddly, even when underexposing two stops, I leave it at 12.800 because I like my corrections better than what the camera does to the RAW.
Camera RAW looks to be consistently great across the board, all the others kept having weird quirks with one image or another.
I also like that it can be tuned back. All of these look way overcooked to me. There's nothing wrong with a little noise. Personally, I'll eliminate chroma noise and then just do 1-3 stops worth of noise reduction.
Luminar Neo did a very good job of looking natural, but not a great job of preserving colors. Everything looked pretty flat and would need more work to tune the colors.
Camera Raw was updated in October of 2024. It was long overdue, and I think they've set a new standard for noise reduction while retaining the most fine detail and correct color.
I have no problems with colors in topaz photo AI, because I use tiff format. Great results are possible!
Besides excellent noise reduction, DxO also removes hot and dead pixels, I think this is very important.
Promise I'm not a Topaz phanboy… but, Photo AI has a lot of tweaks available and it makes a huge difference how things are set. It's also unintuitive how the settings interact and you just have to play around until you find out. In most cases I just use Lightroom/Camera Raw because it's more than adequate and quick. When I have an image that I don't like the results of in LR/CR, I run to Photo AI and get better results, but it takes time tweaking the settings. I think it's pretty hard to go far wrong with whichever, Topaz, LR/CR, or DXO.
I am using PureRAW4 in combination with C1. When PureRAW3 (the old version) was around C1 automatically disabled their own denoising on the imported DNG files. With PR 4 C1 wants to add their own denoising on top of the already denoised files. This makes some images look soft. Once the denoising in C1 is set to 0 the files look sharp again.
Your tips are always so useful - thank you. One thing i am frustrated with is the sort preferences under the view tab in LR classic. I set it to "file" each time but it always reverts back to "capture time" next time I open the program. do you know of any way to make it stick permanently to "file"? Thanks.
I use Topaz and I does in fact shift colors on some photos. Also, I've noticed it creates hot spots in the before image that wasn't there in the original and tries to deal with them in the after.
Please share a video for iPhone photo noise reduction
It would be good for you to talk about pricing. Some of these are REALLY expensive.
The AI Denoise in Lightroom is very, very good, and included in the program, so is essentially free.
Although, Topaz Face Recovery does look very good. Perhaps too good, and maybe verging on unnatural? But it's too much cash. I have the older Topaz Sharpen AI which was a lot cheaper. I don't know why they moved away from that pricing model but it's not worth the outlay IMHO.
Hey umesh sir,
Do you think Photo Editing, Photoshop Manipulation, and Digital Art are slowly losing relevance? Will AI eventually take over these fields entirely? What’s your opinion on this? If I were still learning photo editing right now, what would you suggest I do? And what about those who were planning to build a career in this field and earn from it? Please share your thoughts.
Which software do you use to record your screen? Is it OBS ? Or something else?
Topaz AI with Face Recovery is amazing. I used it for some fotos and was almost magic. But to be fair i used it in combination with PS Neural Filters, "Colorize" and "Photo restoration".
From Topaz there is a programm "JPG to RAW AI" which can make DNGs from your JPGs so CameraRaw should(!) be able to denoise them too.
Many thanks for that interesting comprarison. LR/Camera raw and DXO make an incredible job. However, the resulting weights are not at all the same !! For instance, if the native raw is about 55 Mo, the final result with DXO is about 146 MO and unchanged with LR/Camera raw. That must be taken in account.
Please define Mo, claubob3207.
Best techer❤❤
What is the best for iPad only workflows?
Capture One is known by users to not be good at noise removal. Many of us do our raw processing in C1 after turning off de noise and sharpening then send a tiff to photo ai to clean up noise and do the sharpening. You left out Iridient from the comparison. Any reason why? Other thing is C1 is aimed at studio professionals and with the lighting right they don't get noise, so its probably not a major issue for them.
Can you try Evoto For Retouching
i use DXO Photolab. There you have settings for the AI-Noise removal in RAW-pictures. And a Standard-Denoise in JPG. ;)
my camera raw app still has the older ai denoise function?