canon S3 IS - how to take grain free pics

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neomustdie

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i recently went to matheranto take pics of the beautiful rainy season... damn most of the pics clicked are grainy....

i took them at different levels and modes and settings... then thought its time to take advice from the experts... what is the best settings for a grain free image in a cloudy sky...
i took pics at iso 80 and 200... image format was 5mp but even 2mp is fine if that helps... focal length varied between 2.7 to 4 and so did the shutter speed...

i dont have much idea about whitebalance settings... have to check some tutorial sites....

help me out guys... will upload somesample pics once i reach home...
 
Generally the lesser the ISO the less grainy the pics will be. But if you want good pic in very low light levels, use long exposures which decreases grain and gets you the correct pic. the down side is the cam has to be perfect ly still otherwise you get blurred pics.
 
by long exposure you mean high shutter times right or you are talking about the exposure option in the menu which takes care of the lightning...???
 
I have a old canon A400 and my cousin has a canon 590 IS .We had taken some similar shots and i found the 590 to have grains, whereas the A400 did not have any grains.
Also 1 of my colleague at office bought the same 590 IS. I had observed grains on photos taken on that too..
settings were similar on all 3 cams..

Donno wat to conclude from this....
 
yes, kumar meant increase the shutter time (or decrease the shutter speed, however you want to look at it). overcast\evening\rainy shots are perhaps the worst to deal with if your subject is anywhere beyond 'nearby'. The flash wont reach far enough (although i personally hate camera flashes, its a necessary evol as you cant lug around a diffused lighting source wherever you go).

back to the point at hand. if you are taking shots of scenery\stationary objects, then you can keep the iso low, and lower the shutter speed as long as you take the shots on a tripod. however, if youre taking shots of moving objects, or dont have a tripod, grains are your only option (if u want to see anything in the photo) with a prosumer camera with a chip size that small.
 
so low iso near 80-100... more shutter time... what about the f length...?? exposure and whitebalance??? any predefined or recommended settings for these..???

should i stick to manual mode or any other mode is better??

will decreasing size to say 1600 x 1200 will help??
 
not much working knowledge with photoshop... although i plan to learn it... but i want to excel in taking good images in the first place... then look into retouching them...

i would be going out this weekend to a nearby beach to try out the camera with the suggested settings... so please tell any more which i can keep in mind and try out...
 
neomustdie said:
so low iso near 80-100... more shutter time... what about the f length...?? exposure and whitebalance??? any predefined or recommended settings for these..???

should i stick to manual mode or any other mode is better??

will decreasing size to say 1600 x 1200 will help??
Click to expand...

focal length and white balance wont reduce noise\grain. exposure, is pretty much the same as shutter speed, or atleast its one component of it (not too sure if it includes the gain +-EV stops, will leave it to more well-read members)

if you dont explicitly know what all the functions on the camera are, or arent comfortable with them yet, then stay out of manual for now. since you'll want to control the shutter speed for the shot, you should go for the Shutter Priority AE mode, which will automatically choose an appropriate focal length for the shutter speed you use.

as for shooting at a lower resolution, i had the same query. logically, it should reduce noise, as you are shooting a smaller image on a sensor designed for a larger one. but i dont know the inner workings of digicams so i wont comment.
 
even better, master the Program (P) ode first. Then proceed to priority modes and then to full manual.
 
gangulysaptak said:
I have a old canon A400 and my cousin has a canon 590 IS .We had taken some similar shots and i found the 590 to have grains, whereas the A400 did not have any grains.
Also 1 of my colleague at office bought the same 590 IS. I had observed grains on photos taken on that too..
settings were similar on all 3 cams..

Donno wat to conclude from this....
Click to expand...

Pixel density matters.
from DPreview pixel density of your cam is 20 MP/cm2
canon 590IS 32 MP/cm2
Now people have realized cramming more and more MP doesnt improve picture clarity but it increases Noise (not grain). Grain has a different meaning in Film cameras. Grain is accepted but noise is not accepted. Further to control the noise Noise reduction smears the details captured by the sensor.
 
neomustdie said:
i recently went to matheranto take pics of the beautiful rainy season... damn most of the pics clicked are grainy....

i took them at different levels and modes and settings... then thought its time to take advice from the experts... what is the best settings for a grain free image in a cloudy sky...
i took pics at iso 80 and 200... image format was 5mp but even 2mp is fine if that helps... focal length varied between 2.7 to 4 and so did the shutter speed...

i dont have much idea about whitebalance settings... have to check some tutorial sites....

help me out guys... will upload somesample pics once i reach home...
Click to expand...

80 to 200 is perfectly acceptable for any cameras. When i used irfan view i too saw some grains but when i opened for editing at Light room the image was a beauty.
If you taking natural scenery always take at full resolution high quality but prefer RAW.
Choose f/8 or higher the depth of focus will increase.
remember out of focus pic always produce grainy images (neat image, noise ninja profiles are taken in out of focus to show up the sensor noise).
Never use noise ninja or neat image unless its taken more than iso 400.
 
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