the crop is a screen capture using `scrot’, so i guess it uses my monitor
profile (should be calibrated to adobergb) but the jpg knows nothing about
it, and the full export should be srgb.
Now I wanna try too. How about this one?
www.robotplanet.dk/f/rawth/SAM_1680_01.jpg
www.robotplanet.dk/f/rawth/SAM_1680_01.pp3
Looks amazing to me!
SAM_1680.SRW TONE CURVE.pp3 (9.9 KB)
I added a parametric tone curve to your PP3 to give it some pop. Didn’t mess with anything else. Give it a try.
Processed in RT. I know this hasn’t removed as much noise as other attempts, but I think the remaining noise has a similar and pleasing characteristic to that of LR.
SAM_1680.SRW.pp3 (9.7 KB)
I like this “more noisy” attempt James. Will process more an more pictures this way 
This thread was very informative, thanks to all who contributed so far!
So, I also tried, just for fun. Here’s my result:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5FVyCxc9SRPa0RCWWZLU3hteFE/view?usp=sharing
Here’s the pp3 if anyone is interested
SAM_1680.jpg.out.pp3 (9.3 KB)
Here is the result compared to LR:
It is a really nice result with Darktable. Perhaps I will come back to Darktable after all.
Thanks !
Here is the result compared to LR:
The result on the second face is quite nice, actually better than LR.
However on the first face, it is really less nice than LR.
Here is it compared to LR:
A bit better than the one provided by James but still not up (IMHO) to the one generated by LR.
Here is the result compared to LR:
The NR is too agressive in my opinion. There is less noise in the result, but the result looks less natural with some strange artifacts.
Could it be that the differences are exaggerated because you are zooming way more than 100%? If I compare your version with mine (and many others here, to be honest) at 1:1, the differences are much less visible IMHO.
Yes. Just do a 1:1 zoom. Don’t overzoom them. Overzooming will show more artifacts than what are actually occurring in the image. You need to compare them both at 1:1.
In my experience (and with my camera), the result is the same with less zoom.
I just need to find someone and make a nice portrait shot.
yep, cool. almost the same as LR. Only needs a bit more warmth to the picture cause the skin kinda looks pale
no matter what camera i used, if i dont zoom way in, the differences arent visible at all, you sure you are not just overcroping images?
It was said before probably, but is it still noise you are looking for?
People in that picture are wearing jackets and scarfs, so it seems to be a cold day. In that environment it is natural that caucasian faces get red in some places. All processed files shown here show red noses red lips and some color under the eyes, except for your LR results. It is as if LR put make up on the girls. Everything is evened out, the lips are not so red anymore, the nose isn’t either, and there are no darker areas under the eyes.
Some processed files even show less noise in some areas like walls etc…
So again my question, are you sure the the thing you are striving for is reachable through denoising alone?
Or are there other things needed (like evening out facial color etc…)?
2 Likes
glad you like it. darktable will extract the xmp for you if you point the
‘load sidecar file’ functionality (
http://www.darktable.org/usermanual/ch02s03s07.html.php) to the exported
jpg. note that i also reduced saturation a bit to better match lightroom’s
default colour rendition (our lightroom import does that too). let me know
if that doesn’t work, then i’ll extract for you.