Neat Image...an absolute for an image professional

questions about practical use of Neat Image
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VG
Posts: 4
Joined: Fri Feb 07, 2003 10:53 pm

Neat Image...an absolute for an image professional

Post by VG »

I can't say enough good about this unbelievable program. I use it on almost every image that I process. I shoot with a Canon D30, use YarcPlus for conversions and then Photoshop and Neat Image for the final result, whether it be print or web. For examples of what this fine program can do, visit my website and poke around. Only a very few of the images there haven't been put through NI. Enjoy....
VG :shock:
www.vizualgroove.com
Creative1Forever
Posts: 2
Joined: Fri Mar 18, 2005 5:38 am
Location: New York
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Great Site

Post by Creative1Forever »

Hello,
I'm a newbie to this program & community. I was curious so I checked out your site. Your pictures are perfect. Everyone of them. Thank you for the inspiration. As an art director/designer doing lots of photo shoots & editing hundreds of pictures, I am truly excited at the prospect of cutting down the boring process of fixing pictures.
Creatively Yours,
EYE-lene!
oldsalt19
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Feb 23, 2003 4:46 pm

Post by oldsalt19 »

It's really nice to hear from a professional consumer of images as contrasted with primarily a producer of images, which I think many of us are. Last month, an image of mine was rejected by a reviewer for a "microstock" photo agency (They're sprouting up like weeds.) His (or her) reason for bouncing the photo was:

The overuse of a noise reduction application (such as NeatImage, Noise Ninja, etc) has left your image with a smoothed appearance thus, degrading the image detail.

The image concerned was filtered with restraint (75%) using the supplied "filter and sharpen.nfp" preset. I use Neat Image so much that I doubt that I will ever submit to this agency again, although I have not officially resigned. Basically, I don't think any of their photo reviewers have ever been in situation of having to produce real work (printed illustrated color page(s)). I have repeatedly examined in great detail and at high resolution the results of Neat Image processing on photos, challenging myself to find ANY degradation of detail, and I have been unable to do so. The noise is gone, but not the sharpness.
I have been paid thousands of dollars by large photo agencies (NOT the microstocks) as well as by private businesses for my images, a large number of which have been improved by Neat Image processing. I recently finished a job for a small Great Lakes cruise line. They liked my work so much that they want a slide show of my images to play on their web site. Much of it was processed by Neat Image. Hopefully, it won't violate any forum rules if I repeat the bulk of this post a couple of more places here on the forum. I think that it is important for us photographers to be aware of the crap that some of the microstocks are trying to shove at us--and at as little as 20 cents a sale!
oldsalt19
NITeam
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Joined: Sat Feb 01, 2003 4:43 pm
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Post by NITeam »

Probably they wanted to get raw, untouched images straight from the camera for some reason? Perhaps to be sure they have the true originals in their hands.

Other than that I don't have any idea what could be a problem. I believe you know how to use NI and how to preserve details while reducing distracting noise, so the problem is most likely inherent to that particular agency..

Vlad
oldsalt19
Posts: 2
Joined: Sun Feb 23, 2003 4:46 pm

Post by oldsalt19 »

:x
Vlad,
Nope, they want JPGs of a very modest resolution of 1600x1200 minimum. 2 megapixals! RAW is unacceptable to them. I usually submit a dslr image which comes out at 6 megapixals which I then post-process with Photoshop and NI (if needed) and upload without uprezing. I doesn't make any sense. I have seen complaints from other photographers about these photo-reviewers both at this agency as well as at other micro-agencies. This seems to be a problem with the micro-agency group in general. They really need to hire some experienced image reviewers away from the macro-agencies (large and well established), but I don't think any of those folks would work for the micros.

There is one possibility that could explain at least part of my problem. I am using a very old version of NI (3.1). It's always worked so well and been so acceptable to my macro-agency over the years, that I've been quite negligent in upgrading. My version is so old that I doubt if I will get any kind of upgrade discount; at least neither my handle nor real name would work on the upgrade page. Also, my old computer died and I re-installed NI to the new one, so maybe I'm legally bound to re-purchase anyway. That's OK, I sure have got my money's worth so far.
At this point, I will end my rambling discourse. Thanks again for everything.
oldsalt19
NITeam
Posts: 3173
Joined: Sat Feb 01, 2003 4:43 pm
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Post by NITeam »

Actually you don't need to re-purchase. Your license is valid and you can directly use it to download the software. Just make sure you use the license that you received after purchase. If you don't have it please contact support by e-mail and we will help.

Thank you,
Vlad
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