Why do my RAW photos look noisy at 1:1 in Lightroom, but exported JPEGs look fine?
Asked 7/16/2013
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I shoot RAW on a Nikon D7000 with the 18-105mm lens. In Lightroom 4, when I zoom to 1:1 in either Library or Develop, the image looks quite noisy. However, if I export the photo as a JPEG without edits, it looks normal.
I already tried increasing catalog preview quality and preview size, but it did not change this. My monitor resolution is 1366×768. Is this normal behavior with RAW files and 1:1 viewing, or is there a Lightroom setting that can make the previews look cleaner?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
13y ago
2 Answers
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Noise is affected by viewing size and distance. When you view an image at 1:1 you will see each individual pixel of the image as it has been demoasaiced from the RAW file as a single pixel on your screen. When you view at more normal sizes, each pixel on your screen is an average of several pixels from the full-sized image. In the case of your D7000, if the image is displayed to fit height-wise on an HD monitor (1920X1080), each pixel on the screen is representing a 3X3 square of nine pixels, so the noisy pixels are being averaged out by the surrounding pixels.
Originally by user15871. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user15871
13y ago
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Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
This is normal.
At 1:1, Lightroom shows image pixels essentially one-for-one on your screen. With a 16 MP RAW file from a D7000, that means you’re inspecting the demosaiced RAW data very closely, so noise is much more visible.
When the image is viewed smaller than 1:1, multiple image pixels are averaged into each screen pixel, which makes noise appear smoother. Your exported JPEG can also look cleaner because JPEG output and resizing reduce the visibility of noise, and RAW files do not get the same in-camera noise reduction that JPEGs do.
Your monitor resolution also matters: on a 1366×768 screen, a full-resolution image has to be scaled down a lot for normal viewing, which hides noise until you zoom to 1:1.
If you want RAW files to look cleaner in Lightroom, apply some default noise reduction in a develop preset or import preset. Many photographers also add their usual lens corrections and small baseline adjustments there. But there is no setting that makes true 1:1 RAW previews look inherently less noisy without processing.
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