The Artificial Intelligence (AI) is really revolutionizing the world of digital photography, with capabilities that 10 years ago seemed impossibile (automatic corrections, context-dependent fill, simulated out-of-focus, etc.) and one of the most useful feature is digital noise reduction, that is evident in high sensitivity (ISO) shots or when you raise the exposure of dark areas. But how much is "intelligent" the AI of most famous editing software? Let's discover it with this detailed comparison with extensive real tests in different noisy situations!
Our tests
We compared the most known software: Adobe Lightroom 12.3, Topaz Denoise AI v3.7, DXO Pure Raw 3.3 and Capture One 23 even if the latter does not yet employ AI, but it's interesting to see how it behaves since it is one of the reference tool for professionals and amateurs.
We considered 6 parameters: effectiveness of the noise correction, quality of details after correction, color fidelity, processing time, file type support (JPG besides RAW), batch capability.
We used 4 test images with increasing noise complexity to be corrected:
- a RAW image from a full-frame (Sony A7 III) at 12800 ISO;
- a RAW image from a full-frame (Sony A7 III) underexposed by 4 stops;
- a RAW image from an APS-C (Sony a58) underexposed by 4 stops;
- a DNG/RAW image from a good smartphone (Galaxy Note 9) underexposed by 3 stops.
First test - high ISO
If you want to check yourself the difference, we make available here the 100% crops of most interesting comparisons:
- initial image
- Lightroom correction at 50%
- Topaz correction with Low Light profile
- DXO correction with Prime profile
- DXO correction with PrimeXD profile
- Capture One correction (no AI).
Second test - strong underexposure with full frame camera
Here tyou have the 100% crops of most interesting comparisons:
- initial image
- Lightroom correction
- Topaz correction with Low Light profile
- DXO correction with Prime profile
- DXO correction with PrimeXD profile
Third test - strong underexposure with consumer camera
Here tyou have the 100% crops of most interesting comparisons:
- initial image
- Lightroom correction
- Topaz correction with Low Light profile
- DXO correction with Prime profile
- DXO correction with PrimeXD profile
- Capture One correction (no AI).
So... which is the best software? Well, in the video all the details, also depending on each photographer's needs and specific photos but in summary here you have a super comparison table!
