Denoise before or after color correction/grading?
 

Hi everybody,

I'm using the Magic Bullet Denoiser in AE, and I'm getting mixed results. Usually, it really helps clean the image, but sometimes, after heavier grading, the noise just pops out again, with maybe even more grain.

So I was wondering, should I apply the Denoiser filter after I'm finished with color grading, or, first apply the filter, then grade?

Thanks,
Mladen

Re: Denoise before or after color correction/grading?
 

Last step. After all color correction and grading. Seems to work best for me. YMMV.

Re: Denoise before or after color correction/grading?
 

Thanks for the tip!

Re: Denoise before or after color correction/grading?
 

Mladen it's not that simple. In some instances it's better to do the denoising prior to grading and in some cases it's better to do it after.

Reasons to do it before grading:
- it's easier to pull good keys on a denoised footage when grading
- it's easier to pull good qualifiers when grading
- the postproduction process doesn't allow it to be done after grading for whatever reason
- you want to do something special to preserve IQ like removing noise then adding 2 dithered bits to the footage to smooth out any possible banding issues that might occur when grading
- etc.

But all in all I find it that it's better to do it after grading. One of the reasons is the one that you mentioned. I don't want to denoise twice instead of only once. But other people swear on doing it before grading. I guess that a denoised picture will fall apart later compared to a noisy image - but I wonder how this would be "healed" with denoising after grading.