Samsung NX20 Noise Reduction

Samsung NX20 Noise Reduction

The Samsung NX20 only offers two high ISO noise reduction settings: "On" (default) and "Off", so there's not a lot of flexibility in choosing how you want to make the trade-off between subject detail and noise levels. The Samsung NX20 user manual doesn't say what ISOs apply, so we've included crops from the base ISO in the table below. We've also included crops from raw files with no noise reduction (or sharpening) applied, so you can see that the "Off" setting still applies noise reduction.

See for yourself how the two noise reduction settings compare across the ISO range under daylight-balanced lighting. Click on any of the crops below to see the corresponding full-sized image.

As you can see, the "On" high ISO noise reduction setting does produce images with less noise at higher ISOs but at the cost of some detail, as expected. You can also see that the "Off" setting still applies fairly strong noise reduction, which is readily apparent in the red fabric even at base ISO. Both settings aren't very effective at removing chroma noise in the shadows at higher ISOs, leaving blotchy clouds of color. As always, for best results we recommend shooting in raw mode and applying noise reduction using your favorite image editor or plugin as you see fit during post processing.