How do PS CS3 Noise Reduction Filters compare with dedicated third-party plug-ins?

Question

Am I missing something by not installing a dedicated Noise Reduction application into my PS CS3? Can Neat Image, Noise Ninja, Noiseware Pro, etc. do something that the PS CS3 Noise Filters can't do? Do these third-party aplications do it better?
Since I like flashless photography, and I generally carry with me small-sensor compacts when I travel, I'm frequently confronted with the problem of digital noise. I've always wondered how the third-party noise reduction applications perform in comparison with the Photoshop Noise Filters. I hope someone in this Forum has been able to acquire direct experience on this topic and will be kind enough to share this experience with us.
Kindest Regards,
Conrad

Answer 1

Conrad,
ACR 4.3 has better NR (noise reduction) than previous versions and can handle NR in most normal situations. However, available light photography with a small pixel sensor may require more NR and the specialized plugins such as Noise Ninja, NeatImage, and NoiseWare Pro can do a better job. I have all three and they do an excellent job, but I currently use NoiseWare most of the time.
Here is a demonstration of NoiseWare vs ACR NR, using 100% crops of an image taken with the Nikon D200, 1/320 sec at f/2.8. The image is reasonably sharp at normal viewing conditions, but has quite a lot of luminance noise. It was rendered with ACR and the settings were exposure +0.85, brightness +60. One thing you learn early in this type of shooting is to expose to the right to reduce noise, but this may conflict with stopping action and reducing camera shake. More exposure would have helped this image, and one should try to avoid exposures requiring this amount of positive exposure adjustment.
The results are shown below, followed by some discussion. Other comments are welcome. Color noise is not prominent in this image and I left color NR at its default.
ACR, No sharpening, no NR
ACR, Luminance NR 53, no sharpening
ACR, No NR, No sharpening, NoiseWare default, no sharpening
Noise reduction and sharpening are antagonistic processes. It is important that NR is applied before sharpening--you don't want to sharpen noise. Following NR there is an inevitable loss of detail, and some sharpening is necessary to restore the detail, but this also brings back the noise. One can use masks and blend if sliders in Photoshop in both NR and sharpening to mitigate some of these effects, and Bruce Fraser discusses the details in his excellent book on sharpening.
If you use an add on such as NoiseWare, you should turn off luminance sharpening in ACR. In doing so, you lose all those nifty sharpening features that have recently been added to ACR. I leave color NR at the default. It has a minimal effect on detail.
In adjusting the NR in ACR at 100% viewing, I estimated that a luminance setting of +53 was optimal. Beyond that, blotchy artifacts appear in the image.
For NoiseWarePro, I used the default settings with no sharpening. The NR effect is dramatic, but detail is lost and some sharpening is needed. This could be applied in NoiseWare or in Photoshop, perhaps with a plugin such as PhotoKit Sharpener. Personally, I have found that PK does not work well with this type of image because it bring back noise and produces artifacts.
In all of these examples, sharpening is needed following the NR. One could try to use surface masks to keep sharpening in Photoshop with the unsharp mask away from the edges. However, I find it is difficult to get a good surface mask, and I don't take the trouble.
For now, I use the sharpening built into NoiseWare. I don't know how it works internally, but it does have a slider for detail protection, and you can play with this to get the best result. It would be best to have the robust NR of the add ons built into ACR much like NoiseNinja is built into Bibble Pro. However, this is an ACR forum and I would expect that ACR is the preferred raw converter of those who frequent this forum.
After expending this much effort on the post, I hope to get some helpful feedback.