Noise reduction...

[inskip]

plug-ins. Which is best? I've been trying to decide between Neat Image, Noise Ninja, and Noiseware. I was originally going to go with Neat Image but their Mac version is behind Windows, so I was a little discouraged by that. Also, it says to make a profile from a large area, do they all work this way? I mostly shoot portraits, so the largest area I'd have would be a cheek or forehead, as opposed to sky. I have a Mac and I use a 20D. I mostly have ISO noise because I often forget to change it (newbie mistake). I know the above mentioned sofwares aren't designed to remove film grain, but do they? Which is the most user friendly? Oh, and do you apply noise reduction as a first step before other editing? What happens when you use USM, does it bring back the noise?

Thanks

[Doug Nelson]

You might just want to upgrade to Photoshop CS2. It has an excellent noise reduction filter.