Today’s Question: Sometimes I can use Denoise [in Lightroom Classic or Camera Raw] and other times it says: “Denoise is not currently compatible with this photo format”. Please explain.
Tim’s Quick Answer: The Denoise feature available in Lightroom Classic and Camera Raw currently supports only raw capture formats, with some additional limitations. Support for other file types may be added with a future update.
More Detail: The relatively new Denoise feature supports Bayer and X-Trans mosaic raw files. In general, that means it only supports raw captures that have not been rendered into a normal image format (a process referred to as “demosaicing”).
Image formats such as JPEG, TIFF, HEIC, and others are not supported currently. In addition, some raw capture formats are not supported. If the image sensor is not a Bayer or X-Trans format, even though the photo was captured in a raw format, it will not be supported by Denoise.
In addition, certain camera options that result in a variation on a raw format are not supported. For example, some Canon cameras offer reduced resolution mRaw and sRaw options. These capture options result in a file that is not a mosaic raw image and are therefore not supported by Denoise.
I imagine Denoise will be updated by Adobe to include support for a wider range of image formats in the future, but for now it is limited to images in specific raw capture formats.
