Lesson Re-learned

  The big news around here, and everywhere really, was the blizzard.  When I heard about it on the radio Sunday night/Monday morning, I thought of the berries I had seen on their stalks next to my porch, and realized that if I didn't get to shooting them, the opportunity would soon be lost.  So out came the sled and on went the macro, and down went I to get the shots.  Having the edge of my sled to steady my hand on, I took the time to play a bit with different apertures to vary the depth of field pretty widely, and it went quite well.  I did notice, however, some pretty significant dust spots on the images taken about f/16 and up, but it didn't look too bad, and cleaned up nicely with Lightroom's spot removal "brush" tool:

Bad spots!

All better!

Wheeee!

  Lo and behold, the weather people were right, and we all got dumped on.  I don't know our official total accumulation, but I do know I don't remember the last time I saw snow like this!

  Nothing like a detailed background to make you forget you have a sensor you haven't cleaned in something like a year.  So, blissfully forgetful of the crud lurking in those shadows, I proceeded with an idea of mine that I had mentioned I was working briefly in the last post; making an abstract photo out of an ordinary household item.  I would tell you what I shot and how I set it up, but that takes all the fun out of it for me.  I like making abstracts for the simple pleasure of keeping people guessing what it is!
  Anyways, this subject is white, and completely devoid of detail.  And I was shooting with the macro lens again.  At f/22....

GAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!! DUST!!!!!

   Yuck!  Unfortunately, Lightroom's spot removal tool doesn't do so hot with such plain surfaces, and basically converted all the dust spots into little shaded circles.  Not to mention all the finer spots (note the very upper-left) that I could never clean up with any brush tool.  Off to Photoshop we go!

Mucha better!

  The context-aware healing brush was far superior, and the "Dust and Scratches" filter took care of the finer spots like a champ.  I have read that it typically lessens detail, but, lucky me, there really isn't any here!  I don't think I could be happier with the way this project turned out, and this is the shot I submitted to Popular Photography for their monthly challenge, along with a photo of how I set it up.  Guess you'll have to wait until they publish that one to see it....

  So the lesson I had to re-learn is: Clean your sensor!  After taking a reference shot, I saw how bad the damage really was:

   Out came the cleaning kit, and two swabs later, things were much improved:

  So, take heed!  If you haven't done it before, there are dozens of articles on how to.  It's not as scary as I've heard some make it out to be!  And if you want to see it done, I plan on bringing my kit and camera to an event at Caroline's Coffee in Kenosha called Caffenol.  I'm really looking forward to getting plugged in and meeting other photographers, and hope I can help a few out with the demonstration.  Wanna come?

  This week's DPS subject is "body parts".  I don't have any specific plans for this yet, but I do already have a shot of Zach, our youngest (in the blue snowsuit above) giving "knuckles" to an action figure.  We'll see what else happens.

Lastly, if you want to be utterly overwhelmed with photos and information, check out DPS articles Links, and "best of 2010" blog list.

Have a great week, stay warm, and I hope to see you at Caroline's!

-JMo