China, a set on Flickr.
scribble
It’s been so long since I wrote something, that I thought it was about time to pick it up again. Obviously a lot things have happened since last August, as they tend to do over time. I have been amused to read the posts about the RED Scarlet and Epic, as well as the 5D MkII.
The RED machines have been improved into a better modular system, which is very exciting. Unfortunately, they have also been delayed until at least 2010.
On the other hand, the rumours about the 5D MkII were close, but not quite. 15MP turned out to be 21MP, which is impressive. The weather sealing, not so impressive. But it is a great camera, and I’ve had one for about 2 months now. My only gripe? Those big Canon lenses are bloody heavy. Luckily, I have a few manual primes which work pretty well with an adapter. I guess you can’t have it all.
I still reach for my film cameras. They are so, er, light…
Read MoreI wonder how long it will take for me to tire of typing on the tiny iPhone keyboard. Not long, I think.
In fact it took as long as the previous two sentences to make me go and find a computer, and type with a real keyboard (with modicum of speed). Well, that’s not the point I guess. But it is interesting how the iPhone has evolved, suddenly.
From third party applications which were only able to be installed by hackers and the technically savvy; to real, sanctioned, and official apps from Apple. It’s hard to think of an (Apple) product that has been so rapidly influenced by outside forces… or been so popular. And now it can run apps which are actually useful and cheap (and a good portion of “cheap” is free).
Now I have a dedicated WordPress app for my iPhone. I’m not sure if I’ll ever use it.
Read MoreA smattering dust can really ruin a good scan. Watching the local film processing guy drop your neg on his putrid floor (imbecile!) can raise your blood pressure faster than you can say C41!
So I’ve been having problems with little smatterings of dust on most of my scans. And the scanner I use doesn’t have Digital ICE (it’s an old Minolta – keepin’ it real). After using a few of the available software-based anti-dust systems out there, I remained unconvinced. On the discussion boards, people were saying to do it by hand. For bigger bits, sure, but a billion tiny grains…?
I decided it was simple to do better. I wrote (in the loosest sense) a Photoshop action which reduces dust, but doesn’t remove all the grain from the photo.
It is does all this with a difference matte made from the original (dusty) image, and a version that has been run through the Photoshop Dust & Scratches filter. Old school like.
It aint fancy.
But it is fast and reliable. Also, it doesn’t get rid of all the dust (yep, paint it). But will remove all that cocaine you chopped up on your negatives the night before… Or if you are more like me, the baby powder that they seem to sprinkle all my negs with when they leave the lab.
See? The grain (mostly) survives. All that the matte is doing is revealing back to to D&S version of the image. Visually, it looks ok, and has probably saved me about a lifetime of manual healing brush time. Now you can get out there and shoot — post production is for the birds!
I make no guarantees this will work with your stuff. But have a go, it might.
There is a great interview in Variety with James Cameron and his perspective on 3D films (pun intended). Of course, what he says is quite convincing, and salient. I met him once. He made some convincingly salient points then too. Via Daring Fireball, via John August.
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