If you’re a fan of prime lenses(as I am), you’re used to swapping glass more often than would seem sensible; in conditions that are somewhat less-than-dust-free.

Your sensor is dirty.

Don’t believe me? Here’s a handy way to test.

-Open Photoshop (or hell, microsoft word) and create a new blank document. Basically, just fill a bunch of your screen with white.
-Set your camera to aperture priority and crank that aperture down to as tiny as possible (so like… F22 or greater probably, depending on the lens/focal length)
-Switch it to manual focus and shove your camera up in front of the screen (doesn’t matter if it’s in focus, you just need a big field of white in front of the camera, focused or not.)
-Snap a photo while moving the camera quickly across the whiteness (doesn’t really matter too much if you move it, but I like to think it helps to make sure that the dust is actually on the sensor and not on my monitor.)
-Open the photo you just took in photoshop (it should look like a 50% grey or thereabouts.)
-Run Image>Adjustments>Auto Levels on it.

All of those little black spots you see, are dust on your sensor. All of the things that look like water spots, are dust on your lens.

Here is my Test Shot of my D80′s sensor before I cleaned it:

Here is my Test Shot of my sensor after I cleaned it:

Notice there is still some dust on the sensor? I know I could probably do a better job but I’m willing to accept this amount because I know I’ll be cleaning the thing fairly frequently now that I bought the tools for the job. You’ll probably never get it 100% clean, and–given the not-inconsiderable risk of cleaning the most expensive part of your camera–nor should you try.

If you’re brave, send me your test shots. Gregg already proved that my camera’s sensor was dirtier than the rental ones they have at McBain. So yours probably won’t be nearly as bad. But I wanna see. Maybe I’ll append them to this post with your name if you’re willing to show and tell.

-dean

Hope you like it.

So we (Steph, Julie, Marc and I) were taking photos in the river valley the other night, and there was this incredible squawking noise of many crows. Above us. At first we thought our flash disturbed them and they were just giving us hell… but then the sound got louder and louder and louder. And soon overhead was a swarm of crows… Hundreds at the very very least but I’m estimating about 1000 flocking and swooping above us. Just try to imagine that sound. Then try to comprehend and the sight of that many of these normally fairly solitary beings. 1000 dots of black against a midnight sky. Needless to say we couldn’t muster a photo of them. We picked Emily murphey park specifically because it was near pitch black out there so we could do some strobe photos. (Upload later today hopefully). Marc pointed his camera up and tried to snap a few, with no results. I didn’t even bother trying.

But… if a flock of crows is called a “murder”…
is a flock of 1000 crows a “Mass Murder”?

A couple more reasonably sized (4+ millimeters) creatures.

Sam lent me his 100mm nikkor micro lens to fiddle with.
So i took a few macro shots. I think this one’s my fave. He’s about a millimeter big. That’s a dandelion stem he’s standing on.

I spent a bunch of time hunched over a slough trying to get pictures of all the little insects in it… but this is about the best shot I could come up with. I’ll probably try again. Literally a pain in the neck to do even with my amazing tripod.

Here’s a little 4mm-6mm snail crawling along on the surface tension of the water, from the bottom. neat.

-dean