Fun With Camera RAW

This image was originally taken with an inexpensive 5MP Kodak point-and-shoot. I liked the composition, but the image had problems. I tried various fixes in PSE7 and in Picture Window, but then read that it was possible to open a JPEG in Camera RAW of PSE7 and to manipulate it there. This strategy seemed to yield the best fix so far. Others looked garish. The window screen is a necessary but problematic part of the picture. It evidently threw the original exposure off quite a lot.

The two predators watching each other in this picture are Xavier the Maine Coon cat, and Broken Claw the praying mantis who hung around the backyard garden area almost two years ago. Her missing left claw made her easy to recognize, but didn't appear to shorten her life span. She was at least 4" long. Insects grow big in the South (more on that when I post on Hercules (a.k.a. Rhinoceros) Beetles). Mantids are catlike in a variety of ways, from the shape of their heads to their behavior--watching and grooming, for example.

Here is the original image as it came out of the Kodak:

Learning Photoshop

I've been learning to use image editing software, experimenting with Photoshop Elements 7 and with a trial version of Picture Window. These two images illustrate the dramatic improvements that you can make to an image with a little effort in PSE 7. On the right is the image as it came out of the camera, with only a watermark added. On the left is the same image with some sharpening and adjustments to contrast and color saturation. I think its pretty dramatic. The picture still needs some work in terms of noise reduction. I took it soon after I got my new Pentax and I was still very early on in the digital learning curve and shot it at a high ISO.

I'll be posting on my turtle telemetry soon. Meanwhile, here's a great blog post on the wonders of modern radiotelemetry and its use in wildlife research.

P.S. I had forgotten to mention it initially, but when I was taking this picture, I'd been interested in the butterfly. Only after a minute or so, did I even notice the little mantis observing both of us. He (she?) was probably too small to take on this butterfly, though I could be wrong. In any case he didn't try, just watched. Most predators probably just watch most of the time, just noticing what is going on around them.

The image starts to tell a story.