This doesn't follow. Well, depending on what you mean by 'thrive', that is.

All that is necessary for a forum to at least continue with its status quo is for there to be enough remaining when all the contrary voices have left. It then becomes self-selecting for the forum policies in force.

Frankly, the only reason I still contribute here is because not enough of the people I like best have, ahem, 'emigrated'. So there is still enough element of community here to keep me around, albeit sporadically. But I do find the moderation policy somewhat totalitarian, and of course, it's abundantly clear that I'm not alone in thinking that.

Faint in the originals, obvious if you take the images and compress the levels:

[IMG]http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t244/chris5gd/Other%20Peoples%20Pics/9903_1401619285-1_zpsabdf2125.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t244/chris5gd/Other%20Peoples%20Pics/9903_1401619387-1_zps3f6ca058.jpg[/IMG]

There's nothing untoward in the original DNG, apart from a couple of bits of crap on the sensor, so I think the clear culprit is Faststone, as it was in Mike-P's case.

PS I'll leave the DNG hosted for a day or two, then delete it.

Yes, definitely not in the DNG.

For those that can't see it, try saving it and compressing the levels together - it's a lot more obvious.
Well it's not the DNG that you see. It must have all kinds of processing done to it, and if you can see it, that processing must be very lossy.

I'll post a link to the DNG later if anyone's interested, I have to go out now.

No probs... however, I noticed that I stupidly ordered ones advertised in "new other" condition. They're probably ok, but who knows.

For quite a few years I've used one of these in preference to a neck strap.

Some of the ones on eBay are better than nothing, but the hand can still slip out.

However, the type I've got has an additional webbing strap that goes round the wrist and makes it impossible to drop the camera. Mine is starting to wear out, and I was a bit concerned they wouldn't be available, since only the not-so-good ones were available for quite a long time.

However, they're back - there are others like it, but I've just ordered two of these.

Thought as much... that has been cited as causing this sort of thing before.

See this thread, for instance.

Are you absolutely sure it's visible on the camera LCD?

The second one is a nice selfie

This sort of thing is very common with some JPG conversions, but if you're seeing it on the LCD as well, it's very strange.

Banding is also common with a partially burnt out sky - blue, cyan, white are typical, but there's no evidence of this.

What's the camera, what were the settings?

And if you can put the raw file somewhere downloadable, it would be interesting to take a look.

I love your work, Alan. I rarely comment, paradoxically since it's almost always immaculate, but I find it a real inspiration.

Why would that make a difference with pictures like this? The DoF isn't that thin, surely.