There was a clear sky and a lovely moon yesterday as I walked home. I couldn't resist it. The light was failing quite quickly and the only bit of sunlight left was just clipping the tops of the trees.
1



2



3



The last two show a very very precious tree. It is an elm that escaped the Dutch Elm Disease ravages in the 1980s.

All with K1 and an 'A' series, macro 100mm.

4 is indeed a fun one to figure out but the 1st one takes the whole packet of biscuits.

The stand alone is still receiving updates (you get then free for the first year and £99 thereafter !!). If you don't have lots of RAM and a very fast processor it will indeed take ages to process an image - that's why there is a big red END PROCESS button. They are currently trying to get everyone to upgrade to Photo AI (2) and to include their video AI in the same package. I have no use for video. You do still get all the stand alone modules, which do indeed give a far more refined degree of control. They push the basic 'auto pilot' concept, however, which analyses your image and decides which process(es) to apply. It will therefore (perhaps) decide to simply de-noise, or sharpen, or increase the resolution, for example. Generally, it is better to stick to a tried and tested workflow and use the individual modules, calling them up as you want them. There is quite a lot of control over what they do but, as I pointed out above, sometimes it can't do something very well and you would be better falling back to a more 'primitive' program to complete the job. It does a great many things very well indeed but it certainly isn't the universal panacea they make it out to be.

Once again I have to root for Faststone Image Viewer. I often use the sharpener after everything else has been done to give it the tiniest tweak. E.g. Unsharp mask "radius" 0.3 - 0.4, "amount" 14 - 16. Play with it around those values and be prepared to be pleased. Even Topaz can't do what Faststone manages. And it will beat it hands down on CA correction. To get the sharpener quickly without mousing around, use Ctrl+u.

And the only one that causes no trouble at all is the frog - the most un cute of the lot ! Nice pictures.

Good luck. We are rooting for you.

Click the link above. "Do not try to do this at home". Wonderful find.

I love wine (well, good wine) but just one glass sets off my gout, so I drink beer and get fatter and fatter.

It is so dismal when you can't get into that groove - but when you can .... you just demonstrated it.

I can't even make basic flash work properly!