Hopefully you remembered to turn your clocks back one hour . . .
COVID UPDATE - It's quite easy nowadays to fall into the "what's the big deal" mindset about COVID with all the boosters and the virus seemingly fading away. But, especially given the experience of our Indo group, that line of reasoning might be faulty. Of the nine people in our group who got sick, I think I'm the only one so far who has subsequently tested negative after the initial positive result. And a couple of people have gotten worse - not hospitalized or anything but yet to turn the corner towards recovery - as the week wore on. So don't think this has gone away. You should take whatever precautions you feel are appropriate. I promise you that I now at least nine people who would say as a caution, "You don't want to get this."
NO AVALON TRIP IN NOVEMBER - Because of my COVID, I'm cancelling the November trip. Hopefully well make it over in December.
INDONESIA TRIP REPORT, PIX, & VIDEO - In case you missed the e-mail this morning, here are the links again. On the SmugMug picture page, everything's displayed as a collage. You can scroll down through that and quickly see everything. You can click on any individual image you like for the full-screen version. You can also have the thing run as a full-screen slideshow. Here are the actual URLs:
PHOTO NOTES - Those of you who snap pix might be interested in this as I experimented with some stuff and am curious what people think. I normally shoot at an ISO of 200-400 but decided this time to try 1600 on all of my shots. The advantage is a combination of smaller f-stops (more depth of field) and maybe needing to use a little less strobe (faster recycling time). The downside is that higher ISO can also mean you'll start to see digital noise, especially if you have to crop significantly or have dark areas of your shot. So if you have any comments one way or the other after you look at the pix, shoot me an e-mail and let me know what you think.
MORE PHOTO NOTES - Some of you have asked me how I process the shots. I use Lightroom 6.0 (stand-alone version) and made these general notes about what I do for just about every shot (as well as what part of LR6 the adjustment is made in). I also timed a couple of them and estimate that I spend 30-90 seconds on any given shot making these adjustments:
• Crop (generally 16:9 but not always - 1:1 is other most common)
• Adj angle if necessary
• Check for focus - discard if eyes are soft
• Check/adj overall exposure (histogram)
• Knock down highlights (basic)
• Increase shadows (basic)
• Adj white balance if necessary (basic)
• Adjust shadows (tone curve)
• Adjust darks (tone curve)
• Adjust lights (tone curve)
• Generally no attempt to deal with backscatter
• Adjust masking (detail -sharpening - hold down ALT key to select edges)
• Sharpen (detail - sharpening)
• Save/export at 2160 pixels high (and corresponding width), 1200dpi
NO ZOOM SEEKERS THIS WEEK - Just a reminder that, because of the election on Tuesday (and assuming some of you will be watching election returns), we're postponing the November Zoom Seekers one week, until next Tuesday, November 15. Craig Gelpi, a founding member of the Catalina Marine Society which is chartered to advance the scientific understanding of the local ocean off Southern California, will be our speaker. You can find out more about the CMS before Craig's talk through this website:
CATALINA MARINE SOCIETY.
IT'S BARELY 5PM AS I WRITE THIS AND IT'S DARK ALREADY - And now the countdown begins until December 21, when the days will start getting longer again.
VOTE!!! - Tuesday may be the official Election Day all over the country but most places are already open for early voting. A democracy only works when all citizens take time to cast their ballots as well as agree to accept the results. Not every one of your choices will prevail but that's what makes our system of government strong.
And that'll do it for now. Have a great week and let's go diving soon!!!
- Ken
