HI all, this is not a post featuring the smoke/vapour challenge. I spent some time trying to get the shot I was after for that and it just wouldn't come off - and I'm fairly low on dry herb right now so didn't want to burn through anymore unnecessarily just trying to get 'the shot'. If I have another idea, I'll do that. In the meantime, I thought I'd share a little experiment I did to show what's possible with a pretty low-grade camera and some freely available software, and some bought (but not super expensive software I'm currently trialing).
Photo 1 is the original. Photo 2 is the crop and processing using Apple's iPhoto for desktop (most of the same processing features are available on the iPhone in the Photos app, once you enter "Edit'). Photo 3 is a similar attempt to process the image using the software ACDSee. I'm liking ACDSee. It's file management is great as I'm just managing files directly on my hard drive file structure, I really dislike the Apple Photos app for it's inability to let me store and arrange my photos not eh hard drive the way I want. I'm fairly sure I'm about to purchase ACDSee - they're currently having a sale.
OK The original: Black Cockatoo: Olympus 6MP SP500UZ: ISO80
f/3.7 1/60
Tha Photos App processing (I couldn't bring out the subject as much as I wanted, but it's better than the original)
And the ACDSee processing - I like this better. It's maybe a bit heavy handed, but ACDSee is totally non destructive so I can tweak it whenever I want.
I'm not claiming that I've done such stellar job or anything. I actually think they're both a bit heavy handed in different ways. I'm mostly trying to show that a lot can be done with free or very cheap software options. I was able to get more out of the light with ACDSee than the Photos app. Neither gave me the option to really bring out the colour of the eye though. It's a Male and they have a pretty deep red eye - in the pic it looks paler than it really is. That would be a job for photoshop and a bit of burning in I think.