No life, not really still...

Oddly enough, it took me 35 minutes of clean-up after I developed the RAW cleaning up spots and other odds and ends.

grsnovi wrote:

Oddly enough, it took me 35 minutes of clean-up after I developed the RAW cleaning up spots and other odds and ends.

Not odd at all when you're photographing something much closer than you would normally view it. I've often spent a week or more cleaning up macro photos of tools where all of the manufacturing marks and flaw get in the way of what I'm trying to say.

Was this shot hand held or on a tripod? ISO 6400 is unusually high for this type of image and the noise structure feels like like it might have had too much noise reduction which is also affecting the parts of the image which are in focus. I'd like to see you try it again at base ISO and maybe paying attention to where the hands fall as well.

...with the watch on my left hand and the camera in my right - trying to get enough distance while watching the light coming through the window.

Yes, the ISO was too high.

I just wanted a shot of what I was wearing. I kicked the ISO up because I also kicked the aperture up to get more DOF since I knew I wasn't going to stack.

I'm wondering if I would/could have gotten better noise reduction using something like DXO PL 6?

Also, I just saw something at the 10 o'clock domed marker surrounded by red that I didn't see before and now it bugs me.

And the hands were at 2:23 because that's what time it was and I didn't think to reset to 1:50...

I tend to just embrace the inherent noise in the file with only moderate levels of noise reduction. I always prefer digital noise looking more like traditional film grain as opposed to overly smoothed and and smeared look that you get from too heavy a hand, but that is also a personal preference and everyone is different. The great thing is that you can try all the different solutions out there and see what works best for you. I'm more than happy with the natural noise look I get from processing in Capture One but I also got very nice noise signatures from ACR on high ISO files.

Thanks for your comments on my shot...

- Gary

Having just reedited a shot i edited last week, I feel the pain of spending too much time improving and tidying up

perhaps take it off your wrist , drop the iso, stack several shots, light the green hands, and perfection might happen

if not remember its a nice watch

Jim

Most of the post developing clean-up was "spotting" and I wasn't looking for anything other than a shot of what was on my wrist.

Despite the noise I was happy with the shot - happy enough to spend some time on it.

Russar wrote:

And what was the reason to take this not connected to any artistry shot?

In early 2022 I began learning watch repair and I read a watch repair oriented site. They have a thread there entitled: WATCH OF THE DAY.

It was the watch I was wearing yesterday and I just felt like grabbing the a65 with the mounted 100/2.8 macro and shooting something.

I haven't taken many shots in the last couple of weeks and it gave me an excuse.

Russar wrote:

Have a good luck repairing watches,

So far, my luck hasn't been so good. After a year of fooling with them my interest has been dashed against the rocks of my lack of skill. It's one of those things that I probably should have started when my eyes were better.

I have several movements that are in excess of 100 years old but they're not complete or working (and have no case). They were just purchased as practice. 100 year old pocket watches are larger and therefore easier to work on however getting parts is a problem - even if you have two that are the same model.

- Gary