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I made it out to the coast this evening and was treated to a wonderful sunset. It was low tide, and I felt that this barnacle-encrusted rock would make for a good foreground subject. Photographed on January 9, 2009.
I liked the way the moon looked against the twilight sky. Even with a 500mm lens, I still had to crop the image significantly to get this composition. Photographed on January 3, 2009.
Good news! Canon just released a firmware update for the 5D Mark II, and it looks like the black dots problem is fixed. Before installing the new firmware, I setup my camera and a test subject and took a series of images. Then I installed the new 1.0.7 firmware without moving the camera and reshot the same images. You can see the comparisons below.
(The swatches are bigger than in the original test from a few weeks ago, because apparently I had my camera closer to the subject this time. I didn’t notice until afterwards, and there’s no way to rollback the firmware and reshoot.)
| Original (1.0.6) firmware | New (1.0.7) firmware | |
| ISO 100 |  |
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| ISO 200 |  |
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| ISO 400 |  |
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| ISO 800 |  |
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| ISO 1600 |  |
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| ISO 3200 |  |
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| ISO 6400 |  |
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| ISO 12800 |  |
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| ISO 25600 |  |
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So it looks like everything is okay. Hopefully people who photograph city lights and other problematic subjects will confirm my findings with real-world images.
Update: Just a word of caution…I normally wait a little while before installing new software, just in case the update actually introduces new problems. This time I rushed in so that I could serve as a guinea pig. Things seem to be fine so far, but if you aren’t bedeviled by black dots you might want to wait a week or two and see what happens.
Canon has just released updated firmware for the 5D Mark II. This is supposed to fix the black dots problem. I’m going to install the firmware this evening and will post again once I’ve tested to see if the black dots are gone. Here’s the download page.
The fields around the local wildlife refuge tend to flood in winter…part of what makes it a good haven for birds. After the recent bouts of snow and rain, the water was particularly high and I wanted to take advantage of the reflections from the sunset. Here I’ve included the reflection of the fence as well. Photographed on January 3, 2009.
I really like redwing blackbirds. The light could be better here, but I still thought it was a pleasant photo. Hopefully I can work with them again at this same location and make some stronger images. Photographed on January 3, 2009.
It’s a little unusual, but I liked this close-up detail of a dog’s paw. Photographed on January 3, 2009.
Here’s one of the dogs resting on the couch. With her eyes shining out from the darkness, I can’t help but think of some wild animal 
. Photographed on January 2, 2009.
