The New American Digest

There’s something about this photo I’ve always liked. It was taken in 2013 and something inside back then inspired me to play with color settings on one of my image processors. I liked what I had come up then with so I re-did the processing here some 12 years later.

The original NEF image was taken under natural daylight, has pixel size of 7370/4916, was translated to TIF with ProPhoto color, then scaled with no further processing to 800/534 JPG with zero-compression and print resolution of 300px/in.

But I go further … and y’all get to experience the joy of pretending you’re in an art gallery, examining works of “fine art” exploring variations in hue, saturation, and a bonus example image of edge detection.

Or not …

The same conversions and scaling were used as in the original print with the addition of adjusting hue and saturation. No mixture of hues was utilized; color filters were RED, YEL, GRN, CYN, BLU, and MAG. Saturation levels for each color were 0% or 100%.

Only RED:

The RED only appears more orange than red and appears over-emphasized when other colors are removed.

Only YEL:

On the other hand, while YEL-only is mostly emphasized on the edges, the color is not as over-whelming as RED-only.

All colors except RED and YEL:

Other than a small hint of green grass through a gap in the machinery, it appears to be a black&white image.

All set to 0% saturation:

With all colors set to 0% saturation, the image appears fully B&W

No adjustments to saturation or hue; conversion of ORIG to Gray-scale (B&W)

At this scale, it’s hard to differentiate between the last three, but there are subtle differences between the 0-saturation image and the gray-scale image. Differences in the conversion algorithms but subtle enough to not be noticeable at first glance of a scaled image.

Just for grins, I applied a basic EdgeDetect filter:

There you have it.
The original is OK as is, but I believe my preference is B&W.

Originally published December 22, 2006

Winter. Late afternoon.
The beach is empty. The air is grey-blue.
The ocean is grey-silver, scattered with foamy white waves.

At the high-tide mark is a long wooden, railed walkway leading to
an old gazebo perched on top of the highest dune.
Inside the gazebo is a picnic table with benches.

Under the table is a pair of small deck shoes.
Between the shoes is an empty styrofoam coffee cup.

The most interesting thing is on the table. An open book.
The pages on the left are flapping lightly with the breeze.
The pages on the right are clipped together by a pen.
They struggle to move with the wind..

On that first page on the right is a single handwritten line.
In the most delicate and precise penmanship. It says…


“I am going home.”

Judging from what I hear about the goings-on in LA and NYC … plus DC and Portland … and perhaps other places not worthy of news reporting Minneapolis? Seattle?, I wonder if the time is coming for at least another time of Peaceful Protesting by the left.

More expansive this time, more dedication to the cause … more bullets flying.

I’m not convinced I like either side, but I am not fond of the left (“not fond” – one way to put it) and I don’t trust the right … but if forced, I have to stick with the right … and keep an eye on my 6.

Anyone else smell at least limited martial law?

Just keep in mind: the alternative was Harris.

UPDATE: Yep – there it is …
“Sen. Cory Booker calls LA riots ‘peaceful’ as rioters torch cars and attack federal agents“

“Here’s how long you should be able to hold a plank based on your age“

I don’t know about you all but I found holding the position (20-30 sec for my age group) a trivial effort compared to getting up out of the position.