A Few More Infrared Images

My health is still quite lousy so I have been laying low and looking for things to do that require little energy and that take up little time.  I've been laying low since mid-January so this is getting kind of old.  I'm still not sure if this poor health is simply a "new normal" for me or if I am experiencing an extra long term recovery that is taking far more time than usual.  Or, if perhaps my health has worsened significantly...  or a new secondary illness...  or a newly ineffective medication...  I'll discuss all of this with my oncologist next week.  In the meantime, I am still struggling each day to do the smallest of things before sleeping away most of the day.

I've been extremely and overwhelmingly fatigued.  Even on those rare occasions when I feel "okay" for a short time, I am quickly so exhausted that I must lay down.  I'm also still struggling with significant difficulties breathing a few times each week.  Then throw in the usual gastro-intestinal issues, bone pain, joint pain, and spinal pain and I'm feeling like things are pretty miserable overall.  I'm still throwing extra medications at my health every day as well as emergency medications a few times each week.  

My appointment with my oncologist is next week.  That is when we will discuss my latest bone marrow biopsy pathology reports and lab results.  Considering how I have been feeling over the past few months, I'm not all that confident that this appointment will be uneventful.  It certainly won't be physically painful like my bone marrow biopsy nor nearly as long but, considering how lousy I'm feeling and how consistently I am feeling lousy, I am expecting some rather lousy news in this next appointment.

This morning, however, I felt well enough for a short time to head out into the backyard with my newly converted infrared camera to shoot some photos.  The weather was nice and I was feeling "okay" so I ventured outdoors with a camera in hand.  Afterward, I ate some lunch and then napped for about four hours.

In this first image, I was looking straight up toward the sky through the branches of a tree.  This image reminds me of the microscopic view of a network of motor neurons...

This next photo is simply a tree branch with some new springtime buds on it.  I'm looking forward to seeing leaves on all these trees again!  The leaves will glow a ghostly bright white in infrared...

This next photo is a photo of the Worcester Range from our open living room window...

Below is a shot of a branch of our spruce tree against the blue sky.  I really love how blue skies render as almost black in infrared.  This also adds incredible contrast to the photos with the foliage rendering white and the blue sky rendering dark...

Below is a photo of an insulator at the top of a utility pole shot from a bit of a distance away.  I was testing my Olympus 140-600mm lens in infrared light.  It looks like this lens will work fine in infrared light which is great news because many lenses do not play well in infrared light...

I noticed that I had a big dark spot in each of these photos.  I must have gotten some dust on my sensor a couple of days ago when I swapped lenses outdoors in the wind.  I'll have to look into how to clean this newly converted sensor.  I'm not sure if I can still safely swab it with a sensor cleaning kit.  Before I attempt to do that I should find out if it is still a safe way to clean my infrared sensor.

I'm really liking the amount of clarity I am getting in infrared.  It is like there is absolutely no hazy atmospheric conditions in infrared.  I know that is untrue because there actually are some specific types of clouds that can only be seen in infrared.  We can't see them with our own eyes but they do show up in infrared images.  They are very noticeable in some ultra-wide angle Milky Way images.  Regardless, I'm feeling like my infrared camera can see more clearly in infrared light.  

The clarity of these infrared images really is amazing making this type of imaging very interesting!