For several years I have designed and given coasters to friends, but as the late night commercial always said … Act Now! … Not Sold in any Store! Anyhow, I have been waiting for a long time for the right opportunity and pricing to offer these coasters to my loyal blog readers. ShutterFly, which is the company through which I design coasters finally has the right deal … 40% off and free shipping to any address in the continental United States. You will order / work directly with Shutterfly. I do not enter into the equation other than to make the coasters available.

Let me stress, I am taking ZERO markup or money for myself.  The coaster dimensions are 4×4 inches, and do NOT even have my watermark on the images. Why a gift from me? Within the next week or so, my blog will hit 500,000 pageviews since its inception … one half million views. Wow! Thank you.

Shown below are the various coaster options. Each set has four individual coasters and unique images. There are three different sets of coasters. Each set of four coasters sells for $14.99 from Shutterfly (plus tax). Order as many sets as desired. You work directly with Shutterfly, NOT through me!

Screenshots of the Coasters (actual size is 4×4 inches per coaster)

Great Horned Owls: Hoot and Family

Snowy Owls of Northeastern Minnesota

Lake Superior Lighthouses

How well do you know your Lake Superior Lighthouses?! From top left in clockwise order: 1. Superior Wisconsin Entry, 2. Grand Marais Breakwater, 3. Duluth Entry North Pier, 4. Crisp Point (near Whitefish Bay)

Once again, your price will be $14.99 per set plus your local tax … free shipping in the continental United States (lower 48).

Okay, how do you get this great deal? Click the link given below. I am curious who is actually taking me up on this offer. You will be directed to a web form where I will ask for your name, city and state. I will NOT ask for your email address, phone number of street address. I respect your privacy.

You MUST take action and order by Thursday, August 25, 2022 at 11:59 PM Pacific Time. This is Shutterfly’s requirement to get free shipping, not mine!!!

• Order Coasters! (will first be asked for name, city and state)

Shutterfly has ended their offer as noted. Thus, I have removed the link.

While I do minimal post processing of my images, I have always performed basic lighting edits … normally adjustments to clarity, shadows and highlights. In addition I often make minor image crops. However, yesterday I decided to try Topaz AI’s Sharpen Tool (free 30 day trial), and I was positively blown away by the results. Let me stress I have ZERO financial relationship with Topaz, nor do I receive any compensation should you purchase their products. My cost for Topaz Sharpen AI was $70 (used an online coupon to slightly lower the price).

Let’s start with a screenshot of from Topaz Sharpen AI which shows a motion blurred image of mine in the process of being recovered.

The actual editing process was easy. I selected my desired process, “Motion Blur – Very Blurry“, and then clicked “Save Image“. If the dropdown had not been blocking part of screen, you would also have seen I had pulled the AI slider to the 90% level.

Here are the Before and After Images of my owlet. No other lighting or coloring adjustments have been taken on either photograph. I suggest “right clicking” and saving the two owl images to your own computer … zoom in and really inspect the two images … toggling back and forth. I think you will be amazed. You may also download this zip file which includes the full resolution before and after photographs (54 Megabytes).

Amity Creek Great Horned Owlet

Reduced Resolution Blog Before Image … Straight Out of Camera

Reduced Resolution Blog After Image … Topaz AI Sharpen Motion Blur Adjustment

Here is a ZIp File which you may download. It includes ALL four images (owls and pelicans) … Before and After and Full Resolution. Right click while on a PC and Download Image ZIP File.

Here is the White Pelicans example. The photograph was taken this past Spring at Chambers Grove on the St. Louis River.

Reduced Resolution Blog Image: Before – Original Image

Reduced Resolution Blog Image: After – Topaz AI

As always … here are a few important notes:

1. Your results may vary!
2. It makes a difference which Topaz AI Setting is chosen
   • I selected: Motion Blur – Very Blurry
3. I was using a Super Zoom Canon SX-70 camera. Super zoom cameras have small sensors but high zoom magnification. On bright sunny days “super zoom” cameras work quite well, but not as well in dark conditions (see my full review of the Canon SX70 camera).
   • My camera was set to Aperture Priority
   • I took the owl photograph in heavy shade
     • ISO was hard set to 200
     • Exposure was selected by the camera and set to 1/100 th of a second
   • I took the pelican photograph in very early morning light
     • ISO was hard set to 100
     • Exposure was selected by the camera and set to 1/1000 th of a second
   • A light monopod was used, but not a tripod. This helps me further stabilize the camera and is not too heavy to take along while on hikes.
4. My camera selection of a Super Zoom Canon SX70 and hard setting the ISO to a very high quality (low number) level dictates that in most conditions my shutter speed may be slower than I might like. Thus, even if an image is in focus, motion blur may occur.
5. Both of these photographs were taken at some distance from my car. The owl image required a longer hike on forest trails. Thus, I like Super Zoom cameras because they are light and easier to take on a hike.
6. I also own and use a Sony A6300, but I tested the Topaz product on images I took with the Canon SX70. I often need the Canon’s 65x zoom (1365 mm 35 mm equivalent) to get “close enough” to the owls without spooking them.

I believe it is worth giving Topaz AI a test. The trial version inserts a watermark on top of your image, but has full capabilities. One final note: While saving an image is a time consuming task, once I determined a favorite process I could do batch edits and saves. Thus, I walked away from my computer and came back later to five saved images.