Chuckwal Loc: Boynton Beach Florida

Rusty
looks like you removed Bokeh or sensor problem
chuck

PHRubin Loc: Nashville TN USA

My first reaction was it was bright spots in the background out of focus.

RustyM

Linda of Maine predicted this would be fun because of the wildly varying guesses about the causes of the spots. She was certainly right. At least one person asked me to follow up with any conclusion about the cause, but first let me say what I'm pretty certain did not cause them. Spots on the sensor or lens: it's a fixed lens camera (Sony RX10M4); I checked the front of the lens, and it was clean; the spots only appeared in one shot. Sun spots: I was using a lens hood; the angle of the shot was down toward the ground; the aperture was wide open. Several folks (Linda first) suggested they were out of focus water drops reflecting sun in the background, and I'm pretty sure that's what they were. The butterfly (White Peacock) was against vegetation, and it had rained the night before, so there were likely water droplets present.

Thanks to those (particularly beirer) who offered tips on using PS tools to remove the spots. I've uploaded a retouched image with this post. Much improved, I think, although I'm not entirely satisfied with the spot off the antenna. I need more practice. BTW, my original post was poorly worded. I should have said "I", rather than "it", didn't do a very satisfactory job. I didn't mean to suggest PS was inadequate.

Thanks again to everyone for all the help.

Rusty

russraman Loc: New York City

I don't know what caused the spots (dirty lens, mold or fungus on one of the elements, sensor dirt, etc.) but I was able to easily remove them simply using the edit / retouch tool in Apple's Photos on my Macbook Pro. My edit is attached. Not a super "professional" fix, but effective.

tgreenhaw

You didn't mention if its in the same place on every frame. If so its equipment, if not its weird bokeh from a bright spot in the background.

My approach for correction would be the clone stamp tool in Photoshop. You will likely want to use the lasso to isolate the antenna, select inverse and then use a big brush - say 160 pixels

(Download)

via the lens Loc: Northern California, near Yosemite NP

Spots are caused by light reflection. Use the clone tool in PS.

Blair Shaw Jr Loc: Dunnellon,Florida

Thanks Rusty.......it was very exciting to read all the responses to your questions and it was worth every moment of it . Glad you resolved the issue. Good luck to you sir.

RustyM

👍

Tom Hungerford Loc: Thomaston CT

I agree with Linda from Maine. They simply look like out-of-focus water drops in the background. Hardly anything to worry about, but try the spot-healing in PS.

Tom

Blenheim Orange Loc: Michigan

Beautiful image, Rusty, and your touch ups worked well.

Also, I thoroughly enjoyed reading all of the wild speculation and the various proposed remedies.

I get spots just like that all of the time from water droplets on plants.

Mike

RustyM

smussler Loc: Land O Lakes, FL - Formerly Miller Place, NY

Try Phil Harvey's exiftool.exe - Free.

https://exiftool.org/