ImageDuster Pro - Digital SLR Dust Removal Software


Here are some examples of sensor dust on images - some quite extreme
The images to the right show three significant dusts spots in the sky area which are in the same position on several hundred images I recently brought back from a holiday in Tuscany. As a direct result of having to clean these images, I started thinking about how I could automate their removal. I asked questions on several professional photography forums as to if or how I could automate this removal process and also if any software existed to do it for me? I received many helpful replies which all suggested that the only way to correct this was to use Photoshop or similar packages and spend some considerable amount of time fixing the images by hand! Because of this ImageDuster - Pro came into being and after a lot of hard work it is now available for others to evaluate online.
The software works in one of two main ways: Automatic - In this mode the software will run automatically, identifying dust spots according to user set values of sensitivity. If more than one image contains the same dust spot in the same place it will automatically 'heal' the dust spot area thus removing it! (This is the default behaviour when two or more images are selected). Manual - With this mode you can manually add dust spots at any point after the system has identified what it thinks are blemishes. This is done by 'clicking' on them in the 100% preview pane. The dust spot is then identified and removed. This behaviour is the normal mode of operation when only one image is selected in the file list box. Screenshot of ImageDuster - Pro running.
One or more images can be selected from anywhere in the file system and during the analysis phase ImageDuster will build an internal list of the exact locations of the dusts spots on all of the images and also keep track of which images contain which dust spots. When the analysis phase completes the software will then allow the spots to be examined on a per image basis to allow review of the effect of the user controls on the way dust was identified. If you are happy with the software's decision or want to add your own user defined dust spots - you can. The software will then correct the images and either write new files with a user specified suffix to the original file name or overwrite the original file in the same format i.e. jpeg original will go to jpeg original likewise tiff > tiff. The software will only work on TIFF and JPEG files at present but processing 'RAW' digital files will be included in the next few weeks as well as a Photoshop plug-in both of which will be available as a FREE upgrade to all registered users. Please read what this software is designed to do: ImageDuster - Pro Removes dust spots from FLAT and consistent areas of an image like blue/gray sky or any other areas of the image which are relatively flat in texture. ImageDuster - Pro Removes spots which are common to more than one image when running in 'Process MULTIPLE' mode provided that images are of the SAME dimensions and orientation! ImageDuster - Pro does not remove dust spots from areas of the image which have texture in! - This is important as its nearly impossible to identify dust shadows in complex textured areas like fabric etc... (Although we are working on this!) This program is not designed to find hairs or other line line features! While 16 bit support is planned for future release, the current version of ImageDuster provides 8 bit support only. Support for Adobe DNG (Digital Negative files) is scheduled for late October! TIFF files written with ZIP or JPEG compression from within Photoshop are NOT supported! All TIFF images are written in NON Compressed output files.