The IR threads finally convinced me to send my camera off to get it converted

[Major Nikon]

I have a Nikon D5000 that I bought many months ago with the intention of having it converted to IR. I've heard good things about Life Pixel, so I'm dropping it off in the mail tomorrow to have them convert it. I'm mainly interested in monochromatic IR, however their tutorial convinced me to go with the Super Color IR filter. With photoshop, I can easily convert the images produced by that filter to something very similar to what a deep IR filter would produce; at least so they say. This also gives me the option of producing false color IR images as well since the filter cuts off at about 600 nm. Since I'm not sure how sensitive the D5000 sensor is to higher wavelengths, this should also give me a bit of room to work with. The bummer is that since it's winter, I don't have a lot of green foliage to work with, but at least I'll be ready when spring comes.

[ret5hd]

1. could you tell me in english, as a non photographer, what this means?

just idly curious, so if not, ok.

[Major Nikon]

2. Sure

The infrared spectrum is beyond the range of visual perception. If you remember your ROY G. BIV, red is at one end of frequencies you can perceive as color. Going beyond red, there are light frequencies which exist, but you can't see. These fall into the part of the spectrum called infrared. Going the other way, you have ultraviolet. Just because you can't see those frequencies, doesn't mean the camera can't.

Going back to the days of film, you could get infrared film for your camera that produced some pretty amazing B&W photographs. The film was sensative to light in the infrared spectrum, but not sensitive to light in the visual spectrum. The images produced were monochromatic, but were quite different from regular B&W. They had a lot of contrast. They were very clear. Green foliage appeared as very bright white. Blues appeared very dark. This caused the images to appear surreal.

Moving into the digital age, most digital sensors can see well beyond the visual range. In order to keep the infrared spectrum from throwing off the colors in the visual spectrum, most digital cameras have an internal IR filter which filters out infrared light. This filter is located right on top of the CCD or CMOS sensor (which is the 'film' of a digital camera). It's possible to remove this filter which gives you a full spectrum camera. Most people that do this will put an external filter on their lens, to select the frequencies of light they want to capture. It's also possible to put an infrared pass filter that passes infrared and rejects all or most frequencies in the visual range. This is what most IR conversions to digital cameras do. It's also possible to select different filters depending on what range of light you want. So you can get a filter that passes infrared, as well as the colors like red, orange, and yellow which are close to the infrared part of the spectrum. This allows you to play around with those colors in post processing (photoshop) to produce some very interesting images.

If you do a search on Flickr for infrared, you'll find tons of examples.
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=infrared

What I'd really love to have is a camera that captures UV light and filters out the rest. The problem with this is you really need special lenses made out of quartz that are very expensive because normal lenses don't pass UV very well. A 60mm macro UV lens for my Nikon would cost over $4,500.

[ret5hd]

3. thanks for taking the time to respond.

as i said, idle curiosity, but interesting. i will look at the examples later

[Mira]

4. I thank you, too. It's all

still Greek to me, and so is Greek.
BUT it helps to chip away at my ignorance and it will fall into place some day and all make sense.
Really kind of you to take so much time!!!

[rdking647]

5. im curious to see how life pixel does.

ive considered buying a d70 and having it converted to I can use better lenses with IR things.

one thing Ive discovered with IR is reflections. Ill shoot at what I thought was a clear window with no reflection and the results are surprising

heres an example
the first one is with a regular camera
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/6718371121/][img][/img][/url]
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/6718371121/]DSC_7310[/url] by [url=http://www.flickr.com/people/rdking647/]rdking647[/url], on Flickr

the IR one shows the reflections that where barely visible in normal light
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/6718359399/][img][/img][/url]
[url=http://www.flickr.com/photos/rdking647/6718359399/]P1020206[/url] by [url=http://www.flickr.com/people/rdking647/]rdking647[/url], on Flickr

[flamin lib]

7. Glass is impervious to IR. All the IR recorded is bounced off

the surface of the glass, hence all you get is what is reflected off the front surface and nothing beyond that. So is water.

[rdking647]

10. if that was true

i wouldnt see the crab claws which were behind the glass

[flamin lib]

12. Okay, then you 'splain it. Just tryin' to help. nt

[CC]

6. They did a great job for

me and I got my camera back a lot faster than I expected. Their tutorials have been a lot of help too. I hope they do as good or a better job for you. Now to find time to use mine a bit more.

[flamin lib]

8. Mess around with portraiture. Focus will be a challenge but once

you figure it out the results will be amazing. IR penetrates the skin and reflects off sub-dermal tissue so human skin takes on the same ethereal glow of green foliage.

[Major Nikon]

9. Focus is one reason I decided to go with the D5000 for conversion

The D5000 gives me live mode, so I'm hoping that will solve that problem. I'd like to experiment with macro a bit if live mode works well.

[flamin lib]

11. OH! Live mode through am IR filter--wouldn't have thought of that.

I would most appreciate any feedback on how that works out. Also like to know how bright the image is and if it looks like the finished image. Please PM me if you don't mind.

If it works for you it might be worthwhile for me to follow you and add it to my inventory of professional imagery. I haven't messed with IR since college because of the vagueness of results. Never offer something you can't guarantee delivery on.

[Major Nikon]

13. I'll try to remember

I just sent the D5000 off today, so it will probably be at least a week or two before I get it back.

I've heard mixed reviews on the D5000's ability to do IR, but I'm not sure all that many have converted one, so it may just be speculation.

[rdking647]

14. from what Ive heard it has something to do with teh d5000 using a cmos sensor

as opposed to a ccd,supposedly the ccd is more sensitive to IR (but i dont know for sure)

[Major Nikon]

15. That's what I've heard as well

However, I haven't found anyone who can definitively say either way. It'll be an expensive experiment if it doesn't. I paid $400 for a refurbed D5000 and $320 for the conversion, plus $10 to mail it off. Looks like I'm $730 into this adventure already.

[rdking647]

16. but if it works well.......

actually im considering buying a d70 and having it converted.

[Major Nikon]

17. Look into different lenses

From what I've seen, different lenses do better or worse with IR. I've seen some people post reviews on how different lenses work with IR (I don't remember where I saw this).

Life Pixel allows you to send one lens in with your camera, and they will calibrate the focus for this lens. They report that one of the versions of the Nikon 18-200 can be calibrated to focus throughout the zoom range, which would be quite nice for the D70, which lacks live mode focusing.