Old glass: Nikon Nikkor-S.C Auto 55mm f/1.2

Recently, a co-worker brought me an old Nikon F3 body with a Nikkor-S.C Auto 1:1.2 f=55mm lens attached that once belonged to his father.  He knew of my weakness for old cameras and offered to sell it to me.  I declined, but I still couldn't resist putting this ultra-fast f/1.2 lens through its paces for a little while.  After a little experimentation and a little research, here's what I know about this lens.

I'm not dead (yet)

Those of you that have been following along regularly with my weekly (or so) posts here on the Prairie Rim Images blog are probably wondering what's happened.  Rest assured that I'm not dead... not yet, anyway.  I've been busy working on some big stuff behind the scenes that will hopefully be visible here before long.  I've also got a few new posts in the works that should show up shortly.  Thanks for your patience, and I apologize for the gap in fresh info here.

Portrait postprocessing

I had the opportunity recently to shoot some portraits of couples for a local charity.  While it's always preferred to get the best shot possible in camera, sometimes that just isn't possible for a variety of reasons.  Even when it is, portraits often require some additional postprocessing to clean up various stray hairs and skin blemishes.  I'm fairly new to portrait work, and don't intend to do a great deal of it, but I wanted to share some of the steps that I took to process the photos from this gig.