The photo to the right is a extremely blown up picture of a rock in the middle of the Devil's Den at the Gettysburg Battlefield.
The white dot in the middle? It isn't a ghost. It isn't a led light. It isn't a reflection.
It is a dead pixel.
Shortly after returning from Gettysburg in August, I discovered that my Canon digital camera has one dead pixel, which always registers bright white, located just to the left of the dead center of the lens.
After some investigation, I learned that (when blown up) this dead pixel can be seen in every single photo I've taken with this camera since I bought in in March. Hundreds of photos.
On one hand, it is almost impossible to notice (unless, like me, you happen to take a lot of nighttime photographs). On the other hand, once you've noticed, it is almost impossible to not to notice it, first thing, in every single photograph.
Now, here is my dilemma.
Fixing this problem is actually fairly easy. I call Canon, I send the camera in to them, and they will fix or replace it under warranty. No problem.
Here is the dilemma: our son is due to be born in about seven and a half weeks. So, if I send in my digital camera to have it fixed, what do I do if it isn't back to me by December 22nd?
I mean, as a father, I have very little to do during the birth except hold Katherine's hand and take pictures of the kid. By sending in this camera, am I potentially ruining one of my two basic functions as a father?
The alternative is, of course, to just keep using the 10,999,999 pixels of this camera that do work properly. But then, there will be that one dead pixel in each of my child's baby photos. Then, someday I will tell him about the dead pixel, and then he will go through his entire life noticing that one dead pixel in all his baby pictures.
So what do I do?
Write me and weigh in.



