Stacking macros

I have been wanting to try this technique ever since I read it and today I decided to give it a go as a trial. Even without choosing the appropriate subject I was quite keen on having a go at it. I am quite fascinated with the result. Now you got to really consider my limitations in experience and knowledge in photography so please do cut me some slack , and also about the fascination issue, as it might not even be that good, but as a newbie and looking at the technique itself and the difference that it made to the images taken at various focus points the result for me was really worthy of an exclamation.

So here is the result and any comments and suggestions are greatly welcome. I am looking for sharpness and good DOF here so please disregard the light and composition issues , at least for now. These ones I will tackle next

I used helicon stacking software, and it was my first go at it.

Am off to loook for some more interesting subjects now and giving it a go. For me it definitely makes a huge difference as I was struggling to find the points where to focus and let the other bits suffer. This way its so much better as I can end up having all the bits in focus.

Comments and suggestions please, let them come.

I may not know much, but I know that I like it.

Thanks Stoupaduck at least I know it was not a total waste

By the way, gosh you live just around the corner from me. What part of harrow are you in? I am in Ruislip, actually just on the borders of Pinner and Ruislip as such. Used to live in Harrow, close to the Stanmore side, and I know Harrow reasonably well. Wife still prefers St Ann's and St George's Shopping Ctre instead of Uxbridge one , I guess old habits die hard huh? .

We should meet someday, I would learn a lot from you

Impressive, well done.

Does the stacking software change the shape of the object at all?

John,

I am doing some more tests, but first impression is it doesn't change, nope. Am about to display a couple more so all your views are appreciated.

This one I am compiling I opened up the lens totally, the first batch came up pretty dark, but that was more a mistake from the photographer's part rather than the software itself , so to carry out the experiment I forced the flash also.

Uploading into the server now

That looks great! How many shots have you used for this?
I remember that someone here on the forum did that stacking manually. This seems much more convenient.
For macro that is very useful, but I'm intrigued also by the possibilities for all sorts of shots...

Prieni

Six shots was all that it took. From what I read I can stack even 30 shots. So my next one I found just the right flower that it spreads across a few more plans so focusing on the conventional way just makes it extremely difficult. I would have to just pick and choose the areas and snap it if I wanted to take an image in the conventional way and not stack it. As I changed the focus plan the other ones were totally out of focus, so you can see the last result. I will throw in the server the original images too, so you can view the original images.

this is the image


Please disregard the dark spots as I wasn't giving attention to it. Didn't want to use the flash, and I get light only coming from the side window. The purpose of the exercise was just for the stacking.

These are the original ones taken, and then the last one after the stacking again,

















and the result

Probably I didn't need the last two shots for the stacking, but hey, I am still new to this so wanted to make sure I wasn't leaving anything out of focus on that plane

Very impressive!
Do you refocus between shots or do you move the camera? I think the latter should be better?

And more hours of fun to be had... (As if I haven't got enough on my plate already:lol

Prieni

James Oops Prieni I mean (aha, almost got you there huh? I bet you thought I was falling for that one again),

Not moving the camera is supposed to be imperative. You just refocus it aiming at different planes. So this really comes handy if you have one of those subjects that you just dont know where to focus minutely, as you focus one area and the other one goes out of the window. All I do is just change the focus plane (is this the correct term?)

Another bunch coming up, but this one just needed 3 shots as the flower was most of it on the same plane

Lack of light seems to have part a huge part on parts of this one.

I did go for it though, opened wide the aperture on the 100mm macro just to see where it would get me.

I saw an image of a fly once that had this technique applied manually. It was awesome.

Your results are similarly as impressive considering your still mastering it.

For anybody wanting to play with this technique with some free software, google for CombineZM .