Bellows Setup

Paul K · Post by **Paul K** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 6:12 am

Just wonder if anyone could show me how to set up a bellows.

Ordered a cheap one from eBay and each time I go to do some images its as if the front 'swings' from left to right in the form or steaks or striation marks.

I was thinking of screwing it on to a piece of wood or some sort.

Any advice or pictures of your own set up would be greatly appreciated to give me a rough idea.

Thanks in advance

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 7:18 am

....and each time I go to do some images its as if the front 'swings' from left to right in the form or steaks or striation marks.

Please post one picture showing the effect you're describing and another of your bellows setup to understand what could be happening.

If you refer to striated bands at the image side after focus stacking it could be just due to some misalignement of the lens-camera set and the z axis movement during the stack capture

Paul K · Post by **Paul K** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 8:51 am

Pau,

The effects I am getting is probably due to the misalignment of the Lens/camera Z axis. How do I go about realigning or to realign for stacking.

The bellows measure approx 140mm, so I have 2 Ext Tubes at 31mm each =62mm, the bellows is set to roughly 125mm taking into account the camera body, in order to give approx 200mm to achieve 10X mag.

It feels like the bellows can't hold the weight of the tubes and objective as there appears to be a bit of play at the end.

ChrisR · Post by **ChrisR** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 3:53 pm

A cheap Arca-type plate which spans the two bellows end "standards" would help a lot, but yeah, it's pretty difficult to align things perfectly.
If you have symmetrical "streaks" that's normal, just a result of the change in field of view when the magnification changes.

mawyatt · Post by **mawyatt** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 4:08 pm

Hejnar Photo has some nice Arca plates that have a lens support on the end. This can supply support for the bellows and lens assembly.

Best,

Mike

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 4:11 pm

The bellows measure approx 140mm, so I have 2 Ext Tubes at 31mm each =62mm, the bellows is set to roughly 125mm taking into account the camera body, in order to give approx 200mm to achieve 10X mag.

What objective are you using? (What are the markings on it?)
Is it an infinity type or a finite type? (Also ... 125mm bellows + 62mm tubes + 44mm body depth = 231mm. Something isn't right here).

As Chris mentioned, regardless of other changes or recommendations you really should provide a bar or brace that attaches to both the from and rear standards. (You have way too much "hanging" out front from your attachment point). Then try to get as much surface area contact between this bar and the top of the Stackshot.

Paul K · Post by **Paul K** » Sun Jul 31, 2016 11:29 pm

ChrisR wrote:it's pretty difficult to align things perfectly.
If you have symmetrical "streaks" that's normal, just a result of the change in field of view when the magnification changes.

Thanks for that Chris.

mawyatt wrote:Hejnar Photo has some nice Arca plates that have a lens support on the end. This can supply support for the bellows and lens assembly.

Best,

Mike

Hi Mike, I will look into that.

Charles Krebs wrote:What objective are you using? (What are the markings on it?)
Is it an infinity type or a finite type? (Also ... 125mm bellows + 62mm tubes + 44mm body depth = 231mm. Something isn't right here).

As Chris mentioned, regardless of other changes or recommendations you really should provide a bar or brace that attaches to both the from and rear standards. (You have way too much "hanging" out front from your attachment point). Then try to get as much surface area contact between this bar and the top of the Stackshot.

Charles the objective is a Nikon CFI Infinity 10X. Regarding the measurements they are not exact, rather a rough estimate for demo purposes.

To all who responded thank you very much for the comments and advice. Greatly appreciated.

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Mon Aug 01, 2016 12:06 am

The bellows measure approx 140mm, so I have 2 Ext Tubes at 31mm each =62mm, the bellows is set to roughly 125mm taking into account the camera body, in order to give approx 200mm to achieve 10X mag

the objective is a Nikon CFI Infinity 10X

As Charles pointed there is something wrong with your setup.

Despite it can work delivering a decent image, infinite corrected objectives do need a converging lens (usually named tube lens) to focus the image. If not you're forcing it to work outside its desing point and image quality will be inferior

Take a look:

http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... hp?t=12147

http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... highlight=

There are zillions of posts at the forum out the subject

Paul K · Post by **Paul K** » Mon Aug 01, 2016 1:44 am

Thanks Pau for the info.

The figures were a very rough estimate of the set up. When I sit down to do stacking with the Nikon its always mounted to a 100mm EF lens set to infinity focus.

I am aware in order to achieve 10X mag it would requie a tube lens of 200mm. I thought using a bellows with some tubes would also work.