Orchid Flower Stack

beetleman · Post by **beetleman** » Sun Aug 20, 2006 9:13 pm

This is one of my miniature Orchids..Eria Amica...which is blooming for the second time this summer. What I did was set up the camera, tripod and the focusing rail, set the camera to manual focus, focused on the first unopened bud (in front of the left flower), took 113 pictures moving the camera with the rail until the second flower was in focus. I wanted to go all the way to the right flowers` stem but I ran out of rail length (my fault). Used Helicon Focus for the stack. The flowers are 1/2 inch in Diameter and from the yellow/white center of the right flower to the tip of the unopened bud is 1 inch (I might add, 1inch behind the left flower & bud). I took these tonight because my wife is going to Africa (Kenya) and she is taking my camera...so I will be without my camera for two weeks

This one is not a stack

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Sun Aug 20, 2006 10:06 pm

Doug... very nice shots! Orchids can be tough flowers to photograph because they are often so 3-dimensional.

113 shots! I've got to think you might have done a bit of "overkill" on this one

, but the results are excellent. (When stacking, it's always better to overlap more than necessary as opposed to "missing" a section or two by moving the focusing slider too much). Sometimes it's interesting to see what the results look like if you run every other image (or even every third one). It's easy to do with Helicon Focus by using the "check boxes" once all the images are loaded. This can sometimes help you develop a good "feel" for the spacing required between images.

No camera for two weeks! Maybe it's not too early to start on the letter to Santa!

beetleman · Post by **beetleman** » Sun Aug 20, 2006 10:35 pm

You are right Charles, I probably could have Knocked off half of the shots from the stack and still have the same results. There is a gap between the first & second flower where I could have taken 30 less shots probably. I guess you have to weight the magnification and the length between the starting point and the ending point. I had an inch to travel here and on my camera, it is hard to see where you are focusing with the small viewfinder or the small LCD display so I just decided to take more than I needed. Next time I will try to take bigger rail moves and see how they come out. Thank you for your comments & tips Charles

Charles Krebs · Post by **Charles Krebs** » Sun Aug 20, 2006 10:54 pm

Doug...

There is a gap between the first & second flower where I could have taken 30 less shots probably

One thing though... you should establish the "steps" and maintain it through the entire stack "shoot" (that is... as much as possible, you want the same distance moved between all shots) regardless of whether or not there is a "gap" in your primary subject.
(As I mentioned... far better to have too many than too few. It's really frustrating to go through all the effort only to realize at the computer that you over-stepped in a place or two).