Irwin
Gymnocalycium baldianum
Moderators: rjlittlefield, ChrisR, Chris S., Pau
Gymnocalycium baldianum
Two stacks from the greenhouse of my gymnocalycium baldianum. The color of the flowers is variable, from a light pink to a deep wine red. Hope you enjoy.
Irwin
Irwin
The first picture is very beautiful and composed very nicely. I like all the different textures and the stems(?) on the flowers make the whole picture.
I find when I try to stack a photo with lots of close matching colors, they tend to fade into each other and you loose detail in the stack but your stack has lots of detail and only gets foggy in a few spots in the deeper areas of the flower. Nice work. Irwin, what do you use for equipment and software?
I find when I try to stack a photo with lots of close matching colors, they tend to fade into each other and you loose detail in the stack but your stack has lots of detail and only gets foggy in a few spots in the deeper areas of the flower. Nice work. Irwin, what do you use for equipment and software?
Take Nothing but Pictures--Leave Nothing but Footprints.
Doug Breda
Doug Breda
Thank you Doug for you thoughful reply. Both shots were taken in available light with a tripod mounted Canon 20d and a Sigma 180mm macro. I compiled the image with Helcion.
I was corresponding with Rik the other day and tangentally discussed the topic of mush in low contrast, similar toned areas. While Rik's explantation is far more cogent, my basic understanding is that the programs often cannot distiguish between what is noise, what is out of focus and what is in focus . Additionally, Helicon averages the slices in some manner. The result is mush.
My method for dealing with mush is simple, but extremely tedious. and time consuming. After Helicon compiles the image, I use its retouching feature which splits the screen into two images: the composite image on the bottom and the chosen slice on top. (You can work side to side if you like) I then decide what is infocus in each slice and manually "paint" that info into the final image. often I have to toggle between several slices to determine which slice has that portion of the image in sharpest focus.
In the interior shot, I stopped my focus stack below the tops of the stamen but above the bottom of the flower for artistic and practical reasons. Artistically, there was little information that I wanted to convey and sometimes I want to use blur to give a visceral feeling of depth. Additonal, it was a case of diminishing returns-- the amount of work entailled to eliminate the severe halation that would have occured at the bottom was not, in my judgment, worth th effort. I do have images that go to the bottom of the flower. When I have time, I intend to recomposite the image using a longer stack for comparison purposes.
I hope that was helpful. Have a geat weekend, Doug.
I was corresponding with Rik the other day and tangentally discussed the topic of mush in low contrast, similar toned areas. While Rik's explantation is far more cogent, my basic understanding is that the programs often cannot distiguish between what is noise, what is out of focus and what is in focus . Additionally, Helicon averages the slices in some manner. The result is mush.
My method for dealing with mush is simple, but extremely tedious. and time consuming. After Helicon compiles the image, I use its retouching feature which splits the screen into two images: the composite image on the bottom and the chosen slice on top. (You can work side to side if you like) I then decide what is infocus in each slice and manually "paint" that info into the final image. often I have to toggle between several slices to determine which slice has that portion of the image in sharpest focus.
In the interior shot, I stopped my focus stack below the tops of the stamen but above the bottom of the flower for artistic and practical reasons. Artistically, there was little information that I wanted to convey and sometimes I want to use blur to give a visceral feeling of depth. Additonal, it was a case of diminishing returns-- the amount of work entailled to eliminate the severe halation that would have occured at the bottom was not, in my judgment, worth th effort. I do have images that go to the bottom of the flower. When I have time, I intend to recomposite the image using a longer stack for comparison purposes.
I hope that was helpful. Have a geat weekend, Doug.
