Lichen on wooden fence (images added)

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Wed Feb 09, 2011 10:11 pm

Frame width about 35 mm.

Shot with Canon T1i, Sigma 105 mm f/2.8 macro lens at 1:1.5, natural light at 1/5 second and f/9 using Live View with EFSC, 23 frames shot with StackShot at 1.10 mm focus step, stacked with Zerene Stacker PMax, no retouching. Slight underexposure plus curves adjustment to bring out the colors and textures.

Here is the physical setup:

I tried shooting the little orange lichen at the right at 3X and 0.040 mm focus step, but it turned out that the fence was swaying back and forth too much for that. The stack ended up looking like it had been shot substantially in random order, and I had to throw out too many frames due to motion blur.

--Rik

Edit: title to add images

LordV · Post by **LordV** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:19 am

Came out well Rik

You might have been better off taking them as I would have done, resting the end of the lens on the same fence rail - at least that minimises relative movement

Brian v.

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 5:56 pm

I went back and took another run at the small lichen. This time I went equipped with flash and a better understanding of what was likely to go wrong. Worked out very nicely!

This is about 5.1 mm field width, cropped from a 3X image on a 22.3 mm sensor. MP-E 65 at f/4.0, 70 frames at 0.040 mm focus step. ISO 100, Canon 580EX II Speedlite at 1/64 power.

Here is a crop at 70% of actual pixels.

And just to fill in about the setup:

The lichen shown above is the little orange thing at image center here:

--Rik

Edit: add technical info about flash.

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 6:37 pm

Interesting Rik!

Just noticed you've added some additional setup pics.

Craig

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Thu Feb 10, 2011 6:37 pm

LordV wrote:Came out well Rik

Thanks, Brian.

LordV wrote:You might have been better off taking them as I would have done, resting the end of the lens on the same fence rail - at least that minimises relative movement

Yep, I thought about that, and if I had wanted a short stack, probably that's what I would have done.

But I really wanted a deep high resolution stack, and I couldn't figure out a good quick way of stabilizing the rail or tripod against the fence. Lag bolts came to mind, but I don't own the fence and this is kind of a public area.

However, it turns out that the bulk of my problem was due to traffic. The fence runs perpendicular to a major street that's located about 50 feet behind me as I stood photographing the tripod. Every time a car goes by, the fence drifts from its neutral upright position to lean toward the car as it approaches, then back past neutral the other way to lean toward the car as it goes away, then finally back to neutral again as the car disappears into the distance. Next car, the same thing happens. It's not so bad when there's just one car, but the first time I tried this, I happened to pick the start of rush hour! Today I got luckier and happened to pick a quiet time, when the movements were both less extreme and obviously related to vehicles. I'm always surprised by what all can go wrong!

For curiosity, I shot a series of "fixed" pictures maybe 1/2 second apart as a few cars went by, then ran them through Zerene Stacker as if they were a stack. Here is what ZS had to say about image alignment:

--Rik

Pau · Post by **Pau** » Fri Feb 11, 2011 10:20 am

Rik, excellent photos and very interesting technical details.

You are going to end building a canon-zerene based seismometer to detect microseismic movements!

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Sat Feb 12, 2011 4:32 am

The white lichen is possible a Physcia and the orange one may be a Xanthoria. In both cases the resemblance may be superficial.

Here is a new website with pictures:

http://www.sharnoffphotos.com/lichens/l ... index.html

which I will add to the FAQ topic.

Harold

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Sat Feb 12, 2011 10:04 am

Thanks for the comments, folks!

Pau, you just reminded me of an experience from many years ago, when as a project in high school shop class I built a small seismograph. It was fun to watch, but nowhere near as sensitive as this new "accidental invention".

Harold, thanks for the links & for extending the FAQ.

Craig, I was torn about putting too much setup stuff here in the image gallery. Eventually I decided to keep all the info together here instead of splitting it between image gallery and technical discussion forum. Part being friendly to the reader and part laziness, I am afraid!

--Rik

ChrisLilley · Post by **ChrisLilley** » Sat Feb 12, 2011 11:39 am

Rik, if it helps you feel better the setup photos also give an impression of the habitat and sizing of the main subjects, so can be justified on non-technical grounds

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 12:26 am

I finally got around to rendering out a stereo version of the small lichen.

Zerene Stacker synthetic stereo, DMap, +-3%, with a bit of retouching from Stack Selected and cloning in Photoshop to clean up the background.

--Rik

Harold Gough · Post by **Harold Gough** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 12:41 am

It worked very well.

Lichens are one of the few subjects that, if you want to, can be revisited a year later to find the structure has little or no change in sizeor shape. Clearly, Zerene allows a stereo pair to be created from a single stack without that revisit.

Harold

ChrisR · Post by **ChrisR** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 2:01 am

A surprisingly pretty little thing. Even I should be able to find some of those. It's spring so I ventured to the shrubbery, but after an hour on hands and knees I'd found nothing to trouble the shutter.

Rik I noticed the thread started with a Sigma 105 macro, and know you have a Canon 100L now. Do you see much of a difference between them?

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Mon Apr 02, 2012 9:19 am

Thanks for the comments, guys. I'm taking this image to a meeting of nature photographers next weekend. I suspect this will be way outside most of the stuff they're used to.

ChrisR wrote: I noticed the thread started with a Sigma 105 macro, and know you have a Canon 100L now. Do you see much of a difference between them?

The Canon 100 L is much sharper and is more convenient to use because of its internal focusing. This particular Sigma 105 was purchased in 2004 and is the older non-DG design. I have no experience with the newer DG Sigmas.

--Rik

Craig Gerard · Post by **Craig Gerard** » Wed Apr 11, 2012 7:22 pm

Rik wrote:I finally got around to rendering out a stereo version of the small lichen.

I finally got around to purchasing a stereoscopic viewer...what an amazing difference.

Craig

rjlittlefield · Post by **rjlittlefield** » Wed Apr 11, 2012 8:13 pm

Craig Gerard wrote:I finally got around to purchasing a stereoscopic viewer...what an amazing difference.

Excellent -- I can always tell when stereo locks up for a new person by when they say "Oh!"

Which viewer did you end up getting?

--Rik