Article: On generating stereo images with focus stacking

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MaxRockbin
Posts: 188
Joined: Sat Nov 08, 2014 11:12 pm
Location: Portland, OR

Article: On generating stereo images with focus stacking

Post by MaxRockbin »

Interesting article with lots of examples and useful discussion about making synthetic stereo pairs with stacking software.
http://www.mindat.org/article.php/2182/ ... g+software

Tips on improving quality and where synthetic stereo works well and where not so well.

A good supplement to the Zerene stacker manual.

One feature of Zerene's synthetic stereo (and PMAX in general) that I think is underplayed is its enhancement of translucency of a subject.

If the surface of a translucent subject is relatively featureless, PMAX picks out the subsurface features that might be less sharp if the focus was only on the surface.

It's one reason I think some of the best subjects for synthetic 3d are transparent or translucent.

Check out this ovipositor on a rove beetle I shot recently. It takes a moment to adjust your (my/one's) eyes to it, but you can see a hole about dead center that helps makes sense of the detail you can see under the surface:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/focusme/1 ... hotostream
(you can click the arrow in the lower right for a 1900x700 version).

Anyway, I've been a huge fan of Zerene synthetic stereo since I first discovered it and almost always at least try to render a stack in stereo, even if they don't all come out well (nice to have a feature that actually makes shallow depth of field with microscope objectives a good thing!)
If your pictures aren't good enough, you're not close enough. - Robert Capa

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