liewwk Nature Photography Blog
yes .. I always tell my friends, my picture have minimum PP especially macro pictures .. but I still spend 10 minutes on this picture …..
actually the Post Processing (PP) only spend 1-2 minutes .. but to remove the sensor dusts spots… took ~12-13minutes …
for me … dusts is something really killing .. especially for landscape and macro photography .. hope one day .. camera manufacturer can have better solution for us rather we sit infront of PC for >10 minutes !!!!
As we know anything >1:1 macro, we have very limit DOF … I had it share before … what we DOF have while we shooting macro e.g. at crop body, F16 at 1:1 .. the dof we have is just ~1mm … so how we have more DOF ?
1. angle is important , if we want the main objects “focus”
e.g.
at certain angle, we have not possible to have both object focus .. e.g. choose one , shoot small to crop , or using stacking method I use (discuss before HERE)
by using the stacking … we can get both beetle focus as below
or discuss http://liewwkphoto.com/blog/?p=922
of if we do not want to do much on post process… choose the best angle to have both object focus e.g.
more beetle collection click HERE
Every macro shot that I shoot, I trying my best to get few focus shot to increase my MACRO picture DOF which previously discuss how I stack it @ How I increase MACRO DOF . Because of that, I always shoot few shots before I stop and while I am shooting I will not leave the insect but keep monitor them… some time, they will so some action which may attract me to capture the action to make it as an animation to show …
And one of very early day share
another Tiger beetle
How Young Tiger performance
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2750/4066074743_9d5ab59482_o.gif
How mature Tiger performance
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2779/4066071239_5f6aaf5a87_o.gif
and … this is 😀
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2427/4066076445_03b911fc6b_o.gif
Let me share how I make my gif file… there are many software can make that but I use only Photoshop to create the animation gif file …
1. load the file into stack
2. if you doing this with full size it need a lot of memory to work on .. so normally resize before load into single stack. it will align the pictures …
3. crop the main object so all the picture in same size and same location
4. from the left panel (layer) save file by file with the new orientation and size
5. after save all the file , load it again into a stack
6. click on Windows –> Animation
7. from the animation window, choose all the files, or re-order the files. highlight all then choose the time for each picture to appear
8. save as web, choose gif file … then the gif file animation is ready
and my final result
think DOF is one important part we need to understand if we serious in MACRO photography … it is just as important as we need to know about light ….
an Old share How I Shoot MACRO – What Depth of Field (DOF) you have while shooting MACRO (I will migrate it ASAP….)
I am not want to discuss further on what is DOF, what DOF we have while we do MACRO … but I am sharing how do we increase DOF, as below
i. choose best angle to have more visible DOF
ii. using Post Processing – Stack – also discussed previously
iii. shoot smaller magnification and crop (if you want to know how smaller magnification affect the DOF please refer above link)
I have a same spider but slight change of angle but different magnification as shown below
@1:1 magnification
@2:1 magnification
I simply crop the 1:1 picture to magnification close to ~2:1
and let’s me share further magnification and further crop picture below to show what’s the different of DOF
@biggest magnification with full 21 mega pixels.
@crop from ~2:1 picture …lost ~50% of the resolution but check out the DOF it have more than the biggest magnification one
@crop from ~1:1 picture …lost >75% of the resolution but check out the DOF it have more than the biggest magnification one
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so if you do not mind lost the resolution which you may not want to print yours’ picture big …. crop to get bigger magnification also another choice for you .. but if you prefer to have max resolution to have your picture to be print big or sale …. use the stack method … (for the stack … you may also use 3rd party software e.g. CombineZM …..
and for me … I seldom crop my MACRO or Landscape picture >20% … the crop normally is plan while I shoot so it can be off center or not too tight into single frame …..
I am working on 2 pano MACRO shot … and think this is quite important especially for MP-E65 user.. so just have a quick copy and paste over
Why I need to Stitch ?
I start stitch my macro due to I have my MPE where only do minimum 1:1 (1x life time) and any object that >22mm will not fit in single picture frame … and how I get the whole object into a single picture …… hmmm I am thinking a stitch it …. and I have my very 1st try while outing to Fraser Hill 21 Nov 2008, where I saw plenty of BIG moth and I cannot fit it into a single picture e.g.
[shot with 1:1] , and this is too big for me and I am thinking how I got the whole moth view .. and I finally did something for a smaller one
[stitch picture]
[picture 2:1]
How I do Stitch ???
1. for start, how we shoot
We need to shot picture at same level of view so I normally shot at standard angle where esily to shoot another e.g. face direct view, side view …….. e.g.
How I do Stitch ???
1. for start, how we shoot
We need to shot picture at same level of view so I normally shot at standard angle where esily to shoot another e.g. face direct view, side view …….. e.g.
i. face focus on left eye
ii. focus on right eye
iii. focus on face
2. use Photoshop “Photomerge” option
3. i use “interactive layout”
4. select the file you wish to stitch
5. this will take some time depend how many pictures to stitch and your PC power 😀
– if this is not auto merge then try to move around the picture to try manual to merge the pictures ….
6. click Ok after #5, then it will come out like standard JPEG with multiple layers
7. for the non-cover area, either crop it away or clone it 😀
8. normally I will use multiple shots again to stack the focus area by using method discuss in
“How I Increase My Macro Picture DOF”
…..please comment and let me know if you need further question.
😀