Background color and focus

[WYKnot 0]

Experimenting with solid color background sweeps, blue and black. I was disappointed to see the tail end of the fly was softer (focus less sharp). I measured the distance from camera (film plane) to fly to ensure a parallel line, but the pictures suggest I was not as accurate as I thought. Thoughts, hints, comments, and help keeping things square would be appreciated.

 

 

 

Russ

[Wulff 0]

hard to say with any certainty but heres what i would check.

 

1) DoF.

Assuming your using a 1:1 macro lens your DoF at the mfd is razor thin. To give you an example of just how thin your DoF this is a shot of your average fly, which you might note is quite a bit smaller than your ties. As you can see only the head is in focus, infact the stone and why I chose this image illustrates just how little room there is. Maybe a millileter or two.

 

Try stopping down to f14.

Its hard to say on this monitor, I might be able to tell on my home pc but thats my guess as the near hackles etc seem to be sharp. You really need to be precise and perpindicular.

 

or try backing off and not shooting at mfd. This will increase the DoF.

 

2) Are you manually focusing or auto focusing.

If manual check your dioptric adjuster, its possible your focus is off just slightly such that what looks sharp and focused in the viewfinder is in fact just a hair off or back/front foucsing. If auto focusing you may be front focusing just a tad.

 

My guess is its just a DoF issue.

Those are fair size flies and at mfd your effective dof is razor thin. I doubt I could get size 12 flies completely within the DoF if at mfd with my macro. There is almost no room for error

 

This thing is tiny and I do mean tiny and again the stone shows just how thin the DoF is and only the front edge of it is sharp.

[WYKnot 0]

Thanks Wulff. I shot the pictures at 1:1, 60mm macro lens, with manual focus. Both images were taken at f8. I will reshoot at a smaller aperture and recheck my measures. I continue to be amazed as the narrow plane of critical focus when shooting macro.

 

Russ

[Graham 0]

Sweet flies Russ!!!

 

I finished a new fly, wish I'd spent an extra fifteen minutes making the wing veins better, but for now, I'm happy to have a new fly tp practice fly photography with.

 

Here's my first shot. I don't know if I like the black background or not, but I'll have fun experimenting with different things. I used a 105 macro, mirror-lock-up, and f/16, used a pair of flexible Solux Lamps, with Solux daylight bulbs and Solux diffusers.

 

[Will Milne 0]

Nice patterns Russ and Graham!!

 

John is very correct on the minimal DOF at macro level.

 

xcuse the crappy lighting etc- Russ- here is a stacked DOF set

 

The pattern is about 3/4" long and set at an angle of about 30 degs to the cam, to try and illustrate the technique.

 

 

There are 7 images in the stack.

 

Here is #1-

 

 

here is #3 in the sequence of moving the focus INTO the frame from front to back, focus is around the middle of the body now-

 

 

here is #7, focus is at the end of the tail now-

 

 

 

here is stacked set with the focus from the front to the tip of the tail-

 

 

 

 

Something else to bear in mind is that you will lose a lot of detail when you downsize the images, so in part your sense of lack of sharpness may be , in part due to that as well.

 

here is a 100% crop of the front part of the stacked dof image to show how much is actually in that image at its full size-

 

 

The program I use for the stacking is called Helicon focus. There is a downside with the technique that requeries some tweaking in the program. There can be ever so slight ghosting when you do it on such a plain background as this one, but it is however minimal and easily corrected.

 

 

Hope something in all that makes sense and helps

 

Will

[Graham 0]

Thats pretty amazing Will. I wonder if a tilt-shift macro lens would work? I assume it would, but I don't have one.

 

Graham

[Will Milne 0]

Graham-

 

As far as I know the only swing/tilt lens Nikon makes is an 85mm , the wider ones atre tilt only I believe. I hav'nt had a chance to play with that lens , pretty pricey for my budget.- if it has suffient swings and tilts it may well work as well, though pretty expensive.

 

I used to do large format work ( 4x5) and manipulating the DOF with swings and tilts of both the film plane and lens plane was a great advantage.

 

I think the stacking software concept came out of the even more DOF chalanged world of photomicrography.

 

Will

[Graham 0]

Thanks for the info Will. I'd love to someday get the Novoflex tilt-shift bellows, but that costs as much as the 85mm T/S. But it can be used with any Nikon lens.

 

Geez, I can't belive how fast stuff happens on the internet. I tyed a fly to practice my photography, posted a pic, and in less than one hour got an e-mail asking if I'd sell it for $250, to be given as a Christmas gift to her husband. I wish that would happen much more often!!! I'm shipping the fly to Europe this afternoon. Now I need to get tying again...

 

I gave my fly a little Photoshop treatment...

 

[JayMorr 0]

Awesome work Graham. I love the Guassian Blur effect and fade to "Darker". The photo turned out great.

 

 

JayMorr

[Graham 0]

Jay, Actually, I only clicked on Poster Edges, one of my favorite choices for a one click, quick fix.

 

I'm wondering if any of you guys also take close up shots of real insect parts?

 

Here's a few quick shots from last summer, taken outdoors.. Nothing special photographically, but it helps me with my tying...

 

 

 

 

[Graham 0]

Hey Russ, Sorry, I didn't mean to hijack this topic.

 

I'm wondering about taking some smoothly blurred out of focus shots in various colors, to print for fly photography backgrounds.

 

 

[oatka 0]

$250 for a fly you just tied? Nice work!

 

I'll give you $2.50 for the turtle!

[WYKnot 0]

Hey Russ, Sorry, I didn't mean to hijack this topic.

 

I'm wondering about taking some smoothly blurred out of focus shots in various colors, to print for fly photography backgrounds.

No worries, I learn so much from this forum, please, take it and run. Russ

[WYKnot 0]

Still working on focusing technique. I believe one of the problems with the original photos was the long axis of the fly (nose-to-tail) was not entirely perpendicular to the lens. That imposes an even greater burden on depth and critical focus.

 

Similarly challenging is a "how to" picture where the fly and tying materials have to be in focus. Here I wanted to capture the thread, ostrich herl bundle, and fly to illustrate a specific tying step.

 

 

Thanks for the feedback, this is a great learning environment.

 

Will - The stacking technique looks awesome. In a prior life I did a little science; worked with confocal microscopy to build three dimensional images of subcellular structures. Same basic idea as stacking, applied to a much smaller scale.

 

Russ

[WYKnot 0]

Will,

 

Thanks for the tips and the information on Helicon Focus; the applciaiton looks like it has a number of tools for macro photography. I realize good software does not replace good pictures, just looks like a fun program to play around with this winter.

 

Russ