Hi all, here is another from a series of different images I have been taking of Banded Demoiselles, this in fact the same beastie as in my last posting but I tried to create a totally different feel. Trying to do some different things with these.
This image was made from 7 focus stacked images (the tip of the tail has been purposely left soft to create depth), the finished image then had extra canvas added in PS and then a lot of stretching and cloning took place to fill the new cancvas ( this is set up to be printed at 24in x 12in)
That is great... I really like your thinking and going for a different composition has worked extremely well here. Your stacking is well thought out (difficult to tell at this size, but there could be a little double imaging on the tips of the wings on the left hand side)... my only problem is that I would have prefered for you to have framed it in camera with this composition in mind....
possibly the left wing tip hasn't stacked properly but otherwise I like this. Certainly different. I think it might work well in landscape format as well, without the need to add canvas.
It sounded like a lot of work Shaun, and the end result looks good, barring what Phil picked up on. Personally never considered stacking - partly probably because I haven't got a clue how to. But I don't understand the need to stack here as you appear to be shooting some distant from the subject and with a cropped sensor body, you should get pretty good DOF at between f11 - f16. You may not get from head to tail sharpness like you would with stacking but it should be plenty good enough and I'd imagine a lot less hassle. Just my opinion of course...
Kudos for the composition and another big step forward for your close-up work. I think on this occasion you might heed Phil's advice, but very good effort.
Hi Shaun,
I like your thinking here but apart from the obvious fact that it would have saved a lot of effort composing it before you pressed the button, I feel it works better if you stretch the left side out rather than the right. It just feels more natural to me that way but as Des says - it is all a matter of opinion; not as good a stretch job as yours, just a quick mock up for interest's sake. Very interesting post though, well-worthwhile and full marks for trying something a bit different.
Actually looking at that now, I might have flipped the damsel if I was doing it this way as well so that it was still slightly orientated towards the centre. eric
Love it - original composition which I think is rare and much needed in natural history photography. I'm a big fan of focus stacking - the human eye focusses back and forth to make the image your brain compiles into a fully focus stacked image - so to my mind it's more true to life, not less. So that's the cat amongst the pigeons!
Hi all thanks for the kind comments on this much much appreciated, to answer a few of the points raised as I have played around with this image a fair bit over the last few days
It is focus stacked to try and ensure maximum desired DofF nose to tip of tail on these is about 1.5 inches no aperture can cover that
It was composed with this in mind in the camera - I have done a few of these n the past and the reason I add canvas in rather than crop top and bottom to make pano is that I retain a large image size - bit like a stitched pano - that will print to 48x24 -if so desired.
Missed mis stack on wing tip - have rectified that on mastercopy - thanks for pointing it out
Eric - interesting one swapping it round never thought of that
So once again many, many thanks -
Of course, I never thought of that - Shaun - excellent reasoning. Next time then it may pay to just swing the camera a bit to the side and take another frame as that would certainly make widening it easier. eric
Discussion
18 repliesThis image was made from 7 focus stacked images (the tip of the tail has been purposely left soft to create depth), the finished image then had extra canvas added in PS and then a lot of stretching and cloning took place to fill the new cancvas ( this is set up to be printed at 24in x 12in)
D300, 105mm macro, f5.6 1/60 tripod, MLU remote release
What do we all think?
That is great... I really like your thinking and going for a different composition has worked extremely well here. Your stacking is well thought out (difficult to tell at this size, but there could be a little double imaging on the tips of the wings on the left hand side)... my only problem is that I would have prefered for you to have framed it in camera with this composition in mind....
All the best
Matt
David
Regards,
Des
Brett
Phil.
I like your thinking here but apart from the obvious fact that it would have saved a lot of effort composing it before you pressed the button, I feel it works better if you stretch the left side out rather than the right. It just feels more natural to me that way but as Des says - it is all a matter of opinion; not as good a stretch job as yours, just a quick mock up for interest's sake. Very interesting post though, well-worthwhile and full marks for trying something a bit different.
Actually looking at that now, I might have flipped the damsel if I was doing it this way as well so that it was still slightly orientated towards the centre.
ATB,
Rob
It is focus stacked to try and ensure maximum desired DofF nose to tip of tail on these is about 1.5 inches no aperture can cover that
It was composed with this in mind in the camera - I have done a few of these n the past and the reason I add canvas in rather than crop top and bottom to make pano is that I retain a large image size - bit like a stitched pano - that will print to 48x24 -if so desired.
Missed mis stack on wing tip - have rectified that on mastercopy - thanks for pointing it out
Eric - interesting one swapping it round never thought of that
So once again many, many thanks -
Ian
David