Category: Photo gallery

Saturday was the fall orchid show at the botanical garden. Although it was Halloween, Dracula vampira ¹ was missing. However, there were plenty of others to photograph, some spectacular, some bizarre.

The show gave me an opportunity to test Helicon Focus, another focus-stacking application. The picture above was compiled from four slices using the default settings, the one below from five.

I also ran a stack of images that Photoshop had trouble with through Helicon. It did much better, though the result could be just a tad sharper. The lack of resolution might be due to the particular settings, and once I figure everything out I might be able to get better results. (The same set processed by Zerene Stacker can be seen here.)

It was well after noon by my watch (though still morning according to the sun) when I spotted these today. Four o’clocks are also staying open into the afternoon hours. They still don’t open at 4:00, though.

I’ve been experimenting with the trial version of Zerene Stacker. The picture above of Dr. Huey, the most common rose in cultivation, ((Dr. Huey is frequently used as a rootstock for garden roses. Often suckers from the vigorous rootstock overwhelm the grafted variety and take over, producing a tremendous display of red in late spring. Dr. Huey rarely reblooms, though. This is the only year I’ve seen it in flower during later months.)) was assembled from 63 slices, each at f/5.6. Z Stacker works pretty well, but the final image tends to be grainy, and there are often some thread-like artifacts. I cleaned most of them up, but you can find a couple near the right edge of the picture in the full-sized version. (Click to embiggen.)

Continue reading “Dr. Huey’s last hurrah”

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, September 10, 2015

Back inside the cathedral with tripod and panorama head. This time I used the old zoom at its widest setting rather than the fisheye lens, so this panorama is more detailed than most of my others. It’s best viewed in full-screen mode.

I recently discovered that Photoshop is capable of focus-stacking, though you have to dig through the menus to find the commands. I thought I’d see how well it works before investing in something like Zerene Stacker or Helicon Focus.

The picture above was assembled from 24 frames at f/5.6, with the camera mounted on a focusing rail. I could have added some more frames to get further depth, but this was enough to show that the process works.

So Photoshop works pretty well when the subject is uncomplicated. How well does it fare with something more intricate, such as Bidens bipinnata?

(Click to see the barbs on the needles.) Not so well. Photoshop has problems with depth perception, it seems. If I’m going to do stacked focus regularly, I probably will have to use a dedicated program.

… when naked ladies pop up everywhere.

I’ve been playing around with Topaz Simplify, seeing if it is worth $40.

Continue reading “Complexified”

The monsoon rains paused long enough for me to walk in to work today. I spotted the above on a traffic light pole. I have no idea what it signifies.

Continue reading “Priority mail”

It’s catalpa time.

Continue reading “On the way to work”

I finally finished going through all the pictures from Figments and Filaments last week, and my eyes are bleary. You can see them all here.

… so here are some roses.

Continue reading “Too tired tonight to string words together …”