photoartflightRain Drops On Evergreen Branch
Posted on August 5, 2020
After the a rain storm I noticed raindrops on evergreen branches above our sidewalk. I shot a few versions, then decided to shoot a panorama showing the new growth and the raindrops underneath. A 5 image panorama, shot with a Canon 7D with 300mm f/4 lens. It seems like Photoshop does better aligning the images in closeup panos with a longer lens, plus I get softer & cleaner backgrounds this way.
More Focus Stacked Raindrop Images
Posted on May 11, 2020
I am still going through images from past shoots. This is another series of closeup raindrops, focus stacked from front drops to further back in the bush they were on. I was using an Olympus m43 body with an old 200mm Canon FD manual focus macro lens with a m43 adapter. This gives me a FOV (field of view) equivalent to 400mm on a Full Frame Digital Camera. I usually start from the front in focus and then do a series of focus points going back to where I want to end. The featured image is 11 images @ f/8. I load all into layers in Photoshop, then let Photoshop blend all the sharpest areas into one file.
Closer up -7 Image Focus stack- concentrating on center area drops. 200mm Canon FD lens adapted to Olympus OM D camera
Rain Drops After The Storm
Posted on November 6, 2019
I am still testing the iPhone 11 Pro for a variety of photo subjects. These are to see how it does for closeup details. Not quite a macro camera, but very close. Plus because of the iPhone 11’s small lenses you get quite a bit of depth of field for these closeup subjects.
For these images I was using the 6mm lens (Full Frame equivalent would is 52mm)
iPhone 11 Pro – 16 x 9 Format
iPhone 11 Pro -16 x 9 format
iPhone 11 – 16 x 9 format
A little closer view
Wet Leaves In Grass
Rain Drops on Leaves -8 Image Stack
Posted on June 19, 2017
After it rained again, I went out looking for rain drops. This time I used an old manual Canon FD 200mm f/4 macro with a m43 adapter on a Panasonic m43 camera body. The old FD lenses work well on the m43 cameras. Plus I have quite a few left from the film days. Makes it, sort of in easy terms, a 400mm f/4 macro in Full Frame Digital thinking on the m43 format, with the depth of field of a 200mm. There are more exacting ways to figure out the exact focal length, f/stop, and depth of field, but it is easier to just double the focal length and be close. Also unless you know the exact focal length of the lens, not what it is listed as, you are going to be wrong in the first place. Most lenses are not the focal length they are listed at, the true focal length is a little shorter usually from what they describe them as. Especially Telephoto Lenses. Also in the Electronic viewfinder, you see the depth of field you are achieving live. Stopping down the lens, you see your depth of field. There has been a lot of debates on lens conversions on m43 cameras, but it is not worth the effort to me.
First of the 8 images, showing the distortion Photoshop did to help align all the layers in the stack. When Photoshop is compressing them into 1 blended file, it will automatically fill in blank areas with what it thinks it needs. Sometimes it works Great. Other times it needs a few touchups.
Last Image (#8) in Series
The above aligned images are showing the manipulation of the areas of the start and last images using Auto-Align. Next when you choose Auto Blend, Photoshop will remove areas from each layer not used, usually the out of focus areas, selecting the areas more in focus and blending all into an image and placing it on the top layer above the other layers.
Sometimes it works very well, sometimes Photoshop just cannot handle it. Or they might need a little touchup here or there. There are other programs that might be better, but I am just doing these for fun and I am used to using PhotoShop.
Rain Drop Image Stacking
Posted on May 16, 2017
Over the Weekend we had multiple series of rain storms, some with heavy rain. It would rain, then the sun would come out, then it would rain again, multiple times over. I went out in the yard during a sunny session in between, to look for rain drops. I was using a Sigma 150mm f/2.8 macro but did not have a tripod at home. So I tried multiple series of images, for handheld image stacking. Trying to be as steady as possible, I shot multiple series on a variety of groupings of water drops. These range from 3 image stacks up to 19 image stacks per image. Being hand held, it was hard to focus in a series of focus points without moving the frame somewhat. Actually, some I moved quite a bit. The newer versions of Photoshop CC seem to do a really great job of aligning and assembling images. And then filling some areas with content-aware fill to give a finished image. They would have been better if I used a tripod, but overall I am pleased with what I did get.
The Featured Image is a 10 shot handheld image stack.
7 image stack
10 image stack
10 image stack
8 image stack
7 image stack
18 image stack
3 image stack
11 image stack
19 image stack
3 image stack
3 image stack
Grass with Raindrops Panorama
Posted on July 9, 2015
I found this grass leaning over after a heavy rain, but liked the symmetry of the arc with the water drops. Probably about a 15″ long section assembled with a 5 shot panorama , 150mm macro lens, assembled in Photoshop.
Water Droplets
Posted on September 29, 2013
A lot of photographers do not like it when it rains, cuts down on their photography. I like a rain showers, when it ends or just drizzles a little, it gives you an opportunity to go and add water droplets to your photos. It adds interest and dimension to leaves and other subjects. It is like a Treasure hunt and you can do it in your own yard or a local park. When shooting wet leaves, sometimes it helps to use a polarizing filter to cut down on the glare if the sun comes out. Most of the photos shown here were shot using the Panasonic GH2 m43 camera with an older manual focus Canon FD 200mm f/4 macro lens. I like using this combination for macro. With this combo it is like using an f/4 400mm macro that goes to 2X without extension tubes. Your depth of field is also extended because it is a 200 mm lens, but with the 2X crop factor of m43 giving you 400mm. Plus you are not right on top of your subjects, gives you a nice working distance. You just press in the exposure compensation and the image in your viewfinder zooms in for critical focus. Then you just touch the shutter button and it zooms out for the full image on the viewfinder. Also as you stop down, the image remains bright in the electronic viewfinder, but you also see the full depth of field of the aperture you set. After you shoot your shot you also instantly see a preview of what you just shot for a second and will give you “blinkies” on a bright area that might have gotten blown out so you can instantly compensate and reshoot a darker exposure. So enjoy and go out and look after a rain shower to see what you can find.
