Wore my glasses today

[waxcap]

I must say I've been intruiged and impressed by the photo's in the Gallery from Mike "Lancashire Lad" of "myxo's".

I'd never knowingly seen one so I made an effort today and took my glasses with me! After a few hours of inspecting just about every rotting branch and twig I came across I finaly found this!

I have no idea what it is but I now understand the technical ability of those who photograph these little beauties so well.

[Jim Ford]

I've never knowingly seen a slime mould (but dimly remember reading about them as a child). I must get out there and look for them!

Jim

[Lancashire Lad]

Hi Dave,

I think that you have found Stemonitopsis typhina.

Many thanks for your kind comment regarding my photos of myxo's. - I have to admit that getting good quality images of them is becoming something of an obsession of mine at present. (Thank heavens for the digital photography age, and for focus stacking in particular!!).

Regards,
Mike.

[waxcap]

Thanks Mike

I must say I didn't realise that they were that small! A little beyond the capabilities of my 100mm Macro I think.

Dave

[Lancashire Lad]

Originally Posted by waxcap

Thanks Mike

I must say I didn't realise that they were that small! A little beyond the capabilities of my 100mm Macro I think.

Dave

Yes, other than a very few, if you find one that's more than 3mm tall, - it's a biggie.

You should be able to get some good shots with a 100mm macro. - Assuming it does 1:1

I occasionally use a Raynox supplementary lens when I'm using my Fiinepix HS10, but the vast majority of my shots are with a Nikon D80 and Sigma 180mm Macro lens. (Camera/Lens/Exposure details are always shown below the photos in my WAB Gallery).

Being a 180mm, the Sigma allows more working distance between lens and subject, but it still only does 1:1 as maximum.

(This is multiplied to 1.5:1 by the camera's crop sensor - but I assume that would apply with your camera too).

As a matter of course with these things, I use focus stacking of several images to get the required depth of field.

The critical thing is having a very rigid tripod, and a steady hand to tweak the focus bit by bit through the sequence of shots needed for the particular subject.

As long as you don't move the camera/lens, during the stacking sequence, and as long as you leave a bit of focus overlap when refocussing for each individual shot, (so as not to end up with a section of the final image that's out of focus), it's relatively simple.

My camera is only a D80, so by no means cutting edge technology!! - But when the stacks are complete, there's still scope for a final crop when needed to get a more aesthetically pleasing composition - without visibly affecting image quality.

Regards,
Mike.

[waxcap]

Thanks for that Mike.

If I manage to spot some more I'll have a go. The above images were about as close as I could get and, as you say , the DOF gets very small. I have also found that you need a steady hand and a very smooth focus ring for taking images for stacking at that level. It's a shame the camera can't take a stack set for you automatically; that would be a nice feature.

I was thinking the Canon MPE 65 (£800) would be nice for Myxo's but it doesn't have a focus ring so you would need a rail (£150) to move it in and out and of course a Canon MT 24 EX Macro Flash (£600) - I'll stop thinking now.

Dave

[Lancashire Lad]

As I understand things, some Canon DSLR's do actually have an inbuilt facility to take focus stacks. (But don't ask me which models, or whether this facility works properly - it's just something that I recall hearing about in the dim and distant past. - I'm a Nikon user and not well up on things Canon).

You can easily get by without flash - I never use it. All my in situ shots are by ambient daylight. Long exposures aren't any problem if you've got a rigid tripod. (For example, several of my recent stacks have been in the range of 25-30 shots, each shot being 2-3 second exposure).

I occasionally take immature specimens home to see if I can get them to fully mature.

When photographing them at home, again, I prefer to do so by ambient daylight. (Usually window light from one side of the subject, with a small mirror or reflector on the other side to bounce some light back and reduce contrast).

On the odd occasion I do use artificial lights, it's just a couple of "bendy" table lamps that take mains voltage LED spotlights. - I've adapted a couple of white plastic yoghurt pots as diffusers to help quench troublesome highlights/glare. - All very Heath Robinson, but it works well enough.

Regards,
Mike.

[Sakke]

Mike, also I have been very impressed about your great photos of myxo's. Are you using Photoshop or any specific software for focus stacking process?

Regards,

Seppo

[Lancashire Lad]

Hi Seppo,

Thanks very much for your compliment.

I just use the standard freely downloadable version of CombineZM:-


My "technique" if you can call it that, is simply to open the required images in CZM, and tell it to do the stack using all the default settings exactly as downloaded - I am quite happy with the results obtained that way, and haven't felt the need to move away from the defaults.

A run down of how I use the program, which I made a while back for someone else, is shown here.
(Best viewed at largest size):-


I will again say at this point that I wholeheartedly applaud Alan Hadley, the author of CombineZM, for his undoubted skill in software programming, and for his making the program freely available to those who wish to make use of it.

Once I've got a suitable stacked image, I just open it up in PaintShopPro for any cropping, sharpening, etc. etc. that I might want to do, before resizing for WAB upload.

(PS - Dave , I hope that you don't mind this slight hijack of your thread).

Regards,
Mike.

[Sakke]

Mike, thanks for your kind advise of CZM, this really helps me,

Regards Seppo