My quest to "fine tune" and understand my setup.

Just bought that first macro lens? Post here to get helpful feedback and answers to any questions you might have.

Moderators: rjlittlefield, ChrisR, Chris S., Pau

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

My quest to "fine tune" and understand my setup.

Post by skrylten »

I have used a simple setup (http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/v ... hp?t=23157 for quit a long time to mainly ID flies.
This thread will be my way to document different settings, light, stacking parameters etc in a more systematic approach to get the most of my setup.
It will also help my poor memory to remember what I did and help me with my curiosity to see what happens if I do this or that.
It will take me some time to get to the end result ...

My goal is to have a simple way to take the images and to process the stack and get a decent result.

I will use the following:

- Canon Powershot SX50 with built-in flash
- Raynox MSN-202
- CHDK "hack" in the camera
- Hugin (Align_image_stack) for alignment
- Imagemagick for noise reduction
- Enfuse for stacking

All open source software.

My intention is to have a look at the following (Im open for suggestions):

1. Light and how to diffuse it.
2. Whitebalance.
3. Use jpg or raw => tiff
4. Best aperture to use
5. Use an extra aperture in the back of the Raynox.
6. Use cameras built-in teleconverter
7. Flash setting and shutterspeed

8. How to align images for noise reduction and superresolution
9. How to handle "inversed perspective"
10. Noise reduction with several images/step
11. Superresolution

12. Align images in the stack.
13. Use slabs
14. Impact of diffent step sizes.
15. Stacking parameters
16. "Stacking tactics"

17. Create scripts to do the stacking
18. Make a simple GUI to stack without a lot of manual steps.

Maybe a neverending list
:roll:

/Leif K
Last edited by skrylten on Mon Aug 22, 2016 12:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

1. Light and how to diffuse it.

Post by skrylten »

1. Light and how to diffuse it.

I have used the neck of a plastic bottle that fits nicely on the Raynox to diffuse the flash.

ImageImage

The light is a bit harsh and its really hard to get to the bottom part of the subject ( the head of a insect pin).

A bit of paper tissue on top of the "bottle" improved the light but its still dark at the bottom.

Image

The next and present solution is a "flashtrap" on top of a milkbottle.
It gives me a better diffused light and a more "even" light. There is still room for improvement but quite pleased with the result.

ImageImage

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Post by skrylten »

2. Whitebalance.

With the milkbottle as a diffuser all the images have a yellow tint. The images are of a part of the white milkbottle.

Here are examples of the Auto whitbalance followed by the different presets for whitebalance in the camera,

ImageImageImageImage

ImageImageImage

Then I tried a custom white balance but had to "manually" push the Blue curve to the right to match with the R and G curves.
This is the result:

Image

And here is an image of the pin head again, not made of gold anymore ...

Image

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Post by skrylten »

3. Use jpg or raw => tiff

I have never used the possibility to shoot raw files with the camera.
Here is a test to see the difference between JPG and RAW=> TIF and JPG.

From left to right crops 100 % (laser printed paper).

1. Best JPG settings in camera (file size 3,93 MB)
2. Best JPG setting with CHDK (3,93 MB)
3. RAW converted to JPG with DPP (Canons software) (5,71 MB)
4. RAW converted to TIF with DPP (Canons software) (68,8 MB)

ImageImageImageImage

I had no idea the difference would be that obvious.
I will start to shoot RAW :D

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Post by skrylten »

4. Best aperture to use

I have tried the available apertures at 4 different zoom settings.

Zoom 20 mm, from left to right: F5, F5,6, F6,3, F7,1, F8

ImageImageImageImageImage

Zoom 52 mm, from left to right: F5,6, F6,3, F7,1, F8

ImageImageImageImage

Zoom 98 mm, from left to right: F5,6, F6,3, F7,1, F8

ImageImageImageImage

Zoom 215 mm, from left to right: F6,5, F7,1, F8

ImageImageImage

I am really struggling to see any difference :? Maybe not enough difference from F5 to F8 ...

ChrisR
Site Admin
Posts: 8668
Joined: Sat Mar 14, 2009 3:58 am
Location: Near London, UK

Post by ChrisR »

My(smaller) Powershot's RAW converter is poor, too!

For the last row (215mm) it looks like the ISO got jacked up :?
The rest, it appears the smallest apertures works best. Surprising.

Your patience is admirable..
Chris R

Online
dolmadis
Posts: 899
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:51 pm
Location: UK

Post by dolmadis »

Hi

Your posts record an interesting journey.

Have you recorded the number of stacking steps you have used at the various zoom settings you have used to yield a good result and along the journey which ones may have introduced banding?

BR

John

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Post by skrylten »

Chris and John, thanks for your interest.

Chris: To me it seems impossible to get "sharp" images at full zoom. Usually I prefer built-in teleconverter with less zoom. The difference will hopefully be seen in one of the coming posts.

Regarding my patience. My wife has other words to describe it :shock:

John: I have not recorded the number of steps but it should be between 20 and 150 depending on the zoom setting. I have made a script in CHDK that calulates the steps depending on the camera settings (including zoom setting). I have not seen any problems with banding with this aproach. One test will be to see if different overlaps will make any difference in the resulting stack.
One problem with this setup is to make deep stacks. Sometimes the distance between closest focus and infinity focus is not enough to cover everything I want in focus.

/Leif K

Grahame
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2014 11:36 pm
Location: New Zealand

Post by Grahame »

Hi Leif,
Interesting to see what settings you get to make this camera work best for you.
For me
Raynox 250
ISO:80
f/ 7.1
The 2X teleconverter
Lens around 200 - 300 mm (for those that don't know these tiny sensor cams, this will fill the screen width with around a 9 mm wide subject), so not really true macro.
CHDK to give the super fine jpeg saving, personally I never found a noticeable difference in an end stack using raw.
But I do tend to use a different pp to most folks.
I find that a light denoise of all images before the stack gives a better final image to then work on.
Whatever if any image data is lost can easily be recovered in pp.
I use Topaz products in PS CS6
I find I can work at 2X (ie a 3 mm wide subject) with care, but that's more than I usually need and is definitely starting to get into diffraction land.
While they will never produce a dslr image it is surprising how good an image these little cams can produce.
Leif was kind enough to provide me with his CHDK script and email help a while back.
Unfortunately I never got it to run, I'm sure somewhere it is user error ... or just my camera.
It certainly works fine for him.
Currently I use a script for SDM, not a perfect solution as it crashes my cam regularly with no obvious pattern.
It does provide a good way of field stacking though, patience needed.
Will be interesting to see where your trials lead you :)

Online
dolmadis
Posts: 899
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:51 pm
Location: UK

Post by dolmadis »

Hi Grahame

I see that you use the SDM Script. I assume the Raynox Script.

David Sykes is on here and he has been helping me learn this.

I asked Leif if he had any info on banding on the SX50HS.
dolmadis wrote:Have you recorded the number of stacking steps you have used at the various zoom settings you have used to yield a good result and along the journey which ones may have introduced banding?
In order to help cut my own journey shorter do you have any data on this please?

Thanks

BR


John

Grahame
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2014 11:36 pm
Location: New Zealand

Post by Grahame »

Hi dolmadis
I see that you use the SDM Script. I assume the Raynox Script.
Yes the Number 1 setting for the 250
I asked Leif if he had any info on banding on the SX50HS.
I use 20 for the "camera step size" with the above settings.
Of course can't use the CHDK superfine

On my micrometer driven home stage 10 um gets me by with no banding at any usable mag.
That of course doesn't mean I don't use finer or that 20 um would and does work as well.

I just play and probably don't do the same thing twice in a row, that's how I learn.

Number of steps is related to the depth of the subject.
SDM for me anything from 3 to 20 something.
My home rig I've gone well over a hundred, just cos I could.

Anyway sort of hijacking Leif's thread.
Have fun playing dolmadis :)

Online
dolmadis
Posts: 899
Joined: Wed Dec 07, 2011 1:51 pm
Location: UK

Post by dolmadis »

Grahame wrote:Have fun playing dolmadis :)
Thanks for the input Grahame. Sure will.

John

David Sykes
Posts: 51
Joined: Mon May 02, 2016 2:04 pm
Location: North Wales,U.K.
Contact:

Post by David Sykes »

Hi Grahame.

I can only fix SDM problems if users report them.

Contact me on sdm_support AT btinternet DOT com.


David

Grahame
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Sep 30, 2014 11:36 pm
Location: New Zealand

Post by Grahame »

Hi David
Here's an original post of mine
http://sdm.camera/forum/viewtopic.php?f ... c8cf488de6
Have also pm you from there :)
I love open source stuff, I just figure folks are a tad busy so haven't hassled you here or on CHDK :)
I have nothing to add to the original post
But yes will drop you an email.
Again hijacking Leifs thread
Sorry mate

skrylten
Posts: 60
Joined: Fri Jan 03, 2014 1:41 pm

Post by skrylten »

Thanks for you interest !

Grahame, it still bothers me we didnt get my script to work for you :(
If you want to give it another try, just let me know. Maybe we didnt have all the camera settings the same.

Lets see what will be the best for me with the Raynox MSN-202 when I reach the end of this journey ...

Time for next test .

/Leif K

Post Reply Previous topicNext topic