Helicon Tube?

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Lou Jost
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Post by Lou Jost »

Bill, Olympus has two stacking features, often confused. One is "focus bracketing" which just shoots a stack, in RAW + jpg or whatever you want. You have to do the stacking in outside software (which is easy since it makes the pictures in ordinary file formats). The other is "focus stacking" which only the newest cameras do (my PEN F does not). That processes the images internally. Like you, I would want more control than that would give.

By the way, I just did my first stack with my Nikon "mirrorless" camera (mirror is permanently taped in the "up" position) and it worked very well. Fewer vibrations to move my subjects, which are immersed in alcohol, gently anchored by K-Y jelly.

All it would take to bring focus bracketing to Nikon would be a tiny modification of the tether control programs, or even an external button-clicking program that could repeatedly click on a button in the Nikon control programs on your computer screen. Probably someone has done it already. Magic Lantern does do that for Canon (I think).

mjkzz
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Post by mjkzz »

Here is my 2 cents: my design was intended for the so called "burst mode" stacking in the field where you shoot continuously, limited by your camera's capabilities. I have seen beautiful spider images done this way, particularly those guys in Australia. I tried to use the following setup and practiced on some household subject, it works but too heavy. So, I designed the lens control thing.

The bottom line is, Helicon Tube might be very useful for this kind of work (burst mode stacking), all you have to do is aim at the subject and press shutter button (or in my case, a trigger switch), no moving parts (well, lens does focus).

Image

mjkzz
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Post by mjkzz »

another 2 cents: if Helicon Tube is designed in such way that it is independent of camera type, then it can be mounted on any other camera as long as the right camera mount is used. For example, it could be mounted on a Sony 7 with right mount and flange distance even though the lens is a Canon one, such as Canon EF 100mm or 180mm

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