Hairy Moth 4 views

[JBW]

I switched my cameras focal point to single. It seems to cut down on the misplaced focus shots but it also seems to leave a little less of the shot in focus?


http://jbrianwaddington.files.wordpr...3.jpg?w=700&h=

http://jbrianwaddington.files.wordpr...3.jpg?w=700&h=

http://jbrianwaddington.files.wordpr....jpg?w=1000&h=

[Stagecoach]

Brian,

Reducing your 'focus points' to single will not make any difference to the amount (depth) you achieve within focus.

This image has limited depth of focus (or depth of acceptable sharpness) due to the aperture used which was f8. If you are unable to increase the aperture above f8 your only option to increase DoF is to move farther away from your subject.

Another thing to consider when you know you have very limited DoF is that rather than focusing at one end of, either the farthest or closest of the subject, is to focus at it's mid depth, but all depends upon the subject size.

Grahame

[JBW]

Brian,

Reducing your 'focus points' to single will not make any difference to the amount (depth) you achieve within focus.

This image has limited depth of focus (or depth of acceptable sharpness) due to the aperture used which was f8. If you are unable to increase the aperture above f8 your only option to increase DoF is to move farther away from your subject.

Another thing to consider when you know you have very limited DoF is that rather than focusing at one end of, either the farthest or closest of the subject, is to focus at it's mid depth, but all depends upon the subject size.

Grahame

And there be the problem, with macro or super macro it is F/3 or F/8. The size of this moth is such that it will simply not all be in focus.
B

[jcuknz]

Sounds like you ill have to practice focus stacking

One possible solution which I have never tried and doubt if would work on a zoom lens is a 'waterhouse stop' to obtain perhaps f/16 or f/22. a waterhouse stop is simply a disc with a small hole placed over the front of the lens but I fear with a zoom [which is a prime lens with adjusting lens elements in front of it [ in crude terms]] it would simple result in a vignette ....Waterhouse stops were how old time photographers controlled exposure before iris were invented ....I used it once for a prime lens which didn't have any aperture adjustment. Drilled holes in half-penny coins which fitted the lenshood neatly Coins painted matt black.
Note I am not that old but back then a half-pennyless photo student

If you have discount store with cheap reading glasses from 'the north' of you you could find that perhaps a one dioptre or 1.5D would enable you to use your zoom for tight framing from a distance of one metre or 66cm respectively and achieve what Grahame suggests. It would help us or me if I knew how close you can get without fuzzies at full zoom ... that expressed either in distance or dioptres would enable one to work out how much closer a CU lens would get you.

Frankly I have not tried this but working from what Grahame told us here and earlier it is worth finding out how close you can get at full zoom [ 580mm ] and how big a subject fills the sensor at that distance. From that info one could make a stab at suggesting a suitable powered CU lens [ for comparison my FZs with their 430mm lens fill the sensor with a 1.5 inch across subject when I use a 2 dioptre which brings me into 13<20 inches ]. This is with the aim for keeping as far back as possible and cropping [zooming] for the tight framing with as much Depth of Field as possible.

Note for the pedants .... Depth of Field is outside the camera and Depth of Focus is the equivalent inside the camera where the lens focuses Obviously Depth of focus is usually very much smaller than Depth of Field although many use the terms improperly .

[Geoff F]

With static moths, I always take a couple of shots, using a tripod, at different focus points then combine them. But I am manually focusing.

Otherwise, I think this is as good as you are going to get.

You have all the important bits in focus so I wouldn't worry too much about a slightly soft area of wing.

[JBW]

With static moths, I always take a couple of shots, using a tripod, at different focus points then combine them. But I am manually focusing.

Otherwise, I think this is as good as you are going to get.

You have all the important bits in focus so I wouldn't worry too much about a slightly soft area of wing.

So now the trick will be to get consistent.