Digital BW, The Print

Ah, the ghosting problem.  Yes it appears occasionally.  Sometimes, in PS CS4, I look over the final composited result and drag an exposure that has that ghosted area clear and sharpas a layer into the composite, set up a mask and paint the needed pixels into the composite.  That works some of the time.  Sometimes I just composite in HF 2 or 3 exposures at the problem point.  If that works then I drag the result into the master composite, mask it and paint.  If nothing seems to work I throw it away.  I look at the process as getting a picture that I never would have gotten anyway so if I lose a picture I feel sad but I don't cry a lot.
   HF has a Pro version which I don't have.  It's twice as much.  That is supposed to help with touch-ups.  CS4 has a blending focus facility which I have never used.  I have seen a review comparing HF to CS4 where the reviewer felt that HF was better but the review was preliminary and an in-depth review has not been published.  If you or anyone else has info on 'blending focus' in CS4 please pass it along.

BertGF



--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Michael King <drmrking@...> wrote:
>
> Bert,
> 
> How do you deal with the ghosting problems that result from the image size
> changing slightly as you change focus?
> This is the big problem I found with Helicon macro work. Maybe its dependent
> on the type of lens focusing (IF or whatever)?
> I know they now support masks but fiddling with masks starts to get much
> more work.
> 
> Mike
> 
> 2009/7/21 bertgf <bertgf@...>
> 
> >
> >
> > Paul,
> > I have been using Helicon Focus for years. I commonly expose 6 and up to 30
> > frames. I have been very pleased with the results. I photograph flowers
> > exclusively.
> > Although I have ALWAYS used a tripod HF would not work acceptably when I
> > was scanning film. The registration was not good enough. Using a digital
> > camera it works fine most of the time. There cannot be any movement in the
> > subject (I work exclusively with macros of flowers where a slight breeze is
> > a storm). If the depth of field is too deep and/or steep HF loses control/
> > goes haywire or whatever.
> > Compositing of pictures used to take me something like 6-20 hours. Now with
> > HF I can watch each composite taking place, see which exposure might be
> > throwing it off and have the result in less than 30 seconds.
> > I have emailed with the developer in the Ukraine but do not have a personal
> > relationship with him. However I feel he has a tremendous product.
> >
> > BertGF
> >
> > P.S. On my website www.cameraflora.com the lower galleries are all done
> > with a digital camera and HF.
> >
> >
> > --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com<DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint%40yahoogroups.com>,
> > "pr_roark" <pr_roark@> wrote:
> > >
> > > (I hope this is not too off-topic.)
> > >
> > > I've been experimenting with Helicon focus, a program that will combine
> > multiple images that were focused on different points of the subject. I have
> > combined frames manually in Photoshop to get better depth of field in my
> > landscape images for some time. I'd tried an earlier version of Helicon and
> > had decided not to used it, but Luminous Landscape published a good review
> > of the latest version. There is a free trial period for Helicon software.
> > So, giving it a test drive is reasonably easy.
> > >
> > > The image I tried today (and gave up on) was composed of 2 focus zones
> > and taken with the Canon 5d2, 35 mm lens.
> > >
> > > The problems included artifacts in the sky and moving the detail of the
> > image around such that the artifacts could not easily be cured by cloning in
> > information from the original scenes. The details were also noticeably
> > softened at 100%.
> > >
> > > Earlier, I'd tried a shot with moving water in it. These types of
> > programs usually have trouble with that too, and it did.
> > >
> > > So, it's back to manual work. While 2 images are not too bad to stitch
> > together, more is a pain.
> > >
> > > Paul
> > > www.PaulRoark.com <http://www.paulroark.com/>
> > >
> >
> >  
> >
> 
> 
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>