A Focus Stacking Workflow For Lightroom And Photoshop

The Tip I Want In Focus

The Base Petals I Want in Focus

Focus Stacking
Have you ever taken a picture and wished you had enough depth of field so several things could be focus at the same time? An example is when you shoot a flower, you can focus on the edge of the petals, but the tip of the center will be out of focus. The same is also true if you focus on the center of the flower, the petals will then be out of focus. There is just no amount of depth of field that will carry focus in that situation. A tilt shift lens help a little, but your out of focus blur shifts from a front to back situation, to a vertical one. This focusing problem holds true for landscapes, bees, heck anything that you can focus on.

In the macro world they learned long ago to use a technique during capture called Focus Stacking. Focus Stacking a system used during capture that allows you to extend depth of field that is impossible any other way. There is even special software (Helicon is top of the food chain for this) to automate the focus stacking postwork process. The whole idea is to work from a tripod and to shoot an object that does not move. The idea is to work your way from one end of the object to the other, rotating the focus ring just a little at a time, ending up with a series of images that when processed will show your object completely in focus. It sounds complicated but it isn’t, it’s just tricky for me to explain in words.

There are special nodal and macro rails to insure you cover your object in it’s entirety. However, there is no need to take it that far in order for this technique to be an effective tool for your image making tool box. Heck you don’t even need a tripod in most cases, just be sure to shoot loose around the edges of the frame. The reason is, you’ll need to crop your final image in order compensate for any misalignment issues created during capture. Remember, no tripod equals framing issues, thank goodness we have Photoshop to save our butts.

In the video below, I shot a hand-held sequence of images of a hibiscus. All I wanted was to have the tip of the flower (stigma pads & pollen sax) to be in focus along with the base petals of the flower. I was able to focus stack only two images in order get the final image I was after. The whole time I was shooting, I envisioned two images, an old-looking black and white, and a 1970′s faded velvia saturated vivid color shot. I am not quite sure I was able to pull it off in post, but I am happy. Just remember I was not shooting this for a job, I was shooting it because I just liked the flower and was hoping to make a print.

Sometimes you just grab the camera and have some fun, even if it’s shooting a simple flower. If you are anything like me, you will feel uneasy with the world if you don’t have your camera in hand making a picture at least once in a day. Thanks for taking time to stop by today. I hope whatever it is you’re doing today is fun and exciting and this post was able to help in some way. Sincerely, Thomas Shue

Below are the two finished images of the flower. Sometimes I just have to get this stuff out of my head so I can move on. So, do ya think I was able to pull off my vision? I would love to hear from you.

The B&W From My Vision

The 1070″s Faded Velvia Vision

A Lightroom Button That’s Hidden In Plain Sight

Hey guys, today I want to show you a feature in Lightroom that has been hidden in plain sight since the day I started using the program. Before I tell you about it, I want to give credit where credit is due. Lightroom guru Matt Kloskowski of Kelby media recently was offering some Lightroom training and brought this feature to my attention. This feature is actually just a button, and it lives in plain view.

So what’s the name of this elusive button? It’s the button that says Previous on it. I am sure you have all seen it, heck it sits in plain view and just happens to be visible every single time you develop an image in Lightroom. With a name like Previous, it seems pretty obvious what it does right? Well if you think that, you would be wrong. I guess the reason I have never used the Previous button is because I use the ctrl+z (cmd+z on a Mac) instinctively as needed to step backwards. I mean its super silly to use a special button to undo/go back/return to the previous state when the same undo shortcut exists on every piece of software on the planet. What a worthless button… boy was I mistaken.

So what the heck does the Previous button do? Let me show you. Take a few minutes and watch the video below on how to use the, “Lightroom Button That’s Hidden In Plain Sight”. Thanks for taking time to visit today. I hope you have a great day. Sincerely, Thomas Shue

Auto Tone In Lightroom Is Not a Good Thing

Today’s post is to show you why the Auto Tone (automatically mess up your image) in Lightroom is not necessarily a good thing. Computers and software are great, they automate all sorts of mundane tasks in life. However having a piece of software automatically adjust the overall tone of your image is not necessarily a good thing. What Lightroom’s Auto Tone feature does is make any adjustment necessary to even and flatten out the overall tone of the image. It tries to even out the shadows (blacks) the mid tones and the highlights (whites). Note, this feature makes adjustments with zero regard with how it affects skin tone, affects contrast or increases noise.

A good image is one where the exposure renders (portrays) the subject as they actually are and has good tonal range. Tonal range is the relationship between the black and white point in an image. This means if you have something in the frame that is supposed to be black, it looks black, also if you have something in the frame that is white, it appears to be white. If you have both a something black and white in the same image, your image should represent it and would be one considered to have full range.

Auto Tone will never give you a true black or a true white point. Auto Tone is trying to eliminate a black and a white point in an image. Auto Tone is basically flattening out everything. You on the other hand need to make sure to set a proper black and white point (if one exists in the frame). As a photographer, you need to take full manual control in post to insure you have rendered the skin tone properly and set a black and white point if they exist. Remember your camera is not capable of creating an image that is full range (an image with a true black and true white). We expose our images making sure to not blow out the highlights, then we develop the blacks in post. Well that is what I do anyway.

Spend a few minutes to see exactly what I am talking about. I am quite sure you will agree that “Auto Tone In Lightroom Is Not a Good Thing”. Thanks for stopping by today. I hope your day is going well. Sincerely, Thomas Shue

Quick And Easy Lens Corrections Inside Lightroom

After Lens Correction

Before Lens Correction

Todays post is going to be short and sweet. Lightroom has so many great features and the one I will cover today is the lens correction controls. Lightroom has the ability to apply lens correction profiles automatically or you can take full artistic control. The way Lightroom is able to automatically apply the correct profile is by reading the image metadata. After Lightroom determines the lens that was used to make an image, it applies the correct profile from a database. These automated profiles do a pretty good job, however I like to take manual control and tweak things to my liking.

The distortion controls in Lightroom are pretty self-explanatory. However if you spend a few minutes watching the video below, I will show you exactly what I do to correct for any lens distortion. I hope that you find the information helpful and I hope you are having a wonderful day. Thanks for stopping by today. Sincerely, Thomas Shue

The Incredible Spot Healing Brush In Lightroom 5 Beta

Guys I have to say that Adobe has really done a kick but job with the updates in Lightroom 5 beta. The cool thing about a Beta is the fact it is free. You do not have to of ever owned Lightroom in the past ans you can still get the new Public beta, feel free to download it here. Since this post only covers the Spot healing goodness, feel free to read about all of the features here.

One of my gripes about Lightroom has always been the retouching features. I could get 80% of the way there during a retouch, bet then I had to do the heavy lifting inside Photoshop. Well not anymore, Lightroom does an amazing job with spot healing brush, almost like the performance from Photoshop but it is much easier to use. Now I am not going to be throwing rocks at Photoshop anytime soon, however I am extremely excited to play with Lightroom 5.

If you send a few minutes watching my video below, you can see for yourself why I am so darn excited.