Agapanthus--My first stacked image

[Mitch Haimov]

This agapanthus detail is my first attempt at focus stacking (I used Zerene Stacker). It is unfinished in that I didn't do anything to it other than resizing after exporting from ZS. Reason being: both stacking algorithms resulted in halos around the stamens, which was not a surprise. I tried following the advise in the second tutorial on Zerene website and running a second round of DMap with a high threshold to get the mask tight to the stamens, but no threshold setting would accomplish that for this image. When I try using the ZS retouching tools with input files as source images to paint away the halos I replace one artifact with another: I am able to paint in appropriate texture but that texture is tainted with the stamen colors because the input files include the OOF stamens in that area. (This version does not include that "tainted" retouching.) Anyway, the point of this long-winded post is to ask if anyone has suggestions regarding how to handle this. The success of this image is not particularly important to me--it was intended as a learning exercise so I can make my mistakes here rather than on an image I care about.

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5532/9155057037_303eb350cb_o.jpg

Canon EOS 7D, Canon 180 mm macro lens, focus stack from 45 images (each 0.5 sec at f/4). All I did was RAW conversion, combine and retouch in ZS, and resize. No Photoshop work, esp no sharpening, so the ZS results un-muddied. The halos are less visible at this image size.

All comments/critiques/suggestions always welcome. Thanks in advance for any ZS advise!

[Gary Esman]

Mitch, really like the colors here, summer time for sure. Great composition. I may try sharpening it just to see what it looks like. Gary.

[Mitch Haimov]

Thanks, Gary, I'll try that. It also occurred to me this morning to try a similar composition again at f/8 or f/11 so that stamens are not quite so OOF in the images where the rear petals are sharp. I guess I have some homework this weekend... :bg3:

[Dave Johnson]

Hi Mitch, having never tried a stacked image I can't offer any advise there but this looks pretty good to me! Loving the contrast of colour between subject and bkg. Super :)

[Steve Maxson]

Hi Mitch. Quite a nice mix of cool colors and well lit and composed. I've done a little work with Zerene Stacker, but haven't really gotten past the novice stage - so I can't help you with your issue. The result, as posted, does look pretty good in terms of the stacking.

[nick clayton]

The colours are very nice and the stacking seems to have worked a treat. Certainly worth a bit of USM, I know because I tried it Mitch :S3:

[Mitch Haimov]

Thank you all for the feedback! Sharpening made the image sharper (of course), but didn't help with the halos. Not too surprising as sharpening creates halos. Maybe my expectations are too high. The problem really does make sense when you think about what is happening in this process--when focused on a BG element you are essentially shooting through OoF FG elements, so there are areas that do not come out clean in any of the exposures. Tried a somewhat similar composition at f/8 and the halos were actually worse. I thought might be better because the blurred FG elements would not be spread out as far. Perhaps, although covering a smaller area, they were more opaque. Will keep experimenting as time and weather permit.