I recently blogged about my winter project of shooting agaves locally.  In prepping for this shoot, I wanted to make sure the entire plant was in focus, and I knew using my depth of field table, that it was essentially impossible using my 24-105/4 lens:

• The example I’ll use in this post was shot from a distance of ~2 feet at a focal length of 47mm and aperture of f/10; using my Canon 30D, my total depth of field is 0.2 feet.  That isn’t nearly enough to get the entire agave in focus.

To circumvent this problem, I wanted to take multiple exposures at different planes of focus then blend them in Photoshop to produce an image that is entirely in focus.  The problem I was having is that by doing it manually, I couldn’t find a self-feathering method to make the blend look “clean”.  Fortunately Photoshop CS4 has an image blending feature that mostly automates the process for you.  I’ll describe my experience using one of my agaves as an example.

The first step was to take the shots.  I composed the shot like I normally would, and took one or two tests to make sure the amount of fill flash looked about right.  To get the proper diffusion, I taped a piece of white printer paper to my 430EX and underexposed by ~ -1.5 stops EV.  After the shot looked “right”, I took three exposures, each one at a different plane of focus:

While these three images do not look much different, you can see subtle differences; by looking at the main floret protuding from the plant, you can see that it is increasingly out of focus as you scroll through the images.

Once I got home, I converted the RAW files in a way that looked good to my eye; when you are working with multiple exposures, make sure to ‘synchronize’ all of your adjustments so all your shots look the same!  This is easy to do in ACR.  Then, I opened the files in Photoshop CS4.  The first step is to load the files into a stack and align them.  You can do this by going to File–>Scripts–>Load Files into Stack

Select the option “Add Open Files”, and check the box that says, “Attempt to Automatically Align Source Images”.  This will load your base images into the script, and will align the images, because even if you shot from a tripod (using mirror lock-up) there will be some slight differences between the images.

Once the script runs, you will want to select all three layers on the layers palette and go to Edit–>Auto-Blend Layers…

Select the option to stack the images and make sure the “Seamless Tones and Colors” box is checked.  This will produce a perfectly feathered and mostly blended image using your base images.  At this point, I suggest you inspect the image at 100% to make sure it is indeed perfectly blended.  On some images, the script has done a great job, and on others I’ve had to reload some images as separate layers and mask off the “in focus” part.

Even if it doesn’t work perfectly, this method will get you most of the way there.  If you like the result, you can flatten the image and edit as you normally would.

Agave attenuata, blended and converted to black and white

There are times you may not necessarily need to use this method; for instance, sometimes simply stopping down to f/16 or f/22 may get you the depth of field you need, but remember, as you stop down, you are losing resolution.  Thus, shooting at a wider aperture and blending exposures can be beneficial if you plan on printing the image.

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I’ve been a huge fan of Kinesis Photo Gear for quite some time.  Almost since I began taking photographs, I’ve used their belt system, with several interchangeable bags to carry my camera body, lenses, and binoculars.  However, I find myself facing two problems.  The first is that I am hiking further and further to get photos, and the second is that I simply don’t have room on that belt to fit my ever-growing stash of loot.  In an effort to not have to buy all new bags, I looked to see what Richard Stum had cooked up over at Kinesis.

What I found was the Journeyman Pack.  I ended up getting it as a Christmas present last year, and since I have had 2 months to put it through its paces, I wanted to share some thoughts.

Kinesis Journeyman Pack

Making the transition from the belt system to the backpack was very easy.  First of all, my hip belt became the belt for this backpack.   To use your belt with the pack, you will need an adapter, but they provide this free when you order the backpack.  Inside of the backpack, there are plenty of loops and webbing–and you can purchase elevator adapters–to use existing Kinesis pouches inside of the pack itself.  I went ahead and bought a front-loading module to provide a padded space for all my expensive equipment, saving my less padded pouches for filters, batteries, etc.

Interior of my Journeyman Pack

This pack is very well built, and is ready to take on the most rigorous of backcountry hikes.  It has heavy-duty YKK zippers (things I always blow out on gear) and is made of heavy-duty Cordura nylon.  The harness system is also very comfortable.  The pack rides very well, and it moves with you almost seamlessly.  I tend to hike fairly quickly, so that’s an important feature for me.  I’m also a klutz, so its double important!  Seriously, after having worn countless backpacks over the years, I’d even say this pack is the best fitting one I’ve worn.  It really is that good.

Harness of the Journeyman Pack

I’m not receiving any kickbacks from Kinesis for writing this review, nor did they solicit me to write it, but yeah, this pack really is that good.  Despite my raves, I do have a few small nits.

The first isn’t really a nit of the pack itself, more about the convenience of a backpack in general.  Even though I love the pack, I very much miss the hipbelt when I’m in the field.  This isn’t so much a problem if I’m shooting in one spot, or even in an area, as I can put the pack down and wander around, coming back to get a filter or switch lenses if I need to.  However, there are times when its not convenient to put the pack down, such as shooting on sand dunes, or when you’re standing in 2 inches of water at Badwater Basin.  For those times, I wish I had the hipbelt system.  That said, I came up with a fix for the problem.  I also bought a tripod pouch (which I’ll talk about below) so I can hang my tripod off the back for hiking long distances.  What I did recently was after I set up my tripod, I moved the pouch around to the front of the hipbelt, and hung it from the loops that are still available.  I filled the pouch with another lens and some filters, thus allowing me to change lenses or filters without having to put my backpack down in the sand.  I just had to keep sand out of the tripod pouch!

I may pick up another pouch just for that purpose.

As I mentioned I bought a padded tripod pouch, and I really like it.  By putting the head in the pouch, it keeps my center of gravity low, which for klutzes like me, is absolutely essential.  It works very well, but I notice I get a lot less bounce when I have a jacket or something in the top part of the pack to help fill up the empty space.

I think I’m off for a hike.  If you’re in the market for a new backpack, I hope you found this review helpful.

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In my last post, I discussed a few techniques that can be used to effectively shoot panoramas.  All of my examples were of grand landscapes, and they were all landscape-oriented panoramas.  I want to use this post to point out another time you can shoot panos to yield great results.

Last November, we visited the Cedar Mesa area near Blanding, Utah.  Since we were limited on time, we chose to visit a familiar and often photographed Ancestral Puebloan ruin that’s been nicknamed the “House on Fire” (also called the Flaming Roof ruin).  I blogged about that visit here, in November.  While at the ruin, I envisioned someday wanting to print it very large, and wished I had a medium format camera with me.  Additionally, I really wanted to emphasize the “flames” exiting the roof of the ruin.

So, I took 3 landscape-oriented images, but rather than putting them next to each other, I stacked them on top of one another,  thus producing a larger image.  If you click on the image, you’ll see a larger version–the detail is amazing!  That said, it would look even better printed on canvas over your couch

"House on Fire" vertical panorama, Utah, November 2009

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As a photographer, or even a nature lover, you’ve probably stood staring at a wide vista wondering how you can possibly do that view justice in your photographs.  Maybe you’ve even wanted to be able to print that picture large to give a room in your home the same feel as actually standing there.  Have you ever thought about taking multiple images of a scene and stitching them together into a panorama?

Shooting “panos” has become more popular in the last few years with the advent of point-and-shoot digital cameras that stitch the image in-camera for you, but if you want to shoot a panorama with your SLR, there are some things to consider.  First, and this should be a no-brainer, pick something interesting to shoot.  It may look impressive as is, but if you pick out something with substance, it will look even better!

So you’ve got your vista picked out.  Now what?  In my experience, the key to producing quality panoramas is making sure your tripod is level.  If this is the case, you will have much better luck at the stitching process.  I have used two different methods to level my gear; the first is via a 2-stop process that’s super cheap.

My tripod does not have a built-in bubble level, so I start by removing the head, and placing a bubble level (~$3 at Ace Hardware) on the tripod.  Tinker with the lengths of your tripod legs until you level the tripod.  Now, put your head back on, and you’ll see that it can rotate on a level base.

By removing the head and using a spirit bubble level, I can make sure my tripod head is rotating on a level base.

The second, and more recent, method I’ve used is by putting a leveling base on my tripod.  I use the Manfrotto 438 leveling base, but other companies like Acratech also make them.  They’re more expensive than my first method, but they’re way faster and you don’t have to fiddle with your tripod legs.  To level your camera on your tripod use a hot shoe level like the Jobu Designs Dubble Bubble level.

My tripod head can be leveled easily and quickly using the Manfrotto 438 leveling base.

After leveling my tripod head, I level my camera on the tripod using a hotshoe level.

OK, now you’re level.  The rest of the pano practically shoots itself.  I usually work from left to right, making sure to overlap my images by anywhere from ~1/3-1/2.  This makes for a lot of images (many of mine are 12-15 images) but you’re almost sure to get a better stitch at the computer.

A couple of other things to consider before we discuss stitching:

• To shoot vertical or horizontal…that is the question.  In stitching, you’re almost guaranteed to lose a little of the top and bottom of your images because the software will correct for barrel distortion.  Because of this, I almost always shoot my panos in a vertical orientation.  That way I’m left with an image that is a little more proportional, instead of something VERY long and skinny!
• Just like with any shot, sharpness matters.  When I shoot panoramas, I almost always use a cable release and set my camera to shoot in mirror lock-up mode.  This reduces any possible vibration, hopefully ensuring a better stitch.
• Do not change your focus or any camera settings while shooting your panorama.  However, consider bracketing your shots.  That way you have more to work with at the computer, and you can even consider making an HDR panorama (let’s save that for another blog post, please).
• I haven’t addressed the problem of parallax yet.  Unless you are rotating on the nodal point of your lens (or using a pano slider), you will have parallax issues if anything in your pano is closer than ~10-15 feet.  The cheap solution is to make sure trees, rocks, etc are further than ~10-15 feet from my camera, and that seems to work to subdue parallax.  The obvious downside to my method is that you’re constrained as to your compositional choices.

So, now you’ve got your image files, and you’re back at the computer.  Can you simply align them in Photoshop manually, then crop the canvas down to its final size?  I think this works for most people ~1% of the time (I’ve managed to do it once, and I’m 99% sure it was dumb luck).  Every other time, the barrel distortion, as well as other factors, will necessitate the use of software to help you stitch your images together.

Dumb luck. I stitched this 4-image pano together manually--I've never gotten it to work since.

For stitching panoramas, I use the software package Panorama Factory.  I like it because it has a fully automatic mode, which should work really well if you leveled your rig properly and provided enough overlap between images.  Alternatively, Panorama Factory allows for various levels of manual stitching, letting you define stitching points, and for the occasional difficult to stitch image, I like that mode a lot as well.  If you are interested in shooing HDR panoramas, Panorama Factory will stitch different sets of exposure identically so they overlay perfectly.  I have to admit that I’ve tried this once, and it didn’t work quite as smoothly as I’d like.  I’ve found that using the auto-align feature in Photoshop CS4 works well before blending images.

So, that’s basically it.  This tutorial was meant to get you taking beautiful panoramas using a minimal amount of equipment.  I hope you enjoyed it.  Feel free to add to the comment section if there’s anything I missed, or needs corrected.  Hope you can find this useful!

An 11-image panorama of the Ritter Range, Sierra Nevada, California

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If you ask my wife, patience is not one of my virtues.  I usually want instant solutions to problems, and you do not even want to be around me at Christmas (little kids have nothing on me!).  However, in photography, I tend to have significantly more patience.  I’m happy to wait several hours for a shot, and lately I find myself sitting on images for days, weeks or even months before processing them.  This potentially has a lot of benefits: it helps us assess their artistic value without the excitement of having fresh images hang over our head, and it also forces us to be patient and thorough in post-processing.

The image I processed tonight benefitted from my waiting, I think.  I took this panorama of Tuolumne Meadows, in Yosemite National Park, last August, but I haven’t processed it until tonight.  Once I got home, I wasn’t really excited about the way it looked.  But, tonight, that golden light on one of my favorite meadows made me wistful for the high country, as well as letting me look forward to summer.  This is a 10-frame panorama of the meadows; I processed each RAW file 3 times, at -2/3, 0, and +1/3 EV then combined them in Photoshop using the blending technique recently described by Younes Bounhar.

I’m pleased with the result; clicking on the image will link you to a larger image file so you can more fully appreciate the detail here!   I love panoramas because they really bring you into the scene.  Enjoy!

Tuolumne Meadows panorama, Yosemite National Park, California, August 2009

Click here to see all of my Yosemite National Park images.

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A friend of mine in Laramie Wyoming reported snow yesterday; here in southern California we’re baking in nearly 100 degree temperatures, but that means that insects are still out, and I can still photograph them!  One of my favorite insects is the sphinx moth.  Sphinx moths are a family of moths (Sphingidae) comprising about 1,200 species; the white-lined sphinx moth (Hyles lineata) is very common here in southern California.

White-lined sphinx moth, 2009

I caught this individual flying around in my garage one evening (they’re nocturnal).  After catching it, I did what any good biologist would do: I put it in the fridge.  Why?  Because I wanted to do what any good photographer would do: take pictures of it.

After letting it cool down, I placed the moth on some vegetation in my front yard.  Using my 300/4 lens with a 1.4x teleconverter, I was able to fill most of the frame with the moth at the minimum focusing distance.  I used a flash with -1 2/3 stops compensation to act as a fill flash.

Moths–like all insects–are ectotherms, meaning they are “cold-blooded”.  In other words, they have to derive their body heat from somewhere other than metabolic sources.  You and I are endotherms–we produce our own body heat via our metabolism.  So, as this guy warmed up from being in the fridge it started to move around more and more.  But, it still needed more heat to be able to fly.  That’s when things got interesting.

Ectotherms have to derive their body heat from external sources (usually the environment–this is why you see lizards and snakes sunbathing), but sphinx moths display something called ‘periodic endothermy’–they flap their wings at a very rapid pace to build enough body heat to be able to fly:

White-lined sphinx moth beating wings in a display of ‘periodic endothermy’, 2009

Beating the wings in this manner generates a large amount of heat, which can then be used for flight.  This moth displayed this behavior for about 3 minutes, then took off.  It was a great interaction, a good physiology lesson, and I got some great pictures out of it!

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In hindsight this seems like a no-brainer, but since its come up in a few threads recently (e.g. http://www.naturescapes.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=162031 ), I thought I would address the question of whether its better to feed a TIFF or RAW file into Photomatix for HDR generation. For this comparison, I chose to tone map only one image, not several. Although you probably already know the outcome, the end images are only subtly different, but getting there was quite different.

I started with a base image, shot in Zion National Park last weekend:

This is the RAW image; all I did before feeding it into Photomatix was adjust the white balance to “shady” in DPP. The TIFF image looked identical; all I did was save it as an uncompressed TIFF with no other change. As soon as I opened the RAW image in Photomatix, it underwent a process of demosaicing and decompressing. I could already tell that it would be taking advantage of the “extra” info in the RAW image. It opened the image as a “pseudo-HDR” image, and I was able to obtain some stats on it:

The TIFF image opened simply as the TIFF image, and there was no more information associated with it than with a regular image. I first tonemapped the images using the Details Enhancer algorithm, and saved them as TIFF files for use in PS. There wasn’t much difference between the two:

Here’s the RAW file tone mapped with DE:

And the TIFF file tone mapped with DE:

Then I did the same thing using the Tone Compressor algorithm:

The RAW file:

And the TIFF file:

Whoa! I can only assume this funky-looking image is the result of the loss of information during conversion from RAW to TIFF early in my workflow. So, now I have 2 tone mapped images obtained from the original RAW file, and 2 from the original TIFF file. My workflow for each of the 2 final images was slightly different although not much:

For the RAW-derived images I used the DE tone mapped image as the base image in PS, and pasted the TC image over it. I used the Overlay blending mode at ~30% opacity, and the image looked pretty good. I did levels and curves adjustments (and also a desaturation of about -15), noise reduction with Imagenomic Noiseware, then some sharpening and I called it good:

For the TIFF-derived images, I again used the DE tone mapped image as the base image, and pasted the TC image over it. This time, because of the extreme nature of the TC image, I used a “Linear Burn” blending mode at about 25% opacity, and the image looked pretty natural. After normal processing (including noise reduction), here is what I got:

In the end the differences between the images are subtle, and I like them both for different reasons. The RAW-derived image looks more “natural”, but I sort of like the reddish “glow” that’s present in the TIFF derived image. The no-brainer here is that you certainly lose a lot of valuable information by using TIFF instead of RAW for this sort of application.

I doubt anyone cares as much as I do (haha), but this was an instructive exercise to go through.

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Last week, Juan Pons gave some great wildlife photography tips on the Outdoor Photo Gear blog.  If you’re just getting started in wildlife photography, these tips will be invaluable to you.

However, as I was reminded the other night, even if you’ve been doing this a while, these tips will be invaluable to you!

As I last blogged about, there are some fantastic nighttime wildlife photography opportunities out there, if you know where to look.  However, because you’re fumbling around in the dark, its important to keep tabs on your gear.  When we were shooting kangaroo rats the other night, I found that I could use a little more light:

While this image is pretty good, I wanted a little more light on the scene.  So, I set my flash to give just a little more “oomph”.  Despite my adjustments, my next shot looked like this:

Wait…what?!?  I set my flash to give 2/3 stop MORE light–not less!  What happened?  Well, after I made my adjustment, I was futzing with the spotlight and other things, and I accidentally twisted my thumb wheel, inadvertently changing my aperture from f/8 to f/16!!

While my mistake wasn’t disastrous to the whole evening, something tiny like this could easily ruin a once-in-a-lifetime shot.  So, Juan’s advice is sound: check your camera’s settings often.  It just might make the difference between an awesome shot, and one you will eternally kick yourself for.

After resetting my aperture to f/8, my adjustments seem to have worked:

Sweet!  Much better.  Thanks for the gentle reminder, Juan.

I would also add a 6th point to Juan’s list: try new things.  If you have the opportunity, try shooting your subject at more than one aperture or exposure–you might be glad to have the options back home at your computer!

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If you’ve done much photography/camping/hiking/being outside at all, you’ve surely heard all of the nocturnal critters starting their nightly rounds shortly after the sun goes down.  Have you ever wondered who is out there?  Seeing them isn’t all that hard, but photographing them can be a little challenging, and often downright hilarious!

Last night, a friend and I went to the University of California’s Motte-Rimrock Reserve, near where we live.  The Motte is prime habitat for Stephen’s kangaroo rats, Dipodomys stephensi.  However, life for kangaroo rats is hard: they have to contend with rattlesnakes, owls (both great-horned and barn) as well as photographers with big cameras trying to take their picture!

Our method was pretty simple.  We scattered a little bird seed near the rats’ burrows and waited for them to find it once the sun went down.  It didn’t take long; within about 20 minutes after dark, “k-rats” were bombing the bird seed from the safety of their burrow.  Seated about 20 feet away, my friend and I waited with a bright flashlight and our cameras.  

Once a rat was comfortable with our presence, one of us would spotlight it, and the other one used the light to autofocus on the rat, and fired:

Stephen’s kangaroo rat, 2009

Its not too bad of a system to take turns doing this, and doesn’t take a lot of extra equipment.  I shot my frames at f/8, ~1/60 of a second–it doesn’t really matter though because the flash will freeze the action.  

After you get bored with the k-rats, its nice to look for other critters.  While owls were flying around, they weren’t being conducive to being photographed.  But, like I said, there are other creatures who seek k-rats.  Locally we have a fairly large population of red diamond rattlesnakes (Crotalus ruber).  

We found this fellow curled up alongside the dirt road, about 20 feet from us.  It was clearly waiting for a meal:

Red diamond rattlesnake, 2008

The snake was very compliant, and gave us about 15 minutes to photograph it before it had had enough, and slithered back into the bushes.

After appreciating the creatures of the night, we headed home, allowing them to resume their nightly routine.  Its always nice to experience new wildlife, it is important to make your impact as little as possible.  No photograph is worth endangering an animal.

So, get out there and look at your favorite wilderness area in a whole new “light”!

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Yesterday, I outlined one of the biggest problems with HDR photography I’ve encountered since venturing down that road a couple of months ago: the dreaded halo.  The “fix” of getting around it is surprisingly simple, and I’ll walk you through it with an image I recently edited:

Sunrise, Joshua Tree National Park, California, January 2009

This is a 3-shot HDR that I processed just last week, after getting the courage to try HDR.  You might be asking why I’m not following through on the image I showed you yesterday.  Well, in the interest of full disclosure, I still haven’t processed it.  However, I will follow the same workflow on that image as for this one. 

I won’t post the source images, but I will post the tone mapped images.  For my workflow, I generally follow Royce Howland’s suggested settings  for both the DE and TC methods of tone mapping.  With that said, here is the image tone mapped using the DE algorithm:

There is some lens flare that I’ll later clone out, but do you see the halo around the joshua tree?  That light purple line all the way around the whole thing?  That’s what we want to get rid of.  Other than that, this image doesn’t look too bad; its lacking some midtone contrast, which is also characteristic of the DE tone mapping algorithm in Photomatix.

Now let’s look at the other tone mapped image, the one done using the TC algorithm:

What do you see?  First you see that its very contrasty–almost too contrasty–especially compared to the other tone mapped image.  However, what you don’t see is the halo!  The TC tone mapping algorithm does not give you a halo.  Good.  Now, we can open these two images in Photoshop and pick apart the best of both tone mapping methods.

I like to use the DE tone mapped image as my base image, and I copy and paste the TC image over the top of it.  The next step–the crux of this workflow–is to choose a blending mode for the TC layer that–at least mostly–eliminated the halo in the DC image.  I’ve had pretty good luck with Overlay, Color Burn, and Linear Burn, but probably the most success in Overlay.  Overlay multiplies the dark areas and screens the light areas, and logically would be good for eliminating the halo.  

Once you’ve settled upon a blending mode that looks more or less “natural”, you will need to adjust the opacity slider to make it look even better.  On this image, I settled for 35% opacity.  

I hate to be anticlimactic, but once you’re done blending these two layers, you’re pretty much done and can edit the image like normal.  There was a little halo still left at the top of the joshua tree, so I selected the inverse of the tree and just closed the sky to look less halo-ish.   In addition, I cloned out some lens flare, and applied noise reduction (I use Imagenomic’s Noiseware).  Other than sharpening and levels/curves I didn’t do much to it.  One thing I’ve found is that I don’t have to apply much saturation to HDR images–they look pretty good as is.

I hope that this has been helpful, and that you find it useful.  I’d love to hear feedback as you try this method with your own images!

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