I've been practicing with Helicon Focus (trial) for a couple of days now, and finally got a stack nearly the way I wanted it!
I used a Novoflex Castel-L rail on a tripod, flower on my studio table. Lighting was two Nikon SB-R200 macro strobes. 105 Micro-Nikkor on 36mm extension. 48 frames @ f6.3.
I had a lot of difficulty keeping the vibration under control, even with a Webster's unabridged dictionary hanging from my Gitzo 2530 tripod. I guess it's time to invest in a steel plate for a studio table!
Thanks to you all at Helicon!
One question: Is the Multi-core wort the extra cash? I'm currently running a dual-core AMD and anticipate that my next build will have at least two cores....
First sucessful stack!
Dan: I batch-processed the NEF files in Nikon Capture Editor, using Auto Brightness to correct for inconsistent flash output from my R200 macro strobes. I made no other changes before stacking in Focus. After fiddling around for a couple of hours, I finally got a decent stack, which I saved as a PSD. The Retouching tools in Helicon Focus allowed me to remove most of the blurring within the image, for instance, the calyx was nearly obscured before re-touching. I used PhotoShop CS2 for the final editing, increasing contrast, enhancing local contrast, and bumping the saturation a bit, all in Lab color mode. I removed the rather extensive halo using the clone and healing tools. After re-sizing for the web, I used a very small amount of Smart Sharpen and converted to sRGB for web display. All in all, I only invested about four hours in this image! First try; hopefully future stacks will go faster.
I still have a couple of weeks on this trial download, and I'm still up in the air about single or multi-core, but I will be purchasing.
I still have a couple of weeks on this trial download, and I'm still up in the air about single or multi-core, but I will be purchasing.