The equipment I had with me:

Canon 1Ds Mark II, 100mm f/2.8 Macro Lens, 580EX II Flash with extension cable, 12, 20 and 36mm extension tubes, large and small silver and gold reflector, finally my Tripod.

• Lens extenders although make you be able to get in really close to a subject, like a sleeping bee (okay maybe it’s SLEEPING sleeping) you do lose your infinite focus. Remove all extenders before starting.
• Setup tripod and compose your shot, focusing back and forth until you have the shot you want.
• I tried a couple of different techniques to get the shot.

1. First, a multi-focus shot. This is very similar to doing a HDR or Exposure Bracket, where you take a couple of exposures based on different settings so that you can combine them later for a higher light to dark range.
   1. Focus on the moon, take a shot: 1/250^th @ f/6.3, ISO 100 – flash fired away.
   2. Without moving anything — refocus on the flower, take a shot: 1/250^th, @f6.3, ISO 100, Flash fired at flower from right.
   3. Combine the two images in Photoshop as two layers, and mask. I’ll redo the steps on how I did this in a post tomorrow.


Moon focus shot



Final image, combined in PS, finished in LR3



Flower Focus Shot

2. Second, a single shot trying to get as much as possible into DoF.
   1. I moved as far as back as I could. Increased distance to subject increases depth of field.
   2. Note that the moon’s focus is infinity.
   3. Focus on the flowers, and note the distance on the lens. Go half way between them, which were just about at the edge of infinity.
   4. Change aperture to f/32, as with the smaller the aperture the larger the depth of field.
   5. Take a single shot with flash pointing at the flowers, as right and higher as I could reach without pulling the camera.

Comparatively, a single shot at relatively faster speed at 1600 ISO will have less noise than 20 shots at a lower speed with ISO 100, stacked on top of each other.

Yes, I didn’t believe it either. It all has to do with the randomness of noise and how the sensor actually deals with the noise. The random effect that is produced and is doubled and duplicated during stacking will make produce an image that has more noise than if you had taken a single shot at a higher ISO. I’m sure there is a cross over point at which this is more prone and even more true, but I have not done enough testing and reading to be able to tell you what that is, but for now know that 1 shot at a higher ISO is usually less noise then a stacked of images at a lower ISO.

What determines what your depth of field is? Most think that the aperture size is the most important factor for the size of the field. This isn’t true at all.

The three factors that determine your depth of field are:

1. Your final focal length, by which I mean your lens’s focal length x your sensor magnifier.

   If you have a crop sensor, for example a 40D, your magnifier is a 1.6. So a 50mm lens is actually a 96mm lens.

   The factor is that the longer the focal length the smaller your depth of field is.

   Example: With everything else equal, a 50mm lens has a depth of field of 5 feet, but a 200mm lens at exactly the same situation will have 3.6 inches of depth.

2. The distance from you to the subject.

   How close the subject is to you is also a very important factor, or rather your focus point is the determining factor.

   The closer your focus point (past your minimum focusing distance) is to your lens the smaller the depth of field is going to be.

   Example: A 50mm lens focusing at a subject 8.6 feet away (100 inches) will have a depth of ~45 inches. If the same subject was moved closer to the lens, say 16 inches away the depth of field would be reduced from 45 inches to 1 inch.

3. Lastly, the aperture size of your lens.

   The last option is the size of your aperture, as the smaller the aperture is the more depth of field you will have. Same goes true for the opposite, the larger your aperture size is, the less depth of field you will have.

   Example: At f/7.1, the depth of field could be 1.3 feet. However at f/2.8 the depth is going to be reduced to 0.5 feet, and f/32 5.8 feet of depth.

This is also in order of most effectiveness, the longer your focal length the less the aperture size matters. Same is also true for the distance to subject and your aperture. The focal length and the distance to subject are just about neck and neck as far as importance. Both have a huge effect on the final result, however again the change in size of the focal length does more to effect the size of the field than the distance to the subject.

]]> http://www.tranquilphotos.com/blog/2010/what-determines-depth-of-field/feed 1 http://www.tranquilphotos.com/blog/2010/photoshop-12-0-1-update http://www.tranquilphotos.com/blog/2010/photoshop-12-0-1-update#comments Mon, 05 Jul 2010 22:22:23 +0000 admin http://www.tranquilphotos.com/blog/?p=326 In case you’re already running 12, there were some serious updates out.  You may want to check for updates.  I myself turn off all the adobe updaters so this was news to me.

The most significant fixes in the Photoshop 12.0.1 update include the following:

• A number of issues that could cause slow performance have been addressed.
• Top crashers found in the field have been addressed.
• 3D refractions, Ray Tracing and IBL workflows improved.
• Out of memory error opening some TIFFs has been addressed.
• A crash in Content Aware Fill has been addressed.
• Font related crashes have been addressed.
• Scroll wheel issue addressed.
• A number of user interface and workspace issues addressed.
• A number of painting issues addressed, including video layer issue.
• Droplet issues addressed.

http://www.tranquilphotos.com/blog/?p=326&preview=true

Please remember this is just my recommendations. This is the stuff that has or has not worked for me in the past. There is a better than good chance that you walk away with no photographs of a hummingbird. That’s just the way wildlife photography is. Out of maybe 1500 attempted bird shots (2126 frames, which I imagine about 500 are nature and macro shots) that I’ve shot at the sanctuary, I can honestly say I kept about 100 of them, and only like 6 of them. Only one has ever been sold or won anything. So keep all that in mind.

Why the hardware limitations, and what they mean:
Let me explain what has worked best for me:
I’ve tried it every which way, I even tried hand holding a 200mm f/2 lens once. That was not a fun day

You setup your camera on your tripod, and setup your exposure, white balance, lock in your aperture and shutter speed, you prefocus your lens and basically setup on a particular flower.

Now you sit there, and wait somewhat quietly AND WITHOUT ANYONE moving around, with your remote control in hand. Sooner or later the hummingbird comes to the feeder and when the feeder is not there they go for the most available flower. You click away until the bird leaves.

Why the distance:
Hummingbirds are extremely skittish and fast as lightning. What we have to do is NOT be a danger to them.

• Movement is danger. That’s why you don’t want to swing your lens around from flower to flower.
• If you’re too close you’re a danger. That’s why we’re going to sit far away.

Why the limitations on the short lenses:
These birds are small, inches as a mater of fact. If you’re 10 feet away, and you’re trying to photograph a bird that’s 2.5″ long and moving like greased lighting you need something at least in the vicinity of filling a 1/5th of the frame up with that bird to even get a chance of a decent picture. To give you an idea. Put two DD batteries on top of each other (AA will do in a pinch ). Now go stand 10 feet back. Now try to compose a shot with a 200mm lens. That’s what you’re shooting.

You should actually bring a macro lens and a wide angel lens with you, just in case the birds don’t show up. That’s what is left to shoot there if no birds come.

Back to the suggestions:

WITH OUT flash:
1) Lens, focus on the flower you are setting up at, change your lens’ focus to “Manual Focus”. LOCK down your tripod.
2) White balance, (or just shoot RAW). The side of the 2nd building is pretty close to white, you can use that as your base.
3) Av, or Manual mode
4) F/Stop — f/11 (f/7.1 works as well) is a good starting point. == Why @ 9 feet a 300mm on a crop body at f/11 gives you Depth of field of 1″. Which is 0.5 inches in the back and 0.5 inches in the front of your subject.
5) In Manual — go for Shutter Speed, the maximum you can do. If you’re shooting RAW you can under expose by 1 stop and still bring it back with a little noise. When in doubt go for higher speed to freeze the bird. Don’t even imagine that you’ll freeze the wings this way. You won’t. Not even at 1/8000th.
6) If you have high speed drive, switch to it. You want the camera to take as many shots as it can as you press down on the remote.

WITH flash:
1) Lens, focus on the flower you are setting up at, change your lens’ focus to “Manual Focus”. LOCK down your tripod.
2) White balance, (or just shoot RAW). The side of the 2nd building is pretty close to white, you can use that as your base.
3) Manual Mode on the Camera
4) F/Stop — Start out @ f/7.1 and take a test shot after all of the setup is done and close down until you have a good histogram.
5) Shutter Speed – doesn’t really matter, but if it’s a nice day out go to your maximum sync speed. This is usually 1/200th or 1/250th. This will reduce the sun’s output as much as it can.
6) For the flash power, if you use the flash go to 1/4th power. If you use the camera, start off at -1 1/3 FEC. You want a tiny little flash to go off to freeze the bird that’s it. Increase/decrease based on the output of the histogram and the amount of light from the sun. The more sun is present, the more power you need to freeze the bird. Why? HIGHER POWER = slower recharge time. The slower you can shoot. Last thing you want is your flash to shutdown from the heat.
7) If you have a better beamer, use it. This is exactly the scenario it was designed for. Remember that you have to be using a 300mm or longer lens for it to work.

I’m not going to go into detail on why the Better Beamer is a good choice here, but you can do a search on the web and see thousands of articles on it.

I’ll be happy to answer any questions, on anything above or any other questions you may have.

P.S. FEC = Flash Exposure Compensation, EV = Camera Meter Exposure Compensation (two different things)

Amaryllis Farm Equine Rescue and Sanctuary

The butterfly room does have an additional charge of $3 for viewing/photography and if you like to use a tripod: $10.