Video stacking software manual#
Video stacking software series#

(Quick aside: YouвЂ™ll struggle to focus stack scenes that feature moving subjects, which is part of the reason why portrait photographers, wildlife photographers, and street photographers rarely use this technique. If you donвЂ™t have a tripod, you can do handheld focus stacking, but youвЂ™ll need to maintain the composition as carefully as possible. Mount your camera on a tripod and carefully compose your photo. LetвЂ™s take a look at how the stacking process works, from shooting in the field to blending the images on the computer: Step 1: Pick your subject, choose a composition, and set your exposureДЇocus stacking starts by locking down a subject and a composition.

Photoshop (or another form of focus-stacking software).

An interchangeable-lens camera and a lens capable of focusing manually.

Video stacking software series#

A tripod, which will keep your composition consistent as you capture a series of images.

That said, I do recommend you invest in a few basic items: ( Shallow depth of field shots can look beautiful when done carefully!)ДЄs IвЂ™ve explained above, focus stacking is pretty easy to do, and you can focus stack with a smartphone camera and nothing else. You can take a single shot with a shallower depth of field and try to make the effect work. And you can narrow your aperture, but at a certain point, youвЂ™ll start to run into optical problems caused by diffraction.

Of course, you can always try to back up or use a wider lens, but that isnвЂ™t always feasible (especially if youвЂ™ve already chosen your composition). Your depth of field just wonвЂ™t be deep enough, and only parts of the shot will turn out sharp (while other parts will turn blurry). Specifically, youвЂ™ll run into depth of field problems when working with: And if youвЂ™re faced by a standard close-up subject such as a flower, you can back up slightly from your subject and narrow your aperture to get your desirable depth of field.Д«ut in a few situations, you wonвЂ™t be able to achieve a deep enough depth of field to keep the entire shot sharp (from the nearest foreground element to the most distant background element). If youвЂ™re faced by a sweeping landscape, you can choose a wide-angle lens and you can narrow your aperture that way, you can capture the entire scene in focus using a deep depth of field. In most situations, you can handle your depth of field requirements without focus stacking.

On the other hand, as you widen your lens, move away from your subject, or narrow your lens aperture, the amount of the scene thatвЂ™s in focus will increase. So as you zoom your lens, move closer to your subject, or widen your lens aperture, the amount of the scene thatвЂ™s in focus will decrease. Now, if youвЂ™re familiar with camera optics, youвЂ™ll know that the depth of field is affected by three key factors: In other words, focus stacking is only necessary if youвЂ™re faced with a scene that canвЂ™t be well handled by your camera setupвЂ™s current depth of field capabilities. When should you focus stack your photos?ДЇocus stacking is designed to overcome the limits of depth of field.

Video stacking software manual#

Note that focusing stacking doesnвЂ™t require fancy equipment, either you can focus stack with a standard camera (even a smartphone camera, in fact), though I do recommend you work with a tripod and a manual focus lens if you can, as I discuss in a moment.

You blend the images to achieve a final file that features a sharp foreground, a sharp middleground, and a sharp background.

You take several images of a scene, making sure to focus on each part (i.e., the foreground, the middleground, and the background).

While the concepts may sound tricky, the basic process is very simple: