Lily Timelapse

Lily Timelapse

This was another suggestion from George Lepp.  I bought the flower for Carol for no particular reason.  There was probably Freudian in that.  I always look for tight buds so it will last longer.  When I got it home and gave it to her, I remembered George's suggestion.  She, very graciously, allowed me to borrow them for a couple days.  Please look at it.  It is at the bottom.

The interval suggested was 3 minutes.  I used that.  I set it up on my work bench and than was afraid to change lighting in the room.  It took about one and one half days.  I used my old Logan light box for viewing slides as the light.  The whole arrangement was in a light cube which provided fill light.  I had an intervalometer for one camera and used CamRanger on the other camera.  I did not have rails so I could not gradually modify camera position.  I set my cameras for Large Jpegs.  I had in the back of my mind to make it in 4K, but was thwarted by AVS4U.  I used AVS4U Video editor to make the video.  I went to "edit, settings, edit" and set Image Duration to .042, which gives about the frames per second needed.

Since I was not using flash, I don't know why the lightness changes.  

I am looking for a better way to do this.  AVS4U did seem very unwieldy.  I spent the time waiting on it to move the images around looking for a solution.  George suggested two Mac solutions which did not me, the Windows guy.  His suggestions were:  Apple's QuickTime 7 Pro and Frosthaus' Sequence (frosthaus.com).  

George shared this idea in Outdoor Photographer, February, 2015, "Tech Tips".

I saw macro possibilities and may borrow the flowers back at a later time.

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Hawaiian Coral

Hawaiian Coral

I just had to get those terrible unsharp images out of my mind so I made these captures.  This is a 100 capture stack at 2.6X using a different lens.  Notice the sand grains in the openings. 

Did I mention that my son Chad and his wife Megan brought back this coral from their visit to Hawaii 2 years ago this March?  I am so pleased with it!

Hawaiian Coral

This is the same piece of coral where a part chipped off revealing the side view of the polyp openings.  A little animal, a polyp, lived in each of those openings.  The polyps secretee calcium carbonate to form their little "house".  Later generations will inhabit vacated openings adding to them using their secretions.

This is a 225 capture focus stack.

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Lens Only Focus Stack

Lens Only Focus Stack

Having eliminated the reverse lens and the coupler as culprits, I shot several stacks with the Sigma 180mm macro only.  The movement is not as easy to see but it is there.  I called Sigma and talked to Paul in the Support Department.  He said that the lens has a floating element which is part of the Optical Stabilization system.  It is controlled by two arms which move it and secure it when OS is "off".  Apparently, those are are not doing their job and allow the floating lens to float during these captures, causing the "un-sharpness".  I packaged the lens and shipped it back to Sigma where it is covered by a 4 year warranty.  I wonder if I bumped it on something sometime.

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Equipment Assembly Examination

Coral Camera Setup

I decided something must be wrong with my equipment.  As previously mentioned, I have mounted a wide angle lens, Sigma 10-20mm, in reverse on the Sigma 180mm macro to function as a closeup filter.  What could be wrong?  I first suspected the mounting coupler.

Lens Reversing Coupler

This coupler is made of two rings which tread together.  I looked for variances in the gap where it attaches.  The threads are very fine and delicate.  It is easy to cross thread them.  I even measured the thickness of the coupler around its circumference to screen the possibility of the cross threading between the two rings.  I found nothing wrong.

I disassembled the lenses and made some shots with the 10-20mm and could not see a problem.  I then decided I must check the 180mm, the last thing I would suspect.

I had been shooting with step small on the CamRanger and decided to continue with my tests of that lens using step small.

180 mm Focus Scale

I focused, using the focusing rail, from the closest focusing point, 1:1, and the CamRanger moved the focus outwards.  This is how far the focus moved during a capture of about 200 images.

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Lens Problems

Coral Camera Setup

As I continue to try to produce an acceptable image using this lens setup, I got the results shown below.

Coral Anti Chromatic Aberration Only

Coral Anti Chromatic Aberration Only

Coral Anti Chromatic Aberration Only

I had to consider the corrections I was making in Adobe Camera Raw.  Since two lenses are involved and the camera only writes data about the Sigma 180mm macro which shows virtually no need for distortion or chromatic aberration correction. The Sigma 10-20mm lens on the other hand, produces distortion and chromatic aberrations.  I was able to invoke corrections for that lens manually in Adobe Camera Raw.   I decided that the aberration correction must be ceased because we are looking through the lens backward.  I produced the above using only chromatic aberration correction.

Obviously this change did not produce the result I desired.  In the bottom, largest, opening of the coral, note the dark almost horizontal line's width.  I was noticing movement of the subject when none could be happening.  It did not seem to be a uniform amount.  I tried eliminating the captures where the movement was apparent and got these three images.  The movement did not cease!  

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