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Focus Stacking and Bracketing Technique for Marco Jewelry Photography

Watch this photography tutorial video to learn how to create amazingly sharp macro and jewelry images using focus bracketing photography technique and focus stacking tool in adobe photoshop CS5.
Article By Alex Koloskov Video By Alex Koloskov

46

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How & Why to Use Focus Stacking (focus bracketing) Technique:

We often use focus stacking for critical product shots, where closed aperture or tilt-shift lens does not provide enough DOF and/or details. For this photography and photoshop CS5 tutorial, we have photographed a silver bracelet, positioned at about 45 degree from a camera focusing plane.

First let me go over the lighting set up used for this Jewelery shot . Even though focus stacking technique can be used for any type of photography where sharp focus throughout the image is required:

Set up for Jewelry Photography:

jewelry photography
Subject was placed on white seamless surface. When looking at this particular product (silver bracelet) please notice that it is not entirely bright shiny silver but also has black cast as a part of the design, I wanted to make sure it will be correctly shown on the final image. So, the idea here is to have soft, even lighting (Tiffany-like, take a look at their silver pieces), yet to show the rough texture of the bracelet surface. To achieve desired look first thing I needed is to hide the bracelet from direct light. I’ve used 2 foam boards: Board 1 is white foam board, positioned the left side of the jewelry piece. Board 2 is a 50% gray and is positioned to the right of the jewelry piece.

Lighting:

First light (front left), is a WL X1600 strobe unit with 20 degree honeycomb grid is creating a spot on the right (gray) foam board and simultaneously spilling light onto the table right in front of the bracelet. The hot spot in the board is being reflected in the curves of the bracelet creating a bright life-full highlights , while the softer part of the light that is being projected onto gray card is being reflected in mid-tones of this jewelry piece. The White card (left of the subject) is being reflected in left part of the bracelet. Such lighting scenario produces even and smooth look.

Second Light Strip box (back, center) is projecting light onto the background. Not only it is lighting the background but also spilling onto the surface and bouncing off both (white and gray) boards adding over all softness. Please note that none of the light sources are hitting bracelet directly.

Focus stacking technique:

The idea is similar to a HDR photography, but instead of exposure bracketing, we do a focus shift- a.k.a. Focus Bracketing: To achieve focus bracketing: For each shot we move camera slightly to cover another piece of the object, and then merging all this captures in one during the post-production: using adobe photoshop CS5.

The correct way to change a focusing point is to change the distance between the camera and our subject by moving the camera while lens zoom and focusing point should not be changed. The best way to achieve precise movement is to use macro focusing rails (I use Manfrotto 454 Micrometric Positioning Sliding Plate)
For camera settings we use completely manual mode: manual exposure and manual focus.
For this image I used F11 aperture: this is right in the middle of “sweet spot” for the lens I’ve used, Canon 180mm F3.5L macro.

Why F11 Aperture was used:

As we all know, DOF gets increased (more deep) when we close aperture (larger number on F stop value). However, every lens looses contrast and amount of visible details (linear resolution) when aperture gets closed or gets wide open: diffraction starts playing a big role when light travels trough a pin hole lens… Each lens has it’s own “usable” range (you have to “master” your lens to find it), but even most expensive ones does not do a good job at it’s maximum F-stop number. You can see examples of how image gets changed when we go from F8 to F16, than F22 and f32 on my another article, where I’ve compared Hasselbald H4D-50 and Canon 1Ds MkIII.

Focus Bracketing:

I did total of 12 shots for the bracelet: by doing a little bit more then needed, overlapping focused area on each shot, we got that extra amount details on the final, merged image. Photoshop does great job of pulling all the usable information from each shot and combining it on one final super-image:-) see video above for Focus Stacking using Adobe Photoshop SC5.
Those extra shots did not cost me much time, but the end result… that amount of details you can’t get even with 50+ megapixel medium format camera when the image is done in one shoot.
See yourself:

Full image:
focus stacking

100% crop of the left end of the bracelet:
focus bracketing

100% crop of the right end:
focus stacking in photoshop

100% crop of the center:
focus stacking tutorial

The video will take you step by step through the process. Enjoy :-)

Hardware/software used for the shoot:

* Canon 1Ds mark III DSLR
* Canon 180mm F3.5L macro lens
* Manfrotto macro focusing rails
* Manfrotto 405 geared head
* Fatif studio stand
* Manfrotto (bogen) shooting table (roll of seamless paper can also be used)
* White Lighting monolight units
* Photoshop CS5 Extended

Give this tutorial a try and post your results here using “Share Your Shot” feature in comments box. Do you use Focus Stacking in your photography? What do you shoot using this technique?

Related Tutorials:

      • How to Photograph Wine Bottle on White Background
      • How to Photograph Shiny Reflective Objects
      • How to Import and Organize Your Photos with Adobe Bridge CS5

This post was filmed and written by a guest writer Alex Koloskov. He also writes for his Photography Blog where you can find gear review, photography tips and behind the scenes videos. His commercial photography portfolio can be viewed @ www.koloskov.com


Tags: bracketing, commercial, CS5, focus, jewelry, Photoshop, post-processing, stacking, studio

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46 Comments

marc labro
4 years ago

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hallo,
nice tuto
454 manfrotto is 90usd so cheap but i have read it is not like B150-B de chez Really Right Stuff and is very poor and moves when we screw at final position,… what do you think ? i am not professional so if 454 is enough i prefer :-)

it is a pity you don’t spend more time on back light adjustment and on how to use 454.
you seem to turn 6 times for second picture…

do you think a d300+105vr 2.8 macro at F22 or F32 wouldn’t make same job ? it is a pro lens intended for such apertures

br
marc

tom jeremiah
6 years ago

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Hello, I need to take jewelry (silver, gold, leather, diamonds etc) on white background for my jewelry business online and catalogI am set with the light, but i am confused of which camera is needed, i was thingking about nikon D7000 but i’ve read i don’t need such an expensive solution… Could anyone assist me on which camera would be a good solution of the camera and lens ? (we’re looking at a very high standard of picture (the one in the video is good i like http://www.tiffany.com images)

Aicha Id Elaouad
7 years ago

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Orthocera

this was my first shoot . I know i still need more practice but it is not that bad lol

    Aicha Id Elaouad
    7 years ago



    Thank you Robert

    Robert Grant
    Robert Grant
    7 years ago



    That’s pretty good!!

Michael Presley
7 years ago

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Dead Roach

An early attempt at focus stacking….. the roach was an excellent model :)

    Michael Presley
    7 years ago



    he gave his life for this shot :-|

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    7 years ago



    he sure did. great focus!

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    7 years ago



    the image is so well done, that I can look at it and not be turned away by such an appealing subject. you are a really good artist

    Michael Presley
    7 years ago



    That’s really nice of you to say – I appreciate that! It’s interesting that as I looked closely at the image I could see small bands on the paper where the focus was shifted which really demonstrated how very narrow the DOF was – even at F11 – shot with Nikon’s 60mm Micro lens (the old one, fantastic lens).

Michael Presley
7 years ago

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Hotel Flower

I travel and when I drive, I usually load up my car with photography gear – something to keep me amused when I have spare time. This is a shot I took in a hotel room in Broken Arrow OK. Black construction paper as a backdrop picked up at a nearby grocery store… I think it was 11 shots combined.

    Michael Presley
    7 years ago



    forgot more details: 120mm @f/11 and one strobe at far camera right with small Lumenquest Softbox

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    7 years ago



    really great. Would look nice framed.

    Michael Presley
    7 years ago



    Thanks Sasha

Lisa Mauck
7 years ago

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Focus Stacking

This was an interesting project and I had to start over a couple of times to make my eyes quit crossing as I was move the camera to the next position. I’ve never used a focusing rail before and it took some time to make sense of it. I thought it came out pretty good except I need more light. My background was actually white.

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    7 years ago



    nicely done ! focus is perfect

Norman Tsai
8 years ago

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Thanks for the selflessness and patience shown in sharing yr knowledge and answering our questions. Appreciate it much!One question: After understanding how focus stacking is done, does it mean that those who use this focus stacking technique on insects macro photography basically shot dead insects instead of live ones because live ones won’t stay still for the tripod rig? If not, how would one use focus stacking technique on live insects, especially out in the field?Thanks!

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    8 years ago



    That’s a great question. I thought about before. I am pretty sure those creatures are not alive (or sleeping) My Landlords are so cheap on heat that my gold fish is hibernating, lol, would make a good subject for focus stacking…. :) I think i should get her a heater, and one for kid’s room :) back to your question from my experience with incests: they will not pose for long, and I wouldn’t kill one for a shot. I had good luck with spiderwebs though. good video for you: http://bit.ly/dAs9PD

    Norman Tsai
    8 years ago



    STROBIST! That’s my other fav site besides this site. Thanks for the link and quick reply. My guess from the video and Charles Krebs’ site is that all of his subjects are clinically dead to be able to be shot via his microscope rig. Stunning nonetheless :)

    Robert Grant
    Robert Grant
    8 years ago



    The next time you find a dead insect you’ve got your subject!

    Norman Tsai
    8 years ago



    Found my answer (sharing here) via John Hallmen’s work: http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnhallmen/5172030576/ See his reply and animated GIF pic showing the stacking sequence in the comments section below. I believe handheld is possible with acquired skill and sufficient light. Of course… the subject need to be relatively stationary. Cheers :)

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    8 years ago



    that was really cool, I guess you can get away with some saddle movements. Thanks for following up on that

Norman Campbell
8 years ago

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This was very interesting. One question though. How do you keep the composition constant while moving the camera forward or backward? Hope this is not a dumb question

    Mehul Bhadani
    8 years ago



    I came across this article as one of my friends was doing jewelry photography and wanted me to assist him. This article is of great help. Thanks a ton for sharing the technique.A question – Is it necessary to move camera forward and backward or we need to move it on left and right – depending on the arrangement and shape of the jewelry?I will be doing the trial and error anyways.Thanks once again for the tutorial!!

    SASHA GiTiN
    SASHA GiTiN
    8 years ago



    Hi Norman, movement is so minor that composition doesn’t change much, really. photo stacking in photoshop also fixed that for you automatically


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