Macro photography focus stacking rig

The main reason for building this as opposed to a sliding sled is that you can do what is called “focus stacking” with this. Macro photography will sometimes have an area of the subject that is in focus (focal plane) that is only a millimeter thick. Focus stacking enables you to have a wider focal plane by combining photos.

What do vendors gain by making closed hardware?

I have a Hp mini netbook, an xbox, a canon 7D dslr, a canon powershot point and shoot camera and an iphone. The netbook is a hackintosh. The xbox has a mod chip so it can act as a media server. The powershot is running CHDK which enables an intervalometer and motion detection. The iPhone …

Weird banding on Canon 7d explained!

The other night I was out filming traffic. I ended up getting a really weird camera artifact. It looks like a dark bar that rolls through the shot from bottom to top. At first it made me freak out a bit, thinking that the camera was somehow broken. I eventually figured out that it is …

good gear to go with your shiny new canon 7d

I can only hope that there will be a lot of other happy people unwrapping new cameras this christmas. I bought my 7d about a month ago, and the best/worst thing is that now I realize buying it is just the beginning. I want to buy sooo much gear to use with it, and it …

Slow motion from the 7d. 720p60 to 24p How-to

There were a few different stages of excitement that I went through after getting my Canon 7d. First I played around with all of my manual nikon lenses (using an adapter of course). Next I marveled at the settings and the live view feature. Finally I decided I wanted to go out and shoot some …

15 great gifts for photography geeks.

I have really had a lot of fun shooting pictures of things and learning about photography in the last few years. One thing I love about digital photography is that you don’t need to spend a lot of money to take a lot of pictures. I have had an absolute blast playing around making pinhole …

Christmas Gifts for Geeks (pt 3) MAKE magazine

There really are few magazines that I eagerly look forward to. There are even fewer that I can’t hold back from reading in the bookstore BEFORE my subscription arrives (I just can’t hold back!) MAKE is chock full of cool projects, ideas, and people. They have detailed build plans for some of their projects, and …

Cheapest follow focus ever for canon 7d / 5d mark II

Ever since I have fallen in love with the Canon 7d dslr, I have been fantasizing about making a legit follow focus for a dslr. It allows you to have more control over the focusing, and a smoother camera because your rotation is in a different axis as the lens. (You may hear more of …

star trail stacking in photoshop

I have always wanted to do this kind of photography, but with most digital cameras there is simply no way you can leave the shutter open and the sensor on for a few hours. My D40 starts to get some serious noise after a few minutes, and there clearly must be an upper limit due …