Extreme depth of field

[Buddy Thomason]

This project required a technique that gets talked about a lot but not used very often. The task was to document a damascus blade, the first in a series.
A flat side view wasn't much of a problem. Click to enlarge, then you may have to click on the image again to make it open fully in your browser window:

#1 http://www.fototime.com/380FF5999711A0B/thumbnail.jpg (http://www.fototime.com/380FF5999711A0B/orig.jpg)

I thought we were done then Josh asked for a shot looking down the blade:

#2
http://www.fototime.com/6E8B643FF2378DE/orig.jpg

This one is a composite of eight separate exposures, each sharply focused on a 1/8th section of the blade, tang to tip. It's tough (impossible) to shoot that close and have depth of field deep enough to get everything in focus with a single exposure. It worked - at least Josh was satisfied.

But it's also kind of disorienting to look at. It's as if the eye/brain is confused by the absence of something it had expected to see: those inevitable areas of variable focus in most photographs that allow the viewer to judge relative distances etc. Weird. :confused:

[David Darom]

Hello Buddy,

Interesting shot, beautifully documenting the subject as requested
by combining the the in-focus sections of the various shots!

In general there are quite a few "focus stacking software" available.

These are software tools that extend the depth of field in picteres
of various 3D objects. To use them efectively, more than one picture
of the object is shot, slowly extending the focus along its depth.

The software later combines all the "in focus" sections of the various
shots to produce a final image with uncanny depth of sharpness throughout,
a result that usually cannot be shot with a rigid back camera alone, no matter
how much the aperture is stopped down. Digital magic... :)

A digital SLR with manual focusing capabilities and a tripod are
all that is needed....

All the best,
David Darom (ddd)

[Buddy Thomason]

Thanks, David. It may be that Photoshop CS4 already has such a feature and I haven't learned about it yet. Otherwise, as you suggest, a plug-in that would do this automatically would save much time!

[Buddy Thomason]

Second blade in Josh's series... thought I'd make a composite image this time.
#3
http://www.fototime.com/B63DC235510AA69/orig.jpg