Forever focus

Both of these images are at f/8 with the Zeiss ZF 100mm f/2 Makro-Planar on the Canon 5D Mark II with exactly the same focus and exposure and processing through DPP...well I’m omitting some details that come after that, but take a closer look (click for larger). Check out the depth of field, then head on over to HeliconSoft.com com and try out this amazing software, Helicon Focus, for yourself.

11-frames for depth of field near to far
Canon 5D Mark II + Zeiss ZF 100/2 Makro-Planar @ f/8

I’ve just barely started using Helicon Focus (10 minutes), and the results aren’t perfect (looking into that), but I have lots of things I want to say about it going forward.

The main issue I see (perhaps some kind of user error) is the halos near sharp/unsharp areas, front to back, like this (actual pixels):

Canon 5D Mark II + Zeiss ZF 100/2 Makro-Planar @ f/8

Helicon Focus does a great job using all eight cores of my 2.8GHz 8-core Mac Pro, which is a refreshing thing with all the lame software out there that uses 1 or 2 cores.