Focus Stacking with a Cell Phone?

[FrankMi]

Robin (Black Pearl) posted a lovely image of a couple of Pitcher Plants that he had done a Focus Stack on using an iMac and Helicon Remote.

When I checked into it I found the following video tutorials using Helicon Remote driving the camera with a cell phone!

http://www.youtube.com/embed/rKE19PdeN18

http://www.youtube.com/embed/3LDSGWPNe3o

I thought what a great idea! If you have a cell phone in your pocket and a tripod handy, you could do precise focus stacking in the field! I loaded the free software onto my cell phone but neither my Nikon D3100 or my Canon SX50 are supported by the application, even though the list of cameras that are supported is quite impressive.

Apparently, you can do much more than just focus stacking such as using live view to wait for a hummingbird to get into position and snap the image without being close to the camera.

My question is, has anyone tried this as yet with a cell phone? If so, what did you find were the up and down sides of using this approach?

[rpcrowe]

I virtually shoot nothing with my cell phone except when I need an obscure part for some project. I photograph it with my cell phone and carry the phone to the home improvement store...

I have not worked with focus stacking at all but have viewed YouTube videos using focus stacking with the Canon software that was packaged with the Canon DSLR cameras and viewing the image on a laptop screen. I wonder if the Canon software supports focus stacking with a laptop computer when using the SX50?...

[inkista]

Richard, what Frank's talking about is using the cellphone as a really really smart shutter release/camera controller, not as the main image taking device.

I haven't used Helicon focus. And if I were going to try doing something like that, I'd probably use MagicLantern instead, because my 5DmKII and 50D both have builds that allow for doing stepped focus racking. But I'm still too busy trying to suss out the Auto-ETTR and dual-ISO modes in ML to try it.

If you're geeky enough that firmware add-ons hold no fears for you, and runnning scripts hold no mysteries, you might be able to achieve something similar with your SX50 and the CHDK.

[FrankMi]

I have not worked with focus stacking at all but have viewed YouTube videos using focus stacking with the Canon software that was packages with the Canon DSLR cameras and viewing the image on a laptop screen. I wonder if the Canon software supports focus stacking with a laptop computer...

I looked at some of those videos as well Richard, and the drawback for me is that I don't have a laptop and likely wouldn't bring one into the field for shooting. On the other hand, I would likely have my cell phone with me.

[FrankMi]

Richard, what Frank's talking about is using the cellphone as a really really smart shutter release/camera controller, not as the main image taking device.

I haven't used Helicon focus. And if I were going to try doing something like that, I'd probably use MagicLantern instead, because my 5DmKII and 50D both have builds that allow for doing stepped focus racking. But I'm still too busy trying to suss out the Auto-ETTR and dual-ISO modes in ML to try it.

If you're geeky enough that firmware add-ons hold no fears for you, and runnning scripts hold no mysteries, you might be able to achieve something similar with your SX50 and the CHDK.

Hi Kathy, I looked at the video in your link and it appears to be specific to Canon. The reason my SX50 won't work is that the SX cameras don't provide a way to externally control them whereas most of the higher end Nikons and Canons do have this capability. Looking at the videos for Helicon Remote and Magic Lantern, it appears that Helicon has a more institutive user friendly process.

[rpcrowe]

My error... I jumped to the wrong conclusion.

[FrankMi]

My error... I jumped to the wrong conclusion.

Now that I look back at the title I can easily see why. It was very misleading and should have said something more like "Controlling a Camera with a Cell Phone".

[inkista]

...the reason my SX50 won't work is that the SX cameras don't provide a way to externally control them....

[sigh]. I hate that for some weird reason if I put a link in the last line of my posts on this board, you can't see the underlining to show that it's a link. Let's try this again:

... something similar with your SX50 and the CHDK.

I don't have an SX50, so I don't know what putting the CHDK on it would do--but the CHDK is very similar to Magic Lantern in that it's a firmware add-on that runs on top of Canon's software and it can be scripted to do things like doing focus bracketing. The link I sent above gives you a script that you can load onto the camera via the CHDK to automate taking a focus stack.

[FrankMi]

[sigh]. I hate that for some weird reason if I put a link in the last line of my posts on this board, you can't see the underlining to show that it's a link. Let's try this again:



I don't have an SX50, so I don't know what putting the CHDK on it would do--but the CHDK is very similar to Magic Lantern in that it's a firmware add-on that runs on top of Canon's software and it can be scripted to do things like doing focus bracketing. The link I sent above gives you a script that you can load onto the camera via the CHDK to automate taking a focus stack.

Ah, just saw this post. Thank you for the link Kathy! For being able to 'see' the link in a post, I usually just click the "B" icon to make the link Bolded. I tried using similar scripting as described in your link on the SX40 to enable RAW mode. Although it did work, it was a PITA. I've since upgraded to the SX50 which has RAW built in.

But back to the question at hand, I upgraded my D3100 to a D7100 which does support remote control, and I have downloaded Helicon Remote. I can now remotely control focus stacking spacing, number of images, time between shots, and a host of other features like viewing the Live View image remotely.