Commons:Featured picture candidates/File:Hemidactylus frenatus (Common House Gecko) on white background, focus stacking.jpg

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File:Hemidactylus frenatus (Common House Gecko) on white background, focus stacking.jpg, featured[edit]

Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes.Voting period ends on 31 Jan 2019 at 07:27:32 (UTC)
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Hemidactylus frenatus (Common House Gecko) on white background, in Laos. Focus stacking from 20 pictures shot in studio.
✓ Done Not sure I understand well the problem with the focus stacking job, as I handled it very carefully and really don't see major problem here honestly. I've uploaded a new version with the very minor issues corrected, please add a note if there's something else I've missed, but yes Ikan is right it is not easy at all to photograph a living creature so close and to make 20 shots at different focuses in these conditions. So for the tail not completely sharp I agree but I'm afraid this is not improvable. Focus stacking is a choice, otherwise f/32 would not be as sharp, nor as detailed with this DoF -- Basile Morin (talk) 08:42, 22 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • This work is a composition of 20 pictures, not 30, since it was not possible to take more shots without the gecko starts moving. At this moment the reptile was breathing, which means the shape of the stomach was evolving in time, and thus a very special rhythm had to be followed for each picture. It's not as easy as with an inanimate object. If I had these parts available in focus, certainly the composition would be more accurate there, but now they're missing unfortunately, because of the manual procedure. Creating a fake object with artificial patches coming from different areas is not my taste, and would not be better on a realistic level. So I keep it with its minor technical issues. The technique is mentioned in the description, so the viewer should understand why there are soft areas. You can't invent the pixels, especially on the edges : they're just not here, when you focus on the foreground, the background is blurry, and when you focus on the background the foreground becomes half opaque, over, due to the scale ratio proportionate to the distance, and also due to the irregular texture. It's mainly an optical obstacle, certainly similar to every subject of this nature. But this resolution is large enough for excellent quality prints. If it's too big, we can downsize it at 2000 px large, 2500 px large, 3000 px large, and even 3500 px large, still acceptable in my view. But requesting extreme sharpness here like a knife blade is a bit nitpicking IMO. This coleoptera had its back leg totally out of focus because the animal moved too early, and the resulting picture was however a big success in FP -- Basile Morin (talk) 05:59, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's very sharp at lower resolution, and all is sharp, from head to tail. The white background is a choice (like here or here) to present the animal in its morphology. It will be perfect for captions like this, for example. Although I find pictures of animals in their environment very valuable, one kind of photography doesn't exclude the other(s), I think. Concerning the lighting, it couldn't be better IMO, diffuse lamps illuminate every part and also avoid harsh shadows -- Basile Morin (talk) 12:50, 23 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • Indeed it's an impressive feat, but for 17 MP full-frame you can go to f/16 with very little diffraction, allowing you to capture it with the same number of frames but with much more consistent sharpness. -- King of ♥ ♦ ♣ ♠ 03:54, 24 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
  • In my experience, there's a visible difference between f/8 and f/16, but the main problem with large DoF pictures in focus stacking is the amount of errors generated in the process, even with the excellent software Helicon Focus I use, the sharp patches overlay, creating frequently undesirable ghosts -- Basile Morin (talk) 07:48, 25 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Confirmed results:
Result: 13 support, 3 oppose, 0 neutral → featured. /--A.Savin 13:07, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
This image will be added to the FP gallery: Animals/Reptiles
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