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4 Easy Steps to Focus Stacking

Tulip Farm (Wynyard, Tasmania)

Tulip Farm (Wynyard, Tasmania)

What is Focus Stacking?

When you layer photos in Photoshop together at different focus planes to produce one image that is all in focus from the nearest subject to infinity.

Edited in Lightroom & Focus Stacked in Photoshop

Edited in Lightroom & Focus Stacked in Photoshop

When Should I Focus Stack?

You only need to focus stack your images when you are too close to a subject and the mid & background is not in focus. A perfect scenario is when shooting a flower close up in a landscape as seen the sample of a tulip field in Wynyard, Tasmania.

Edit > Auto Align Layers in Photoshop

Edit > Auto Align Layers in Photoshop

Auto Align Layers

Auto Align Layers

How Do I Focus?

Use a tripod and a wide angle lens (14 - 24mm lens range) Turn on your live view and focus on the nearest point by magnifying x 10. Repeat the process at different planes of focus. Make sure you are also adjusting for any movement (flower in the wind) with a faster shutter speed.

Focus Stack (5 of 7).jpg

How Do I Edit For Focus Stacking?

In Photoshop open up all the images as layers in Photoshop. Highlight all the layers and choose edit > align layers. Crop accordingly and choose edit > auto blend layers (tick seamless tones & colours) Flatten all your layers and WALA you have your focus stacked image.

Gear Used:

Sirui Carbon Fibre 024X, Carl Zeiss Distagon 18mm Lens, Canos EOSR

Focus Stack (7 of 7).jpg