I received a new piece of equipment today—a bit of industrial mechanics invades my art space. It is a linear rail - a solid little platform that chugs with incredible precision across short to medium distances. I put my camera in the saddle, I programmed it in 30 seconds with my phone, and for half an hour it moved 30 microns at a time, told my camera when to take pictures, and slowly built up a 108-image stockpile of images across three magical millimeters.
This photo is the result, after focus stacking in HeliconFocus.
It would have been my fingers doing the chugging in the past; I am now into post-modern period of my macrophotography, taking full advantage of what industrial-grade mechanics can do for art.
Technical info: This was done on top of the washing machine in the laundry room, because that little space has the most light. Even so, at this magnification (should be around 4x, but I can’t tell for sure with an organic subject like this), that required each exposure be 2 seconds long. The rail made things easy; I got to consider things like what part of the crocosmia seeds to photograph, how long the exposures should be—far from stealing the show, the hardware made it easier to focus on the art.