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Women's Small Wristwatch

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Stephen Barrett

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Today I went into a jewellery store to see if I could buy a small old mechanical women's wristwatch. I explained that it didn't have to work because I just wanted to take pictures of the gears. They found one but wanted to keep it, and told me that I could photograph it there if I wanted. So I went home and got my SX30, Raynox 150 closeup lens and tripod. I photographed the watch on a counter and was a little worried about the shots of the gears, which were taken at full optical zoom because I could see the image vibrating as people walked around the store, which has wooden floors. The lighting wasn't great, so the exposure time was about half a second. The timer was set for 5 seconds, so I tried to time each shot so that there wouldn't be someone walking by. They were nice enough to let me take pictures of their watch, so I couldn't very well tell everybody not to move for about five minutes. Anyway, here are the results:


Shot #1: Front of the watch (without glass).
You can tell that this is a women's small watch from the size of the winding knob.


Shot #1: 15 shots 0.3 mm apart; SX30 @79.6 mm with Raynox 150; focus-stacked using Zerene Stacker



Shot #2: Inside the watch (from the back).


Shot #2: 37 shots 0.2 mm apart: SX30 @150.5 mm with Raynox 150; focus-stacked with Zerene Stacker

I offered to make a print for them and the jeweller said he would put it on the wall.
 

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Stephen Barrett said:
Stephen Barrett wrote:

Today I went into a jewellery store to see if I could buy a small old mechanical women's wristwatch. I explained that it didn't have to work because I just wanted to take pictures of the gears. They found one but wanted to keep it, and told me that I could photograph it there if I wanted. So I went home and got my SX30, Raynox 150 closeup lens and tripod. I photographed the watch on a counter and was a little worried about the shots of the gears, which were taken at full optical zoom because I could see the image vibrating as people walked around the store, which has wooden floors. The lighting wasn't great, so the exposure time was about half a second. The timer was set for 5 seconds, so I tried to time each shot so that there wouldn't be someone walking by. They were nice enough to let me take pictures of their watch, so I couldn't very well tell everybody not to move for about five minutes. Anyway, here are the results:
Shot #1: Front of the watch (without glass).
You can tell that this is a women's small watch from the size of the winding knob.


Shot #1: 15 shots 0.3 mm apart; SX30 @79.6 mm with Raynox 150; focus-stacked using Zerene Stacker

Shot #2: Inside the watch (from the back).


Shot #2: 37 shots 0.2 mm apart: SX30 @150.5 mm with Raynox 150; focus-stacked with Zerene Stacker

I offered to make a print for them and the jeweller said he would put it on the wall.
Click to expand...

I like these, and you certainly went to a lot of trouble but it came out well considering how small it is. I have also bought an old wind up clock a few years ago, not as small as yours, and taken macros of the working parts.

Thanks for showing.

Brian
 
Very nice shots. It certainly makes we want to grab my Raynox and try stacking.

You mentioned the lighting was not great. Can you describe it a bit?
 
Last edited:
Thanks Brian and OpticsEngineer.
The lighting was from small pot-lights in the ceiling. Some of them were aimed towards the counter-top but it wasn't very bright. At home, I use a goose-neck lamp one or two feet away, to which I have added a metal cylinder to prevent direct lamp-light from entering the camera lens or the light box (a pail loosely lined with black cotton cloth) behind the subject.
 
Stephen Barrett said:
Stephen Barrett wrote:
Shot #2: Inside the watch (from the back).


Shot #2: 37 shots 0.2 mm apart: SX30 @150.5 mm with Raynox 150; focus-stacked with Zerene Stacker

I offered to make a print for them and the jeweller said he would put it on the wall.
Click to expand...
I've been Amazed by this shot Stephen, really very VERY well done.

May I ask, what you mean by "37 shots" ?

--
Hossam
[Canon SX50HS]
EGYPT: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?show=all
Pharaohs: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?comment_page=1&photo_page=11
 
Thanks Hossam.
By 37 shots, I meant 37 pictures at different focus distances, which were later combined by focus-stacking software to make one image.
With a closeup lens on my SX30 at its full optical zoom of 150.5 mm, the depth-of-field is very shallow: only about 0.3 mm for the Raynox 150, which I used, and about 0.2 mm for the stronger Raynox 250. With focus-stacking, you take typically 10 to 50 pictures focused at decreasing or increasing distances. You can either change the focus distance manually or you can manually set the camera focus to infinity and use macro rails to move the camera, which is what I did, increasing the distance by 0.2 mm between each of the 37 pictures.

Here is a picture of my modified macro rails:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/51484745

My Macro rails are from Cowboy Studio ($63 CDN):
http://www.amazon.ca/CowboyStudio-Macro-Focusing-Rail-Photography/dp/B0047DS41S
From the photographs, they appear to be identical to those from Adorama ($58 U.S.)
http://www.adorama.com/MCFRS1.html


Stacking software later aligns all of the pictures and combines their in-focus parts to make one image. I use Zerene Stacker
http://zerenesystems.com/stacker/
but there are other products, including the full versions of PhotoShop and I think there are some free programs on-line.
 
Thank you so much Stephen, for the valuable information about macro focus-stacking, that was now for me because I didn't use any macro equipment as "Raynox" before, and that will be helpful for me when get "Raynox" some day.

Thank you again Stephen
 
That sounds like a good idea waterwingz. It is certainly very awkward trying to adjust the focus manually by turning the control ring. With maximum zoom on my SX30 and the Raynox 250, I find that I can get a total depth-of-field of approximately 11 mm by dialing the focus down from infinity to about 1 metre on the scale in the viewfinder. The problem is that the depth-of-field is at most 0.2 mm per single shot, so it is very easy to dial too much change of focus. The only time I have had success with manually dialing the focus-bracketing is with the camera's macro setting (4.3 mm focal length with no closeup lens). Even for that case though, your idea would make things much simpler. One of these days, the focus bracketing and stacking will be built right into the camera so that all we have to do is choose that function and press the shutter.
 
waterwingz said:
waterwingz wrote:
waterwingz said:
Stephen Barrett wrote:

You can either change the focus distance manually or
Click to expand...
You could also use a small CHDK script to automatically step through the focus range, shooting at each step.
Click to expand...
so , send the link of that script, because the manually have only 3 steps only.

I made this fast test with only 3 focus distance (sorry for the bad quality, that for its Handheld, both the cam & the watch too):

324ce690ee894c77812e1cc3c688b7ce.jpg

fa07f9fbe9dc46f293480cf02e2aa464.jpg

--
Hossam
[Canon SX50HS]
EGYPT: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?show=all
Pharaohs: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?comment_page=1&photo_page=11
 
Last edited:
That is very good, Hossam. You can see the gears meshing and lots of texture.
The first picture has more light so that you can see gears and the spring through the slot.
Is that with Macro setting?
Did you stack the shots somehow, or just pick the ones with the best focus?

I have had some success with home-made closeup lenses. In particular, a 600 mm focal length objective from a cheap telescope worked very well and I still like using it:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/post/50119908
 
Stephen Barrett said:
Stephen Barrett wrote:

That sounds like a good idea waterwingz. It is certainly very awkward trying to adjust the focus manually by turning the control ring. With maximum zoom on my SX30 and the Raynox 250, I find that I can get a total depth-of-field of approximately 11 mm by dialing the focus down from infinity to about 1 metre on the scale in the viewfinder. The problem is that the depth-of-field is at most 0.2 mm per single shot, so it is very easy to dial too much change of focus. The only time I have had success with manually dialing the focus-bracketing is with the camera's macro setting (4.3 mm focal length with no closeup lens). Even for that case though, your idea would make things much simpler. One of these days, the focus bracketing and stacking will be built right into the camera so that all we have to do is choose that function and press the shutter.
Click to expand...
I took a look at the currently available scripts and they are all pretty old. Scripting in CHDK has changed a lot (for the better) in the last couple of years. I'll plug away at it this week and see if I can come up with something current that will not be specific to a particular camera model or CHDK build. I'll post a link here when I'm done.
 
Now that was a really cool idea, leading to a really nice shot. Well done, again.

Take care,

Al
 
Stephen Barrett said:
Stephen Barrett wrote:

That is very good, Hossam. You can see the gears meshing and lots of texture.
The first picture has more light so that you can see gears and the spring through the slot.
Click to expand...
Thanks a lot Stephen

Stephen Barrett said:
Is that with Macro setting?
Click to expand...
yes

Stephen Barrett said:
Did you stack the shots somehow,
Click to expand...
yes its stack by "Zerene Stacker" from 3 shots
Stephen Barrett said:
I have had some success with home-made closeup lenses. In particular, a 600 mm focal length objective from a cheap telescope worked very well and I still like using it:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/post/50119908
Click to expand...
there are a Masterpiece Images at your old post there Stephen

but this one are my favorite Excellent work ..... WOW



TS560x560~2284030.jpg


its reminds me by the old Clown with a defrant eye colors as this:



47058_963074.jpg




--
Hossam
[Canon SX50HS]
EGYPT: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?show=all
Pharaohs: http://www.panoramio.com/user/60318?comment_page=1&photo_page=11
 
Thanks Hossam.
That's a nice comparison with the clown.
About 6 months ago, Vision Light started a theme about "other-worldly creatures". Now he has us all copying him:

http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3349006

If you want to know what it is, check out his mini-review Take 4.
If you haven't seen his mini-reviews of the SX50 yet, you will find them very useful:

VisionLight Mini-review Take One:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3334476
VisionLight Zoom Testing:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3337900
VisionLight Mini-review Take 2A:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3338977
VisionLight Mini-review Take 3:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3346914
VisionLight Mini-review Take 4:
http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3351553
Here is an example of me copying him:
Potato Sprouting (Picture #2: "I'm hungry and I smell humans on this planet").
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/post/50929172
 
Thanks a lot Stephen, for the bunch of links you send to me, sure all are very helpful as well,
I think I'll spend a hall year until finished read them all, ;-)

but whatever that take from time I'll read every word there, and Enjoy every Image too :-)
 
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