Achromatic macro filters

[Brad Bohland]

Now that I think about it, I did get some similar advice somewhere and tried zooming in but it didn't really do much to eliminate the chromatic aberration. The image below is the one I was using that technique with and has an aperture of 5.6 but it seemed to have the same chromatic aberration as when at 2 so I just stop using that technique because it didn't seem to do much.

 

[_sem_]

Now that I think about it, I did get some similar advice somewhere and tried zooming in but it didn't really do much to eliminate the chromatic aberration. The image below is the one I was using that technique with and has an aperture of 5.6 but it seemed to have the same chromatic aberration as when at 2 so I just stop using that technique because it didn't seem to do much.

At least, more of the subject is in focus here. Though the light is bad again. Diffused flash could light up the front. And the achromat lens approach at the tele end would blur the background more and hlp you get the corner highlights out of the frame.

Did you try removing CA with software?

 

[Brad Bohland]

I have Elements 9 which doesn't have a dedicated chromatic aberration tool, so you have to do it the hard way by selecting the outline and then de-saturating it. If the Raynox lens attachment works on the Panasonic FZ1000 and gives me control on the macro end, then hopefully it won't have as much chromatic aberration as the Nikon P7700 and that will solve the problem. The Raynox just arrived today so I'll take it home tonight and try it.

 

[_sem_]

I have Elements 9 which doesn't have a dedicated chromatic aberration tool, so you have to do it the hard way by selecting the outline and then de-saturating it. If the Raynox lens attachment works on the Panasonic FZ1000 and gives me control on the macro end, then hopefully it won't have as much chromatic aberration as the Nikon P7700 and that will solve the problem. The Raynox just arrived today so I'll take it home tonight and try it.

I've tried CA correction of your image in LR4. Lateral CA correction didn't work. The Defringe option in was partially successful but not perfect in 5 minutes - some edges got corrected nicely, but others not, depending on the colour of the fringes. So I don't think other Adobe software would work for you.

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You could further try if better laCA correction would happen to do the trick, because Adobe's auto correction is prone to failure and manual laCA correction is no longer available since LR3. Automatic laCA sometimes fails in cases of obvious laCA

- if the fringes are wider than anticipated by the software (also manual CA may fail if the slider is not long enough and one may need to apply it twice)

- if laCA is irregular with bad lenses, so that moving the slider improves one area but makes a different area worse (have seen this with one cheapo front wide converter)

You could check if this is available with free Nikon software, Raw Therapee, GIMP, Hugin or such. Maybe there is a plugin for PSE? http://powerretouche.com/Chromatic_aberration_tutorial.htm

The DCR-250 should also work with the P7700 at the long end (no extreme magnification though).

 

[Brad Bohland]

Thanks for your helpful input. I will look into using Elements 9 more effectively. I don't know why the camera companies don't install chromatic aberration correction software on cameras (they probably do on better ones) like they do with red eye correction. Seems like the camera should do the work.

Unfortunately the Raynox 150 was a bit of a disaster. I'm going to start a new thread under the subject heading "Raynox 150--for reals?"

Thanks again.

 

[_sem_]

... I don't know why the camera companies don't install chromatic aberration correction software on cameras (they probably do on better ones) like they do with red eye correction. Seems like the camera should do the work.

Actually, some do correct laCA on-the-fly for JPGs. All recent Nikon DSLRs, maybe the P7700 too? But it works only up to a certain laCA magnitude. Automatic defringing isn't as straightforward AFAIK, also the Adobe defaults aren't useful mostly. But even the laCA correction is often efficient and makes some folks happy using cheapo close-up filters, which were previously considered utter junk because of the obvious laCA.

But I think you will get much less CA issues if you get softer light first. CA issues are worst on high-contrast edges.

 

[Brad Bohland]

If high contrast produces CA, does it help to turn the contrast adjustment down? I can't do much about the light.

 

[_sem_]

If high contrast produces CA, does it help to turn the contrast adjustment down?

Nope.

I can't do much about the light.

Yes you can Messing with light is a biggie in photography.

With a longer macro, you can recompose the shot so that bright background doesn't get into the frame.

You can use a shade, or stage a background.

You can pop up the flash and hold a napking a few cm in front of it so that the flash light gets nicely diffused. Or cut up a translucent white picnic plate and attach it around the lens barrel. You may have to fiddle with the settings a bit to get exposure right (some cameras want to be smart with flash exposure but don't get the napkin; for instance, one should switch Nikon DSLRs to spot metering for this, because they don't want to do plain TTL flashmetering otherwise).