BCSS - Forum

A bit of a technical challenge for this month, the cameras built into phones and tablets have to have short focal length lenses to fit in the thin bodies, this results in a greater depth of field i.e. more of the subject in focus, than the larger lenses on conventional cameras. For my entries in last months competition the mammillaria photos were taken on my phone and the schlumbergera using a mirrorless camera - to get as much as possible in focus the camera image is a stack of 20 images with the focus changing slightly between each one then a clever piece of software combines the in focus bits of the different images - much more complicated than the simple tap on the phone screen.

Most phones now have lots of pixels in their sensors so you might find you get a better picture by not getting too close then using simple editing software to crop the picture which should still leave enough pixels to fill most screens.

Editing is not required for the competition the only requirement is to use phone or tablet to take the picture

Picture below is how I posed the mammillaria - I did get a bit closer to take the image that was cropped before posting to forum

Mammillara Haageana,taken with my Samsung tablet

Took this just now with my Huawei P Smart 2019 (yes, I know, I should update it) Aloe speciosa that has spent the past 12 months outside. I find that rather encouraging when considering most of my aloes look like boiled spinach.

Paul in Essex wrote: ↑Tue May 02, 2023 5:36 pm Took this just now with my Huawei P Smart 2019 (yes, I know, I should update it)

My Samsung A40 was bought in 2019, does all I want so not seeing any reason to update

Just wondering are photos required to be taken this month?

Abigail123 wrote: ↑Tue May 02, 2023 9:01 pm Just wondering are photos required to be taken this month?

Probably not, but I expect Jim Mercer will confirm this.

Abigail123 wrote: ↑Tue May 02, 2023 9:01 pm Just wondering are photos required to be taken this month?

I might check the exif data (included with most jpg files) to see which phone/tablet has been used but I will not be checking when the photograph was taken. The only requirement for this month is that the picture should have been taken using something that uses a lens/sensor package similar to the one in the picture below, this is an old design without any autofocus that used to be used in mobile phones but mounted on circuit board for use with raspberry pi computer.

Jim_Mercer wrote: ↑Wed May 03, 2023 11:41 am

Abigail123 wrote: ↑Tue May 02, 2023 9:01 pm Just wondering are photos required to be taken this month?

I might check the exif data (included with most jpg files) to see which phone/tablet has been used but I will not be checking when the photograph was taken. The only requirement for this month is that the picture should have been taken using something that uses a lens/sensor package similar to the one in the picture below, this is an old design without any autofocus that used to be used in mobile phones but mounted on circuit board for use with raspberry pi computer.
20230502_175041.jpg

Ok
But what about post processing? Any machine? And for those of us who have more than basic skills, can the image be stacked? Or combined in multi-layered processing?
Just asking for clarification.

Trichodiadema densum
Samsung A70 with process in Lightroom and other copy in Photoshop Express

Taken with a Sony Xperia