Macro photography
1:1 to 2:1
Products, jewellery, watch movements, coins, textiles and textures, lit and stacked so the whole object is sharp. Delivered as edited, high-resolution stills ready for print, web or catalogue.
The small world, sharp from every side.
Macro and extreme macro photography from 1:1 to 20:1, focus stacked so every hair is in focus. We're also building software to turn those stacks into 3D models you can turn around in a browser, and taking early mail-in orders now.
How we turn hundreds of photos into one 3D specimen
Our rig is built around a WeMacro rail mounted vertically, so the camera looks straight down at the subject. Scroll to follow a single specimen from the stand to a Gaussian splat. Drag the scene at any point to look around.
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Mount the rail vertically
A WeMacro focus rail is clamped to a rigid square column on a heavy, damped base, with the camera hanging lens-down from the carriage. Shooting vertically lets the subject lie flat and keeps the optics in line with gravity, so nothing sags between frames.
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Light and align
A 10× microscope objective on a tube lens sits 33.5 mm above the subject. Light from two LED panels passes through a diffuser to tame reflections on shiny surfaces, and an XY stage nudges the subject into the centre of the frame.
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Step and shoot
The controller lowers the camera a few microns at a time, pausing for vibrations to settle before each exposure. A 3 mm deep subject at 10× takes around 240 photos, each sharp in one thin plane.
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Find what's sharp
Software measures local sharpness in every photo and keeps only the in-focus contour. Stack those contours in the order they were shot and they already trace the shape of the subject, slice by slice.
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Seed the Gaussians
Each sharp point becomes a 3D Gaussian: a small, soft ellipsoid with a position, size, orientation, colour and opacity. At this stage they're rough guesses.
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Optimise against the photos
The Gaussians are rendered from the camera's point of view, focus blur included, and compared with the original photos. Thousands of iterations nudge every one until the render matches what the lens saw. This is the stack-to-splat software we're developing now.
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Turn it in your hand
The result is a lightweight 3D file that opens in any modern browser. Drag to see the side of the specimen that no single photograph could show.
The specimen on this page is generated in code from about 23,000 Gaussians, and the rail's movement is exaggerated so it's visible. Client splats are built from real focus stacks.
Pick a magnification
Magnification decides how much of the world fits in the frame. The bars show the width of the frame on a full-frame sensor, to scale.
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1:1A wristwatch dial, a ring, a postage stamp
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2:1A Canadian dime, edge to edge
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5:1A ladybug, a gemstone's facets, a watch's balance wheel
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10:1A house fly's head, a circuit board's solder joints
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20:1A single compound eye, a grain of sand, butterfly wing scales
Extreme macro
5:1 to 20:1 and beyond
Insects, minerals, electronics, seeds and specimens shot through microscope objectives on a micron-step rail. Hundreds of frames per image, combined into one picture with detail you can't see by eye.
Focus stacking for your own frames
Remote
Already shooting stacks? Send the raw frames and get back a clean, retouched composite with halos and stacking artefacts fixed by hand.
3D models by mail
Early access
Post us your subject and we'll turn its focus stacks into a Gaussian splat and a 3D mesh, alongside the stacked stills. Our splat software is still in development, so these are early-access orders. See how ordering works.
Who this is for
- Jewellers and watchmakers
- Show the hand-finishing, engraving and stone settings that buyers can't see in a normal product shot.
- Researchers and collections
- Document specimens at a known scale, and keep a 3D record that colleagues can inspect remotely.
- Brands and product teams
- Material close-ups for launches and packaging, from fabric weave to brushed metal.
- Museums and educators
- Interactive 3D specimens for exhibits and classrooms that visitors can turn around themselves.
Why Gaussian splats suit macro
Photogrammetry struggles with the things macro is full of: fine hairs, translucent wings, glossy shells and iridescent scales. Gaussian splatting represents a scene as millions of soft, semi-transparent blobs instead of a hard mesh, so it keeps exactly that kind of detail.
Most splatting tools expect dozens of photos from different angles. A focus stack is different: many photos from the same angle, each sharp at a different depth. We're developing software that reads the depth directly out of the stack and fits splats to it.
- Mesh from photogrammetry
- Gaussian splat
- Fine hairs and bristles
- Lost or turned into spikes
- Kept as thin ellipsoids
- Iridescence and gloss
- Baked flat into the texture
- Changes as you turn it
- Translucent wings
- Holes or solid sheets
- Semi-transparent, as shot
- Viewing
- 3D viewer or app
- Any modern browser
Have something small you'd like to see in 3D?
Order a 3D modelOrder a 3D model by mail
Send us something small. We'll shoot hundreds of focus-stacked photos of it and turn them into a 3D model and a Gaussian splat you can turn around in any browser, or embed on your own site.
Our stack-to-splat software is still in development, so 3D orders are early access. Your quote will confirm exactly what we can deliver and when. You keep the stacked stills either way.
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Tell us about the subject
Fill in the order form below. We'll reply with a quote, an estimated turnaround and our mailing address.
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Pack it and post it
Use a small rigid box inside a padded one, and include a note with your name and email. Tracked shipping is best.
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We shoot the stacks
Every angle of the subject gets its own stack of a few hundred photos. A model you can turn all the way around can take thousands.
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You get your files
We send a download link with your splat, mesh and stills, plus a viewer link you can share straight away.
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We send it back
Your subject comes home by tracked post, packed the way it arrived. If you don't need it back, just say so.
What you get
- Gaussian splat
- A .ply file, plus a hosted viewer and the code to embed it on your site.
- 3D mesh
- .glb and .obj files for 3D software, printing and AR.
- Stacked stills
- High-resolution images, sharp front to back, as TIFF and JPEG.
- Raw stacks
- Every source photo, if you want them.
What we can take
Anything from a grain of sand to about 5 cm across that can survive the post: pinned insects, shells, minerals, seeds, jewellery, watch parts and electronics.
We can't accept live animals, anything wet, or anything hazardous. Not sure about yours? Ask in the form.
Start an order
Tell us what you're sending and what you'd like back. You'll get a quote and our mailing address, usually within two business days. Please don't post anything until we've replied.
Booking a photo shoot instead? Choose or and the form will switch over.
Or email hello@capitalcoders.ca