Your opinion? Is the winner "Clear"?

[Tina Boes]

I did an experiment using LR to Photoshop Focus stacking method compared to Helicon Focus Stacking software (free 30 day trial), using some flowers misted with a mix of water and glycerin. The settings are exactly the same with lighting adjustments etc. using LightRoom classic. I chose a really busy image to give a real workout for the programs to prove their stuff.
Can you tell which one is a better result?
Nikon D7100, 105mm Nikkor manual focus, tripod with focusing rail, natural light, F/9, 1/100 sec., ISO320. A total of 21 photos were stacked.

First photo LR to Helicon Focus....2nd Photo LR to Photoshop Align/Blend

 

[lovitazoe]

Nice experiment, Tina Boes .
I prefer the first photo. It's clearer and the colours are pop out.

 

[Helix_2648]

It's some years ago since I made a similar test with Helicon Focus and Photoshop. The results from Photoshop are not bad but sometimes it fails and that's the point where the problems starts because the manual corrections based on just the layer masks are more than awful!

Apart from that I prefer Helicon Focus because of the possibility to have much more flexibility related to the render parameters. I use mostly a combination of B & C with a radius between 4 and 20 (depends on the magnification). Should mean, that I render the stack with render mode B and then with C. After that I save both outputs and render these two pictures again. I retouch the total output with B but the halo areas with C. The result is a crystal clear picture with low noise and nearly no visible halos.

And that's something which you cannot do with Photoshop. Even if this simple test worked but give it a try with higher magnifications!

I made a tutorial for my mushroom photos where I explained my workflow with Helicon focus:

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