On the cover: Playfulness and the joy of discovery led to the cover shot of the Haworthia cooperi. Irwin Lightstone picks up his plants and looks at them at all angles in different lights to observe their details and textures. He particularly loves how the little globes of leaves in the image glow when backlit. To maintain sharp focus, 46 separate images were used in a process know as focus stacking, which is explained in greater detail in the article. As the leaf is taken at a magnification of approximately three times life size with a specialized lens, the focus was changed by advancing the camera in very small increments, 0.058 mm per shot, on a motorized sled. |
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