NOTE: Some of the sets have been modified to work with the March 13th 2008 release of CombineZM, they may not be compatible with older versions.
If you wish to use one of these Macro Sets, download it to your compouter and save it in the CombineZM folder.
To use a Macro set in CombineZM click on Macro->Load Macro Set, and the Macros contained in it will appear on the Macro Menu.
An Image Pair, Right and Left, produced from a single stack, reduced in size.
And a Red/Green Image produced from this pair.
Two Macros that can be used indipendantly, the first for making single pictures from two to view through coloured spectacles. The second generates a pair of images from a single stack.
Supplementary set for Batch Processing 3D for Batch Processing
Examples of before and after pictures
This first picture, the foot of an insect, is Copyright Hajo Hornberg and is reduced in size from the original
The picture used for the next example is Copyright Peter Hösel, it is reduced in size from the original.
The example used here is Copyright Don, (sorry Don you'r second name has got lost in the mists of time.)
Here is a Movie of the Original 14 frames greatly reduced in size.
And here the result of the normal Automatic Two Pass Alignment function.
Normally CombineZ only aligns frames to their neighbours, this is sufficient to make in focus edges match etc. It will not prevent any gradual change in size, it preserves some of the original difference in size between parts of the scene that are near to the lens, they look bigger, and parts further away from the lens, they look smaller. It may lead to inaccuracies when making measurements. Hence the need for this Macro Set, the result of procrssing the original frames with this macro is below.
This set consists of a pair of Macros, one is the standard Do Stack but with easy parameter input via a dialog. The second macro will try a range of values as parameters and save the results so that you can select the best.
Th is a hybred method of stacking suitable for stacks in which different things are in focus at the same place but at different depths into the stack. This set requires the 26th of January update of CZM or later.
Use a 'Correction Frame' to correct a frame or stack of frames with these problems.
The macros in this set reverse the Split RGB and HSG Commands.
Here is a simple Macro and some procedures to colour code an image with Depth information.
When using File->Extract Frames on a movie, or processing a stack of frames extracted by another program, scanning up and down the stack can reveal many duplicate frames. These are often included to maintain the frame rate of a movie when the camera cannot keep up. This Macro Set will remove any consecutive duplicate frames from a stack.
The following sets have no instruction page yet
The standard Do Stack split into 3 parts, Preprocessing, Stacking, Postprocessing, useful for doing tests - you only need to align etc. once etc.
Dynamic Range Enhancement
Alter Contrast and Sharpness of a single frame or the whole stack, remember to Save Work before running in case you make a mistake.
Place a black frame containing your text in the correct position and it will be placed on every frame in the stack
Adds fade in and fade out frames at the top and bottom of the stack.
Adds frames between the existing ones that are a blend of their neighbours.
Adds a reversed version of the stack to its top. The original top frame is not repeated nor frame 0. If you play a movie of a reversing stack as a loop it is like focusing up and down at a microscope.
Generate the frames for a Rocking Movie from a single stack.
Use a camera with a WIA driver to take pictures, focus on screen. Remember to select a source using File->Acquire->Select Source or press 'F8'. These Macro Sets are set up for my Logitech 4000 web cams, the time to take a picture and transfer it to the PC is 2 seconds, you may need to modify the macros if your equipment can do it faster, or needs more time.
A settings dialog appears, choose the number of frames you wish to average together for the next shot and click OK. When you have taken enough pictures click on Cancel. This is useful for taking noise free pictures with webcams etc.
When the settings dialog appears choose the number of duplicates as above and the delay between shots. Remember the time to take all of your shots for one picture must fit into the delay time.
These are for my personal setup, you may need to alter them for yours. The numbers in the names refer to the number of stepper motor steps i.e. the amount the fine focus knob is turned between shots. Fill in the parameters in on the dialog when it appears. Before starting focus the scope just above the subject, press 'F12' to raise the stage and count how many steps are needed to be in focus just below. This is the value entered for 'Test Steps'. 'Duplicates' is for noise reduction as above. If you wish a different actual step size to the test steps change the last value, notice the negative value here so the stage moves down and the objective can not crash.