Here is a quick snapshot of a work in progress.  So far I have taken over 2000 photographs of the 32 odd beetles displayed below.  Using my Macro Rig, I try and take three sets of 21 odd photographs of each beetle, one on it's side, top and bottom.  I then use the wonderful CombineZP software to combine a stack of photos into one photograph.  See my Macro Rig project for some examples of this. 

 The Living Atlas of Living Australia has reviewed a lot of software that can help in Biological software world.   You can download the 300+ page 2008 report here:  http://www.ala.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/ALA-Tools-Review-February-2008.pdf  [6.8MB]

BRAHMS a UK based free Database:     http://herbaria.plants.ox.ac.uk/bol/  BRAHMS a UK based free Database

US Based Open Source and free Database:   http://specifysoftware.org/   

Atlas of Living Australia:     http://www.ala.org.au/about-the-atlas/downloadable-tools/open-source-sof...

• After a bit of use, I found that the camera button servo motor was stressing out the slim bit of wood that was meant to hold it in place.  In the end, I went back out to the shed and redesigned a more robust servo motor holder.  The new mount is easily holding it in place:

Unknown beetle from around Capel.  Some sections are still out of focus. 

unknown beetle from around Capel 2012.  Note the haloing effect from movement in one or more of the beetle photographs, compared with the others.

unknown beetle from around Capel - 2012

Part 1 of this project talks about the initial project concept and testing.  Part 2 goes into building the Macro Prototype Rig.  This blog post describes some of the electronics that operate the rig.