close up filters / macro

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troytime

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Jan 3, 2006
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Thanks. I was getting ready to throw it away.

For those of you with a real macro lens, do you still have to stop it way down to get more than a few millimeters of depth? Or is that just the result of close-up filters?
 
fuzzybabybunny

fuzzybabybunny

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The pics look soft and lacking detail, at least compared to a macro lens or regular lens + extension tubes or other close-up filters like the Canon 500D.

And yes, with a real macro lens you still have to stop down a lot to get decent DOF. Balancing DOF and light loss and lens sharpness is a constant problem in macro photography.

If you want good DOF, you have to stop down your lens to something like f/8. Stopping down further, like to f/16, will get you more DOF, but as you stop down past f/8 your lens will get softer and lose detail due to diffraction. Stopping down also means you'll need more light or a longer shutter speed, which is usually hard to work with.

Then there are situations where no matter how much you stop down, you just can't get enough DOF. In these instances you would need to attempt focus stacking with programs such as Helicon Focus or CombineZ.

EDIT: Just looked at the EXIF data on your beetle shot.

1/4s, f/22? This would definitely severely hinder your sharpness.

f/22 on basically any lens will be very very soft. f/16 will be soft. f/5.6 - f/8 is usually the sweet spot for sharpness.

The 1/4s shutter speed isn't helping you either, even if you were using a tripod. At this speed the vibration from the mirror slap will cause enough movement to blur a photo. You would need to use mirror lock up plus a remote shutter cord, and make perfectly sure that the beetle and tripod are motionless. Even so, it's best to get at least 1/30s IMO.
 
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troytime

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Jan 3, 2006
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<div class="FTQUOTE"><begin quote>Originally posted by: fuzzybabybunny
The pics look soft and lacking detail, at least compared to a macro lens or regular lens + extension tubes or other close-up filters like the Canon 500D.

And yes, with a real macro lens you still have to stop down a lot to get decent DOF. Balancing DOF and light loss and lens sharpness is a constant problem in macro photography.

If you want good DOF, you have to stop down your lens to something like f/8. Stopping down further, like to f/16, will get you more DOF, but as you stop down past f/8 your lens will get softer and lose detail due to diffraction. Stopping down also means you'll need more light or a longer shutter speed, which is usually hard to work with.

Then there are situations where no matter how much you stop down, you just can't get enough DOF. In these instances you would need to attempt focus stacking with programs such as Helicon Focus or CombineZ.

EDIT: Just looked at the EXIF data on your beetle shot.

1/4s, f/22? This would definitely severely hinder your sharpness.

f/22 on basically any lens will be very very soft. f/16 will be soft. f/5.6 - f/8 is usually the sweet spot for sharpness.

The 1/4s shutter speed isn't helping you either, even if you were using a tripod. At this speed the vibration from the mirror slap will cause enough movement to blur a photo. You would need to use mirror lock up plus a remote shutter cord, and make perfectly sure that the beetle and tripod are motionless. Even so, it's best to get at least 1/30s IMO.</end quote></div>


that is great advice, thank you!
I had the camera in aperture priority, i just kept increasing the aperture until the DOF was more than JUST the bugs head...and even then the bugs abdomen was out of focus.

i was using a tripod, but i didn't use the mirror lock up (forgot how)
I was using 2 second timer to prevent any human vibration

I have the nikon 1.8 50mm, maybe i'll get some exension tubes and try it that way.

EDIT: ZOMG, i just looked at your pics fuzzy, they're amazing!!
 
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troytime

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Do i have to get the automatic ones? Or will the 10 dollar ones work for what i want to do?

I'm still a noob, but i CAN manual focus now ;)
 
fuzzybabybunny

fuzzybabybunny

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You want to get the automatic ones because the 10 dollar ones don't allow you to stop down your lens.
 
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troytime

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Jan 3, 2006
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Originally posted by: fuzzybabybunny
You want to get the automatic ones because the 10 dollar ones don't allow you to stop down your lens.
Click to expand...

my 50mm has the aperture ring, should i still get the auto ones?
 
fuzzybabybunny

fuzzybabybunny

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Originally posted by: troytime
<div class="FTQUOTE"><begin quote>Originally posted by: fuzzybabybunny
You want to get the automatic ones because the 10 dollar ones don't allow you to stop down your lens.</end quote></div>

my 50mm has the aperture ring, should i still get the auto ones?
Click to expand...

The problem with this is focusing while stopped down. Say that you don't use an auto tube, so you use the aperture ring to stop your lens down to f/8, and then you try to focus. You're looking through your lens while it is stopped down, which means the picture will be darker and it will be hard to gauge when you've got stuff in focus in all but the most brightly lit subjects. You could first focus wide open and then stop down when you're ready to take the shot, but this simple movement of turning the aperture ring will most likely throw you out of focus again with the shallow DOF of macro photography.

The advantage of auto extension tubes is that they allow you to focus wide open and then stop down automatically during the shot.
 
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troytime

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Jan 3, 2006
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ahhh, so auto is the way to go.

looks like the kenko tubes are about 100 bucks :

maybe i'd be better off getting the phoenix 100mm macro (manual focus)
 
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