Macro Flower

[tonycoyle]

I'm trying my had at Macro stuff again - I have a (very) cheap Quantary 70-300mm tel lens that allows macro in the 180 to 300 range. That makes it very challenging to get enough stability or light (for outdoors anyway, which is where all the interesting shots are!)

This is one shot of a flower in a bed in my front yard. I've isolated it in Photoshop, and other than color balance (via Adobe Raw) the black background (for printing), and resize (to fit the upload limits) no other manipulations were done.

[kombizz]

Re: Macro Flower

you need better exposure

[rogleale]

Re: Macro Flower

Sorry Tony, but for me the essential of shots like these is that the subject is in focus, and none of this flower is in focus.
Roger

[ash]

Re: Macro Flower

Certainly bright and pops off the screen but theres no clarity and shapness to the flower.
Maybe santa could bring you a macro lens.

[jds9000]

Re: Macro Flower

Is there any way you could take the shot using a tripod ?
Surely then, a longer exposure with a lower F-stop ......

er .... I think !!
Or is it a higher iso and a faster shutter ....

Something like that ..... ah .... too many ciders today !!


Jay

[jds9000]

Re: Macro Flower



Took this with an old canon 80-200 ..... on my old 300D years ago ...

iso 100
F5.6
1/200"
at 166mm

so you don't need an L lens ... (but it helps )

Jay

[ash]

Re: Macro Flower

That is kinda confusing for anybody reading.
Let me put it a sober way

Firstly if your out in the field, tripods are not always convenient.
But for this exercise lets just say that it is convenient.

By using a tripod this will mean:

you can close the aperture blades within the lens smaller (higher f number) which will give you more depth of field ( more things in focus).
But by doing this you are reducing the light entering the lens so you need a longer shutter speed to let the required amount of light into the lens to expose your image. Hence the need for a tripod because you cannot hold the camera steady for a long shutter speed.
Ok now your saying well whats a long shutter speed, well without going on all night, if I was shooting at 28mm thats like as wide as a normal lens will go, I would not go below 1/30 sec without vr or image stabilisation. As a guide match you shutter speed for your focal length 'at least' and you will not go far wrong.

Using a high iso number will mean you can attain a faster shutter speed but at the expense of noise or grain on the final image.

Just think of, APERTURE as light entering the lens.
SHUTTER SPEED as how long it will expose the image for.
and ISO as how sensitive you want to make the image to light, but at the expense of noise.

Its taken me 5 years to get my head around what Ive said above and be able to use all three aspects comfortably together in manual exposure mode on a camera. If you understand what they do then you have cracked it, then there's all the other stuff like white balance, flash etc.

Ive tried to make it clear for any novices on the forum, which I once was, I no how confusing it is, Ill share what ive learnt, just ask.

For an example, this was taken at 150mm f2.8 @ 1/125sec iso 100 handheld.
Because i am already at 150mm, ive instantly decreased the depth of field to a very small amount, and because I am so close to the caterpillar this has reduced this even more, even if Ide have had the light to close the apperture to f22 the whole of this image would still not be in focus.
This is the problem you have with long focal macro lenses, but they have there uses.
I would purchase a macro lens between 50 & 70mm if you are just getting your first macro lens. And you dont have to spend alot to get exceptional results.

[ash]

Re: Macro Flower

Note to admin, this might also be of use in 'help and advice for beginers' or 'camera technique'

[tonycoyle]

Re: Macro Flower

Thanks all for the helpful comments

I agree with the sharpness. From what y'll have said, four problems contributed:

1. It was very windy (difficult to get an accurate focus)
2. It wasn't very bright (needed to open up, reducing the DOF too much)
3. My exposure was too long for the conditions (exacerbating blurriness)
4. The lens is pretty 'soft' to begin with (nuf said)

I'll try again - with more controlled conditions - to see if I can improve on this.

Thanks!

Tony

[Jocelyn Walker]

Re: Macro Flower

The colours are great! Macro photography can be very rewarding! Its a subject I love to dabble & practice with! Did you use a tripod or like myself, mainly take hand held pics! The problem with hand held, camera shake tends to blur the focus a tad!

[Jocelyn Walker]

Re: Macro Flower

This was a macro shot taken the other day with my Nikon compact in macro mode, also hand held! A slight breeze making life difficult too! Thus focus seems a bit soft!

[tonycoyle]

Re: Macro Flower

love the colors!

My daughter would love that as a quilt cover!

[tonycoyle]

Re: Macro Flower

problem is the lens is too long, leading to major issues with DOF/aperture/speed trade offs.

I'll need to get something shorter than 180mm if I'm to do anything outside the (nonexistent) studio

[tonycoyle]

Re: Macro Flower

Ash

Thanks for the detailed explanation.

I think its a combo of everything. the extremely shallow DOF (due to180mm+ on my lens) is certainly a factor. That and wind and noobish behaviors = not sharp.

I'll look to get a shorter lens for macro (the tele was for tele work anyway -- the macro was a 'bonus')

I've posted another version of a similar flower, but clamped to a stand on my desk. So no wind, no shakes, and using a tripod.

I hope you'll agree it's much sharper. But the DOF is still an issue even at f22 (as with this image). 1800mm makes it too shallow.

[tonycoyle]

Re: Macro Flower

1800? oppes I meant 180!