Bees at twice life size

Dalantech

Mark Plonsky, a macro shooter that I look up to, told me that I need to get closer and to put everything I've got between the camera and the lens. So here is the end result of the first outing with a Canon Xti + 25mm tube + 1.4 teleconverter + 12mm tube + lens (in that order). Manual mode F11, 1/200, ISO 100. MR-14 EX ring flash set to a 4:1 ratio.

Lord Vetinari

Wonderful series- lovely little bee with great eyes and lovely texture. Think you lost slight detail using the TC but excellent focus and compositions especially considering your no cropping rule.
BTW is Mark taller than you ?
Brian V.

Dalantech

Lord Vetinari wrote:

Wonderful series- lovely little bee with great eyes and lovely texture. Think you lost slight detail using the TC but excellent focus and compositions especially considering your no cropping rule.
BTW is Mark taller than you ?
Brian V.

! I'm only 5' 6" -so most of the planet is taller than me

I may have to invest in a better set of tubes -maybe the Kenko ones will get me close to 2x without the TC. I thought about dropping to F8 with the TC, but depth of field was pretty shallow at F11...

Awais Yaqub

Wonderful photos
How much it weighs when shoot with all those things and how far you were when shoot these pics

When i was shooting flowers i noticed bugs are really sensitive to focus beep. Don't all DSLRs make shutter sound ?

Lord Vetinari

Dalantech wrote:

! I'm only 5' 6" -so most of the planet is taller than me

I may have to invest in a better set of tubes -maybe the Kenko ones will get me close to 2x without the TC. I thought about dropping to F8 with the TC, but depth of field was pretty shallow at F11...

A set of kenkos will take you to just above 2:1 with the 100mm canon and you could always use your existing tubes as well and get to 3:1.
Brian V.

Dalantech

Awais Yaqub wrote:

Wonderful photos
How much it weighs when shoot with all those things and how far you were when shoot these pics

When i was shooting flowers i noticed bugs are really sensitive to focus beep. Don't all DSLRs make shutter sound ?

Not so heavy, but the balance was odd. I had to put my tripod mount back on the lens so I could attach it to the brace I use (instead of attaching to the camera). The front of the lens was less than five inches from the bee.

Butterflies can "hear" the mirror slap and jump before the shutter opens...

Dalantech

Lord Vetinari wrote:

A set of kenkos will take you to just above 2:1 with the 100mm canon and you could always use your existing tubes as well and get to 3:1.
Brian V.

Sounds like a plan

Skippy

Dalantech wrote:

Mark Plonsky, a macro shooter that I look up to, told me that I need to get closer and to put everything I've got between the camera and the lens. So here is the end result of the first outing with a Canon Xti + 25mm tube + 1.4 teleconverter + 12mm tube + lens (in that order). Manual mode F11, 1/200, ISO 100. MR-14 EX ring flash set to a 4:1 ratio.

Nice Series John, sometimes getting that close you lose out on the rest of the bug, why don't they just make us a lens that lets us have the whole dang thing in focus??? surely they can come up with one ???

I see you posted further down the page here that everything on the planet is taller than you, well your taller than me hahaha, I'm only 5ft nuffin.

Have you tried shooting close without using the 1.4 Converter,
and comparing the differences at all ??

I'm impressed with you bee's eyes, they look nothing like the eyes on the bees I have photographed in the past.

Thanks for sharing your pollen covered friends ........ Skippy
.

ShepsMom

Stunning!!! In times like this i wish i was a midget.

Dalantech

Skippy wrote:

Nice Series John, sometimes getting that close you lose out on the rest of the bug, why don't they just make us a lens that lets us have the whole dang thing in focus??? surely they can come up with one ???

We can send a man to the moon but we can't bend the laws of physics...

Skippy wrote:

I see you posted further down the page here that everything on the planet is taller than you, well your taller than me hahaha, I'm only 5ft nuffin.

Good things come in small packages -at least that's what Mom use to say

Skippy wrote:

Have you tried shooting close without using the 1.4 Converter,
and comparing the differences at all ??

Not at the same magnification, but I have shot them with all of my tubes for about 1.6 times life size. Using the TC adds more glass and increases diffraction, so shooting with tubes alone will always give you better image quality. When Mark first told me to put everything I have on the camera I was a little hesitant because I was concerned about the image quality. But Mark knows a heck of a lot more about shooting macro than I do, so I took his advice...

The next time I shoot with tubes and TC I'm gonna drop my aperture down to f9 and see if the image quality improves. Depth of field will drop, so I'll have to watch the angles that I shoot from (I was doing that yesterday to get the most out of F11).

Skippy wrote:

I'm impressed with you bee's eyes, they look nothing like the eyes on the bees I have photographed in the past.

Thanks for sharing your pollen covered friends ........ Skippy
.

Everything changes when you shoot it up close...

Dalantech

ShepsMom wrote:

Stunning!!! In times like this i wish i was a midget.

Uh, no you don't....

Thanks for the props! :cool