When to Macro?

[Marcel Walker]

Let me preface this post with simply stating, I haven't done much still life, mainly just portraiture and my camera knowledge is not much.

I would like to know what I should have done with my lens or settings to make this work. I was shooting with the 24-70 2.8 canon lens. I shot at 200 ISO on a tripod with a timer at 70mm (not really because I shot with a Canon 1D Mark II, conversion rate 1.3, so 91mm) at f4 at 1/20. I was maybe 36 inches from the set up so I thought I would be okay but obviously I need to figure out how to read the depth of field guide. I had to sharpen in RAW and after.

Can I use this lens and make this kind of picture work?

It's ok that it didn't turn out because it just wasn't what I wanted. For starters, it wasn't nearly as gross as it should have been.

This shot is entitled "Clean".

 

[Marcel Walker]

never mind

uhhh......little emabarassed...found the macro section....never mind....

 

[charlie chipman]

I am not sure I understand your question(s).

The lens you used is definitely not suitable for macro photography because it is not a macro lens, but this picture is not a macro picture either, it is a close up. If you want to get closer with this lens you can use the canon 500D close up attachment, but if you want macro close you will have to get a macro lens.

As for the picture I don't know what your goal was so it's difficult to what would make it work for you. You want it dirtier wash the toilet bowl with the tooth brush first, if you want more depth of field stop down your aperture to f/8 or f/11.


As a side note just because you are using a 1.3 crop sensor camera that does not change your lens from a 70mm to a 91mm lens.

 

[Asher Kelman]

Marcel,

Charlie is correct in everything he says. You can have a Macro picture by getting up much close with a lens that can focus at that distance. When you so that, the very structure and form of the subject becomes intimate and of greater stature than it would be taken with a normal lens.

Just let's digress and think of taking a picture of a dog. We can point our camera down and tak a picture. However, the dog will be less important. We need to get on the floor and redo the image looking up at the dog to bring it to the importance and rank it might have in it's animal world.

Now let's consider the macro picture of a grasshopper or a screw head. When done well, the subjects are rendered as 3 dimensional things of significent importance. They matter and are no longer trivial. They have a presence like an actor delviering a solilque on stage or the dance of a ballerina.

You might find such characteristics by blowing up part of your image taken with a longer lens. However, it will likely be too flat and compressed. Ideally, we don't discover things in images, (although, we try to do that), but art generally needs prescience, a knowledge beforehand of what one wants.

I'd invest in a macro lens. The 100mm Canon or the 150mm Sigma are great lenses. There's a brief review of lens possibilities here. I use the EF 50mm 2.5 Macro, but it's too short. You can get a reversing mount for a longer lens and add a 50 mm 1.8 lens, for example, backward on the front of your lens or else a macro lens to the filter screw. Canon makes one. You can also add space rings which will icrease the magnification. The latter two options are relatively inexpensive.

 

[Marcel Walker]

Thank you Charlie and Asher for you knowledge and correction.

For clarification, the picture didn't work for me because the depth of field was not great enough and it was not gross enough. I was assured by a number of teenage boys, not my own, that it really could have been much better. It's always nice to have a number of things to work on.

Thank you again for you help!

 

[Asher Kelman]

Actually, Marcel, it may be worth reposting the image with the background blurred. That might unify the picture. At present it breaks the picture up. Is that something you can do?

Asher

 

[Marcel Walker]

For the record

Well I'm going to have to hunt my friends houses for some supplies, but I know enough teenage boys that I should be find something. I am terribly partial to the "concept" of the picture.

Ok, for the record, shoot it at f/8 or f/11 and and then blur da background?

Where can I can Will Thompon's post. I tried a search, no dice.