Grass Miniatures

I've been looking with interest lately here at all the macro and close-up work being posted, and whilst bugs and similar things are not for me, I enjoy flowers and have been seeking out hidden miniature examples. These few were right outside my front door buried within thick grass. The little flowers are about 2-3cm in diameter, and the lens front element was about 1.5ft from them.

On the K7 I attached 2 basic extension tubes (no contacts), 13 + 23mm, and then the Tamron Adaptall 135mm F2.8. This old lens from the 1970s has a Manual aperture switch to allow manual stop down, and I set apertures around F11 - F16. This was all handheld working, so there was no way that I was going to get enough steadiness with natural light at those sorts of apertures, so I used a Cactus RF60 flash in a softbox on the ground just to the right of the frame, triggered by the V6 radio trigger. I used ISO 200 and 1/180th sec .....





























Thanks for looking.... the biggest challenge with this sort of approach is focussing, as its very dark in the viewfinder and you don't want to move from the moment when focussing is achieved and the capture.

Really nice shots Nigel,
Love the quality of the lighting. Your focusing is bang on and as we have all come to expect from you the lighting is too.
Just lovely

I would like to see some bug shots from you, to see what can be achieved by someone who knows how to use flash properly.

You said you shot yours at 180th, when shooting macro I don't seem to have a 180th option. It will go from 160th to 200th and of course won't fire at 200th so I'm left shooting at 160th.
Any thoughts. As ever, shooting in manual.

Lovely soft light on these Nigel. Really brings out the detail where it counts.

Thanks Derek and Peter.

Derek, it's the camera custom setting for EV steps ..... This needs to be set to 1/2 ev steps I believe, then you can get 1/180th.

The lighting is going to be quite different to a ringflash and diffuser around the lens..... With a softbox of 60x60 cm this light source is about 300 times bigger than my subjects here, so softness is guaranteed!

The box is placed at 90deg off from the shooting angle, so it's an all enveloping light, but strongly directional, giving the shape and 'modelling' effect going from right to left across the subject.

I very much doubt I would be able to get the closeness and steadiness with bugs that you can Derek! Even a bit of a wind gust sends me into a panic and the softbox flying !

Very impressive. I particularly enjoy the lighting and detail in the second one.

Ahh the joys of hand held shooting in the breeze with a dof that's in the region of 5mm.


Its fairly obvious, the benefits of off camera flash even for this type of shooting, as the ringflash is just front on, so no option for real directional light.
Thanks for the ev steps thing. Will try it when I'm back home.

2nd one for me too
Colours, detail and comp, came together on this one.

I love them all..stunning shots expertly taken.
Must start learning to use my flash more

A very underrated camera the K7... And the capability of the tog isnt too bad either.....Well done Nigel.

Excellent shots Nigel...the sharpness in No. 2 is stunning.

I have to say, using off the camera flash with your setup for macros is not something I would have thought of really...almost more of a reason to consider buying some external flash than for portraits.

cheers

Karlo

Great images, Nigel - the d.o.f. effect makes the flowers really pop out from the background. Several members at the local club produce good flower shots in artificial light but often in front of a black background - I much prefer to see them in their o-o-f natural environment as you have presented them here.

Thank you.
Philip

Great work Nigel - I love the amount of detail in no 2 - fantastic!

Thank you Andy, and also to the others who have posted here, much appreciated. There's been some really interesting points and I'd like to respond to them later with more time, but for now I've got some quick shots showing the set-up and layout of the gear. I've put the camera in approximately the right position in relation to the softbox and one of the tiny flowers....(I was lying on the ground myself looking through the viewfinder).

Very informative and the outcome is just lovely!

The second image is the stand-out Nigel, both from a detail and composition point of view.

We really must try to get you interested in the bugs, I think you might treat us with some excellent images!

Regards
David

The lighting and DOF on both is spot on, really good

Keep and eye on the backgrounds and don't be afraid to do some gardening in the shot to remove anything that will detract the eye away from the point of interest in the frame