Macro lens vs extension tubes

I am looking to do a one off series of photographs to enter in a local art show. What I am planning is a set of town landmarks reflected in peoples eyes called (rather pretentiously) Reflections of the town.

Now I am sure I will need a macro facility for this as I have done some test shots with my 18 - 250 lens which are not great. But as I have no real general interest in macro photography then would a set of extension tubes allow me to produce what I am after or should I go for a proper macro lens and then sell it afterwards?

Thoughts appreciated.

Andy

Extension tubes, bellows, reversing the lens etc. will all do the job nicely and more cheaply. A macro lens, however, is much more convenient as you keep all your automatic functions and so forth. Macro lenses also have a flatter plane of focus important for photographing, well, flat things.

It also depends on how close you need to get to achieve the effect you want. Some zooms have a "macro" function --- rarely "true" macro --- which might be close enough, e.g., my Tamron 70--300mm has a useful close focus mode.

One warning, however. Macro work is strangely addictive...

K.

I would not get extension tubes for the DA18-250. You need to have tubes which allow aperture control and those are expensive.
Your probably better off with a 50mm lens and extension tubes or reverse mounting the 50mm lens onto your camera.

I've got an FA 50mm f1.4 so will look at that option.

Andy

Bear in mind the distance you'll need to be away from the eye so that you don't just end up with a reflection of your lens. Also, think about the composition of the final images. If you're aiming for a print that just has eyeball and reflection, you'll need a magnification greater than 1:1, so you could need macro lens + extension tubes, or decent longer focal length lens and bellows.

A 50mm lens at 1:1 magnification will only be an inch or so from the eyeball, so you may struggle with that to achieve a composition that doesn't include your reflection.

Dan

Luckily Dan is awake

Reversion would be problematic with distance, don't know how good long focal-length + extension tubes is.

A small but significant point about using macro lenses rather than tubes that hasn't been mentioned so far is that you will retain focus to infinity. Using tubes, you'll lose it, therefore a macro lens is much more versatile, but more expensive.

Go onto Ebay and find the cheapest 2x teleconverter with A contacts that you can. Knock out the glass and using a pair of molegrips unscrew whats left of the middle element. Make sure all the glass has been removed and then attach it to your camera and then connect the FA 1.4.

Cheap way of getting an A contact extension tube ... this was taken with the same thing I described and a 50mm f1.4 .. gives full aperture control as well.

Bubbles in a glass of lemonade.

That's a good idea, I'll have a look.

Thanks,
Andy

Barely awake though!

The problem with long focal lengths and extension tubes is that you need proportionally longer extension to get the same magnification as you would with shorter focal lengths. That's not such a problem if using bellows, but you might need quite a few extension tubes (or modified converters! ) to get the required magnification.

Dan

What you really need is a FA* 200 macro lens. That'll do the job nicely. Oh look... a squadron of flying pigs. Now there is something one doesn't see every day.

K.