Reversing ring

On Ebay I found an original Pentax reverse adapter for £12 inc postage which turned out to be in excellent condition, so decided to have a try today - well it is Father's Day so I don't have my usual chores! It has a 49mm thread so is a fit for an SMC DFA 1:2.8 50mm macro and an HD DFA 1:2 35mm, both of which have manual aperture rings. I have just tried it on the 35mm for now as that is supposed to give greater magnification, but here is the weird thing: the focus ring makes no difference. The only way to focus is move backwards and forwards which on a tripod with a standard head is hit and miss, so for accurate and focus stacking a macro head is a must, which I don't have. Of course there is very shallow depth of field even stopped right down. Here are a couple of poppy seed heads, both at f16:




I would be interested to hear of other people's experiences with one of these.

These are intended for magnifications greater than 1X which usually means with bellows or tubes. You would be better off using just tubes at least the 'A' contacts work with the correct ones.

The Pentax manual for tubes covers the reversing ring and gives the magnifications possible.

I don't think the Pentax tubes have contacts. Jessops ones do and are described as AF, but AF doesn't work.

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The Jessops ones need the paint scraping off where the pins meet but otherwise work very well indeed.
Sticking with the two-unit, reversed lens setup described in the O.P. another way to get around the focusing
problem is to put the subject on a sliding table of some sort in front of the lens. That way you don't need
to awkwardly move the entire camera-tripod ensemble.

So, putting it onto a BPM Focus-Slide, mounted on a second tripod for example, allows the tiniest, precision changes.



Looking at this .....



You end up with this ....



This was a 'one-click' image - no stacking, no messing, just tedious focusing. That is money spider silk with
sub mm droplets on it. The detail and the quality are amazing, especially the way the droplets provide
extra magnification of the silk and yet further reflections of it from the back walls of the droplets.

Changing the topic to gardening, I have found this to be an excellent use for spent solar lights. You can
plant them up with all manner of small succulents provided the soil is free draining. Then you use the
original spike to place them wherever you wish.

That is an amazing result, thanks for posting.

Echo that - plus thanks for the Gardening Tip