Simple ways to start Macro photography

This is follow up from thisThread.
Brian is new to this site and has great interest in Macro photography, asking for help. I thought this might be of use for others too who want to start macro for the first time and thought it is too difficult or needs too much tools. Simple solutions are suggest here. Have fun reading.

World of Macro is all about "Magnification" in its extreme form. You might have seen a dedicated lens for macro that for eg says it is a 1:1 macro lens. All that means is the image that lens creates at its focal length (Other side of lens from object) is exactly the same size in terms of its lenght in Cm or inch compare to exact size of object itself. A Macro 1:1 lens, when lens at its max magnification, can produce an image from for eg a 1/2 inch coin, that is its virtual image on the film or sensor that is exactly half an inch in diameter.

To achieve magnification adequate for macro photography, you can do several things utilizing your current camera and lens, only you may need appropriate accessories, some of which a lot cheaper that others or even free.

1- Add on the lens, Plus lenses. Usually you can find a set or +1, +2 +4 that should be same size as your filter size of current lens (Say 58mm filter thread size of a kit Canon lens). This is not the best option as you get a lot of chromatic aberrations, distortion but is a modestly priced and a simple solution. Smaller numbered lenses give smaller magnification and combination of them can be done to add on the magnification factor and effect.
Here is an eg LINK

2- You can physically keep your current lens off from its attachment site of camera, but in the same axis and move it away to see great magnification in view finder. Do it right now. remove you lens from camera body and point to a very close object that is well lighted and you keep the body in same axis as lens and object, then moving the lens forward or backwards to get the right focus. You see that the closer you object is to front of lens, the farther lens goes away from camera to focus right and larger get the magnification. You are physically limited at the point that your lens front touches the object and you can't get any closer.
This is the concept of using a Macro Bellow or Macro Ring / tubes. You need an air tight connection between camera and lens and that is what Ring/Tube or Bellow gives you. With below you can simply add the length as you need to get larger magnification but with tubes as physical length is limited in each, you can use the smallest for low mag or largest, then combination of them to get ultra magnification:
LINK to Bellow

LINK to Macro Rings
The good part of ring is when equipped, it can give you a full electrical connection to your lens so your AF, Auto exposure in various modes, flash use in TTL remains functional but don’t expect to get AFing. You need to learn how to do it manually like bellow by moving the whole setup or your object closer or away from lens. You can not have electrical communication with bellow. So everything manual. Exposure could be AV for ease of it. You will want M ultimately once you master the situation.

3- Now comes more tricky things. If you have any other lens at home, please find it, keep it in reverse direction in front of your camera with camera’s normal lens already attached; that is filter side of second lens (In your left hand) towards you and in close approximation to filter ring of your camera lens, bayonet side towards the object to be imaged (In well lighted area) and you need to move forwards or backwards toward the object to see the image in view finder well focused. Be aware that you need to get really close to your object and you magnification factor will be a lot larger than what you have tried so far.
So if you have the second lens, you are already ready to go. Even if this is an old manual lens that are the best for this function. If you are a handyman and can use that friendly duct tape to get a fixed stable attachment between two lenses you are ready to go. Then if you liked this approach that should give you something light low power microscope magnification and want a more traditional and professional approach, you need to buy a reverse ring (Very cheap) or what is known as Male to Male Reverse Ring( L I N K )
This is my suggestion as is the cheapest, you get the best and highest mag (But is not variable unless your second lens is a zoom) and you need to pay attention to the exact size of your normal lens and then the second lens filter size. The eg above is for a 58 to 58 mm lens ring. You can use step down or up rings to fit them on a Reverse ring but then you may as well buy the right size at first that gives you one step solution at cheapest price. Image quality is very good here. But once you start, you will learn how “Light” is crucial and then probably you should involve yourself with maro flash or homemade flash for macro that there are several good threads here in this wonderful forum. Also even if you keep the current lens in reverse order, filter ring kept in close contact with camera body, and look through view finder, you see a great magnification and there are these type adapters also that is one side is bayonet say EOS, the other end is a male screw filter type thread that accepts the lens in reverse order. Same concept but first option above with two lens is my favorite.

4- You can point a small lens camera say a PnS camera at the objective lens of a microscope and get ultra high magnification of an specimen. This is Digiscopy and if you have or know someone or some place that have microscope, worth to try for extreme magnification. You may find this interesting for say picturing a small bug or plant subcomponent or even Snowflakes.

5- Attaching a camera to a microscope for direct imaging via T adapter ring. I think this is totally out of our discussion scope for now.

6- Buy a dedicated macro lens. Its expensive but gives you all electrical connection, AFing, TTL flash convenience etc. Sigma 105mm F2.8 or Canon 60mm F2.8 are excellent eg of 1:1 AF macro lenses.

No matter what you do, Light is your First key issue. As I said either experiment under direct sun light or try a DIY macro flash, say a flash used over off camera flash shoe cord that can be bought for a cheap price. (L I N K)

Then your second main problem is a very shallow depth of field (DOF) that macro will bring in. So you want to use you very narrow apertures (Large F number). This means your field will go dark and difficult to focus. So you need to do step down once you achieved the correct focusing to get into correct narrow aperture for light adjustment when camera is on AV mode.
Your third problem is motion. At high magnification, everything magnifies specially motion. You want to find a steady place for your camera. Look into what you can do with current tripod.

You are ready to explore the world of Macro.
Have fun.

Great write up! Thanks for taking the time!

Thanks. Will try the M to M ring using 58 to 52mm threads.

Got my ring and looks like i ordered the wrong thing and have to try again

If this is for macro, make sure it is showing the threads on both ends, the same way your filters have threads toward the camera end (Not outer subject end That threads are made internal to barrel and you can't see it by looking full at the side). The one that has tread one on each side exactly like your regular filters (One out side the rign thread, one inside are step up or step down only threads).

Here's what you need. I bought a couple from them in different sizes. Work just fine.

^^^ That is exactly correct.
Male to Male is the key word and at that price, just a bargain.
Ed do you mind if to share some of your images with inverse 2nd lens here to show samples?

I am not a macro guy, but i am interested in it, so please bear with my question. In doing option #3, when using a number of different combination of lenses i have in reverse or taped to another lens, I get heavy vignetting. The result is usually just a circle in the center. How does one minimize or avoid vignetting like that?

losangelino wrote in post #15760010
In doing option #3, when using a number of different combination of lenses i have in reverse or taped to another lens, I get heavy vignetting. The result is usually just a circle in the center. How does one minimize or avoid vignetting like that?

You are probably using a wider lens in your camera when compare to the a say tele or larger focal length lens attached to inverse ring adapter.

If you go reverse, say use a 200mm lens on camera then attached to a wider diameter thread lens (A wider angle lens with larger F number), you should see a lot less, if any vignette. Another way to deal is to use a zoom on camera and then as you zoom, actually you only change the circle of view, making it wider or narrower.

In general its always a good idea to have a larger FL on camera than what is thread on its filter end. You do get a larger distance from your tiny subject with a better area for placing flash or that very much needed light.

So make sure you are not attaching your wide angle on camera then a longer FL over the thread. See if this can help.

I was trying my primes (85mm and canon 50 1.4 and an old 50 1.8 FD lens). Didnt try with the 70-200 I will try that. Thank you.

Oh one more thing.
Make sure your threaded lens (Inverse one on the adapter) Has its diaphragm fully open.
When needing narrow F for macro, use only the one attached to camera directly and not outer lens.

You should be perfectly fine with 70-200 that give you abilty to change the "Circle size" and also "Working distance".

I do some macro stuff and was interested in seeing some of the wide angle discussions - e.g. where you see a sharp bug and some recognisable if OOF distant landscape. Here the answer seems to be to machine a very thin macro ring for use on your fave wide angle lens.

This generally means loss of aperture control and focus assist, not to mention being quite difficult if you don't have access to a lathe. I wondered if the cheap +1 dioptre filter screw lens would be better as:

easy
aperture and focus assist work
bonus: if you hit the subject with the lens it is only the cheap lens.

or is the image quality (especially with the difficulty in lighting the subject so close to the lens) so bad you shouldn't even start down this route?