Stinky and the Fly

[bloodhound31]

Today I thought I would go practice with RAW instead of JPEG, thanks to the good advice from Troy.

I also used the Canon Digital Professional Software for the initial processing (very subtle) and conversion to JPEG. I then put it through Photoshop as usual just to crop a little and whack my name on them.

Stinky - 55mm 1/125sec F5.6 ISO 800 no flash.
The Fly - 51mm 1/80sec F5.6 ISO 800 no flash.

Troy, I also took the filters off and used only the 4x on its own. I have a 1x, 2x, and 4x. Previously I have been using combinations but your advice about image degradation through multiple layers of glass at the expense of magnification is good.

Definitely a lot smoother.

Baz.

I am keeping a log of my progressive improvements on Photobucket. http://s136.photobucket.com/albums/q184/bloodhound31/Barry%20Armstead%20Photography/Macro%20Photography%20by%20Barry%20 Armstead/

[Jen]

:eyepop: wow Baz that is so cool :thumbsup: even though i hate bugs :lol:

[troypiggo]

Like the action of the first shot, it's a great pose. And you're definitely getting the natural light exposure down pat now. I know I'm sounding like a broken record, but see how narrow the depth of field is? You're right at the limits of balancing ISO/noise, shutter speeds/motion blur, aperture/depth of field I reckon. If you had a flash it gives you more light to allow you to do a bit more with the aperture and maybe drop that ISO or something. I don't know any more tricks for natural light shooting - I've given you all I've got... unless you reflect sunlight maybe. Get something to bounce sunlight off to make the area you're shooting brighter?

[bloodhound31]

Thanks Jen. :thumbsup:

I'm hearing ya Troy. Yeah, trying to get that light meter to balance in the zero without the flash is hard, especially in the late afternoon overcast failing light. I opened the aperture up as much as I could, dropped the shutter speed as much as I dared, and it was still underexposed. I had no choice but to up the ISO, which I would prefer to keep down to 400 or even 200.

The built in flash introduces all kinds of horrible reflections and sometimes when I am real close, it even inrtoduces shadows from the lens. Yuk.

I will keep practicing though, but I might be limited to brighter times of day until I get the new gear next year. Thanks again for your tips mate.:thumbsup:

Baz.

[dpastern]

Interestingly, I used the inbuilt flash on my D60 (Canon) for a while and was quite happy with the results. Not perfect, but certainly usable imho.

Good shots Baz, although the first one isn't a stink bug. Flash is the way to go with macro imho. When I get a Mark IV, then I'll be doing natural light macro images. Here's a fly shot, natural light that I took from a few years ago:

http://www.macro-images.com/images/Macro/Insects/Flies/slides/F79C8528.jpg

Dave