Went out to Lydiard park today. My house is under a mile from it, but never been there before now. Played about with the various lenses, the most challenging was insect shots with the macro lens. This has a narrow DoF when used wide, and you need it for the light. Even with a 90mm lens, for 1:1 macro the minimum range is some 20cm or so. Try getting that close to an insect before it decides to disappear. I don’t think I was at min distance for this shot. All not helped by the wind, which messes up the manual focus. AF was wobbly too as any movement made it want to lock elsewhere. Anyway, this was the best shot, and I’m really happy with it
That’s excellent Mackerel!! I know what you mean about the close-ups. Insects are very skittish and are a bit camera shy, but when you get a pic like that, it’s all worth it.
If you want some help with the focus on macro’s try the continual autofocus if you’ve got the option. can help with your and the objects small movements.
When using the viewfinder (which I had to for the fine focus) the camera defaults to continuous focus mode. But there was enough movement so that it kept seeking. I found I could react better with a combination of moving distance and focus than the camera AF did I wonder if a motorised macro lens would react better in a case like this.
Hmmm at the minute I’m using a Tamaron 70-300 lense with a macro function (saving up again for a macro specific lense, ) and the AF is pretty swift on it. It takes ages to seek but once it’s got a bead on the target it’s pretty good. It could also be a camera thing as well since it controls the focus.
When you say “motorised macro lens” do you mean the motor in the lens?
The focus behaviour is generally as you describe it. But when trying to get very close to something on a plant in the wind, the subject movement is much more severe which causes much more AF work and higher chance of losing tracking and waiting to regain it again. I just found manual more flexible on that as I can wait for it to come back again.
At work they have the Canon 60mm USM macro model and it just seems so fast regardless of range. Blink of an eye fast. A weakness of Sony in general is they don’t put SSM into shorter lenses, instead relying on a body drive system. The Tamron 90mm macro takes a significant portion of a second to go from end to end.
Yeah my tamaron takes an age to go from end to end. The nikon kit thought with the speedier motor takes no time at all it seems and is fantastic on the continuous focusing. Guess it’s another thing to consider when purchasing a lens. Though I guess the pricier the model the better they’ll be.
I guess we’re no bug experts here. Showed pic to girl at work, and she said it was a damselfly not dragonfly. Have checked and confirmed it. Generally, damselflies fold their wings along the body when at rest like in my pic, and eyes are not joined. Dragonflies keep generally keep wings out all the time and eyes are closer together. Learn something new every day
Just happened to find the competition site again while searching for something else. Winners page here. I didn’t make it. With hindsight, I was concentrating so much on the technical details I didn’t consider composition then. I did also submit another dragonfly, but again while it was technically ok, it was lacking the wow in composition.
I know what you mean about the close-ups. Insects are very skittish and are a bit camera shy, but when you get a pic like that, it’s all worth it.