Reader Mark Sturtevant specializes in insect photography, and sent us four nice photos;
I do most of my macro photography with a Canon SLR camera that is equipped with a stock 50mm lens and extension tubes (but I am saving up for a top ‘o the line macro lens). Although I have enjoyed some success with this equipment, many subjects are too large and/or too camera shy for the close approach required with extension tubes. The solution is of course to use a telephoto lens, working near the closest focal point of these lenses. But my first instinct is to be a cheapskate, and so inexpensive alternatives must be considered.
Back in the early ‘80s, Canon had switched from their old ‘Fd’ mounting system for fully manual lenses to a different mount for their electronic focus (EF) lenses. This meant that there were decades worth of perfectly good lenses that were suddenly obsolete. This huge stockpile of old Fd lenses can still be had at bargain prices, and they are easily fitted to the modern cameras with an adapter. So I bought an old Canon Fd 72-210 mm lens for $35 on Craigslist, and an Fd-EF adapter. There are compromises for using legacy lenses on modern cameras. Because the lens is set farther from the camera sensor I lose at least one f-stop, and of course the lens is fully manual for setting the focus and aperture. But as you can see from the pictures below, this old piece of glass can still take pretty good pictures!
A Copper butterfly (Lycaena hyllus) on Joe-Pye weed (Eutrochium spp.) which is an awesome native plant that attracts lots of butterflies.
The lovely Halloween pennant dragonfly (Celithemis eponina). The red markings near the wing tips are the stigma (a definite Christian reference) which are weighted areas on dragonfly wings that are thought to dampen wing vibrations. It was so windy that this insect was being whipped back and forth in my viewfinder, and it was barely hanging on.
The Great spangled fritillary (Speyeria cybele). These large butterflies seem to prefer purple flowers, and if you look for them in Bugguide the pictures there pretty much agree. They are common in my favorite field, and there they seek out the Wild bergamot flowers (Monarda fistulosa). It is fun to watch them as they daintily turn around and around on a flower, probing each floret. Then off they flit to find another such flower among the many other flowers. They also seem territorial, since any orange butterfly that flies near is immediately chased it away.
And finally, a regal Monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) that honored us by coming to our butterfly bush (Buddleia davidii). There have been many nice lepidopteran visiters to these flowers, and I am very intent on planting quite a few more. Maybe I will also sneak in some Joe-Pye weed as well, and hope my wife does not object.
Reblogged this on Mon site officiel / My official website.
Lovely photos, thanks!
I admire your resourcefulness!
I’m sure you already know about putting a reversed wide prime lens on a telephoto, for extra magnification. You only need a $3 adapter for that. Also, you can very cheaply spiff up your new old Canon zoom with a high-quality close-up lens like a Raynox. These are incredibly good. I highly recommend them. And unlike extension tubes, you lose no light with these, and maintain a very respectable working distance.
I should add that the Raynox lenses also can serve as excellent tube lenses for infinity-corrected microscope objectives, so you can use microscope objectives on your camera to get amazing results. Some microscope objectives are surprisingly cheap.
Yes, these are very good points. I will have to look into the Raynox lenses. The other add-on lenses that I had seen are reviewed as giving a lot of distortion in the periphery, but that brand is considered much higher in quality.
One of my schemes to try out next summer is to reverse mount a 50mm prime lens to the end of my other 50mm lens, and having that on extension tubes. This would allow me to keep aperture control in the more proximal lens. Right now, my only way to get super close-ups is by reverse mounting a single prime lens onto extension tubes, but with that set up I lose aperture control and so I need to pre-set the aperture to be closed down. In this situation it is pretty dark in the viewfinder.
Perhaps you know about John Hallmen (https://www.flickr.com/photos/johnhallmen/), who is one of the amazing insect photographers. He seems to specialize in using the craziest combinations of lenses, including microscope lenses, diffusers, and assorted other gadgets to take stunning pictures. Clicking on his Photostream and then Gear is great way to just geek out for a while on unusual equipment.
Yes, I know of John’s work, which is extraordinary.
I can vouch for the quality of the 150 and 250 models of the Raynox lenses. They are not just a single lens, like typical close-up attachments, but are multiple-lens achromats that are really good, though it is best to stop your aperture down a bit. I and others have also found them to be better than any other reasonably-priced solution for mounting modern microscope lenses on a camera.
Your scheme to reverse-mount a 50mm lens on another 50mm lens is, I think, not a good idea. Far better to reverse the 50mm on your new/old zoom. You can try it right now by hand-holding it in front of each of the two lenses. (With flash and some dexterity, you can even take pictures with a hand-held reversed lens on a another lens.) Magnification of a reversed lense mounted on a forward lens is the ratio of their focal lengths, so a -50mm + 200mm would give you 4x magnification without extension tubes. Better still if you have a wider lens to mount on the zoom.
Putting extension tubes on this kind of assembly is not the best way to get the extra magnification. You lose lots of working distance and you lose light. Much better to just reverse mount a wider lens on the zoom.
You mentioned stopping down the front-facing lens. That can get you into trouble. The right way to stop down this combination is to stop down the reversed lens, though it is harder to do. I don’t know about Canon but Nikon made a cable release mount for this purpose. Nowadays I think one could hack up a Canon automatic extension tube to build a coupler from your (non-hacked) extension tube to the reversed lens (with half a hacked extension tube mounted on it, wired to the corresponding wires in the unhacked tube).
You would surely enjoy the Photomacrography Forum where all these techniques are discussed by optical experts:
http://www.photomacrography.net/forum/
This is the place to go for reliable technical info and amazing do-it-yourself set-ups, as well as inspiring insect photography.
Thanks for the info. I will be sure to look into those things.
Have you evered tried reversing something like a 15 – 55 mm zoom lens for macro shots, and can you comment on that?
Reverse mounting a lens is among the least expensive ways to increase magnification with the equipment you have. I found that the added magnification is not quite as great as using a moderate amount of extension with extension tubes, but reverse mounting in combination with extension tubes does bring you some serious magnification. One does lose aperture control with reverse mounting, but there is a gadget (which is not very expensive) that lets you keep aperture and automatic focus control with reverse mounted lenses.
Thanks. I know of the simple adapter rings that allow you to reverse mount lenses, but I’ve never seen a gadget that allows you to keep aperture & AF control. I’ll have to search for those.
It is called the Automatic Reversing Adapter, from Meike.
Thank you.
Great photos Mark. You are inspiring me to go ahead and get the macro lens I’ve had my eye on for about a year. Even though I don’t have a camera of my own. The camera is my daughter’s.
The lens I have in mind is cheap but very highly rated. Said to be nearly as good as some high end macro lenses.
Beautiful pictures! I also had two Buddleia davidii, but I was severely criticized about them by some colleagues, because they are extremely invasive – and actually, I discovered some unexpected ones growing spontaneously in the garden. So, the species was condemned… and the butterflies diversity shrinked in my garden. I’m looking for good indigenous (= european) plants attractive for butterflies. Eupatorium cannabinum, which looks quite similar to the Joe-Pye weed, could be a good candidate.
Our flower garden is far from perfect. There are certain ‘weeds’ in there that I protect from the spouse, since they (a) attract lots of insects, and (b) flower all summer. I deem them to be ‘honorary ornamentals’.
Nice images. As winter sets in, I love to think about butterflies. I have a Nikon macro lens I use on my Panasonic GH2 and GH3 to get insects. It works quite well since I can stay back a bit and not disturb the critters. I shot video this way of the Cicadas emerging two years ago. It worked pretty well, although the depth of field was hard to control.
Beautiful! I appreciate the attention to plants. Sometimes I wonder what the flora is in the posted fauna photos.
Beautiful photos and interesting info about lenses. ‘Course, I remember when everything was manual. We managed to take good pix anyway. (But not as good as yours…) 😉
But as you can see from the pictures below, this old piece of glass can still take pretty good pictures! Damn straight, these are great photos Mark and a very economical and clever set-up.
I’ve also found around here that purple flowers attract the most insects, followed by yellow. And hummingbirds prefer red as the ubiquitous red-colored syrup in feeders demonstrates. Flowers are smart, just like evolution.
A good addition to a flower garden to which you wish to attract photogenic insects is blue giant hyssop (Agastache foeniculum)which is not a giant at all (2-4 feet) and which has blue/purple flowers and the leaves of which smell like anise. Butterflies, bees, syrphid flies love it. It’s a native wild flower which does tend to take over but not such a pest that it can’t be hand weeded. this year the bumbles bees (small) and skippers were constant visitors.
Those are seriously fine shots, very nice.
Your photography is really coming along, Mark! I especially like the dragonfly.
Beautiful photos, Mark! I have the Canon EF 100 mm f2.8 macro and love it with a passion and recommend it to you! The only lens I ever bought for myself. It is not the fancy L series and does not have IS, but I like what it does and have developed a personal yoga-Pilates approach to hand holding for macro shots that works for me!