Some questions about reverse macrophotography


IlovePENTAX

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Oct 4, 2016
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I am a little curious about macrophotography now, but on a budget. Have some questions that I tried to find the internet for answers, but either I don't understand their explaination or the answers cannot be found.

1) If I use a zoom lens for reverse macro (15-55mm). 15mm will give the most magnification (e.g see the nose), 55mm will get the least magnification (e.g see the whole face). correct right?
2) Is it possible to do macrophotography with reverse/coupled lens or extension tube and still able to capture the subject from a distance as though I am using a 180mm REAL macro lens?
3) Does the aperture size of the lens matter?
4) If I use a slow/kit telephoto lens as the primary lens and a fast UWA prime lens as the secondary/reversed lens. I would need a flash to light the subject up right?
5) By using the zoom telephoto lens + fast UWA lens, I am able to control the focusing distance by zooming in and out, right?
 

I'll try to answer the questions....

1) Not too sure about reverse macro magnification.. But I'm pretty sure if you use the kit lens, you will get heavy vignetting at 15mm and the vignetting will be gone at around 50mm.
The vignetting will look something like this: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/...-16mm_f4.5-5.6_DC_HSM_lens_8mm_vignetting.JPG

2) It is possible to stack extension tube and reverse macro adapter BUT you will not get the working distance like the 180mm macro lens. Just putting on the extension tubes, your working distance will be less than 20cm.

3) Yes and No. Yes, it matters when you are doing focusing as the viewfinder will be brighter with a f/2.8 which will make life easier when doing manual focusing or for the AF module to focus more quickly and accurately (f/2.8 typically found on macro lens) vs a f/5.6 (usually kit lens f/3.5-5.6). No, because when shooting macro, you will be stopping down the aperture to at least f/11

4) what do you mean by using telephoto and a uwa prime lens? you can't use 2 lens at the same time on a camera... (hope I didn't misinterpret your qst). For macro, most of the photographers I've met used flash for macro. Unless maybe you are shooting some still life objects that you can afford to use a tripod and take a long exposure shot.

5) Will need to understand more about this zoom telephoto + fast UWA lens thingy before I can comment more...

For more info on macro topic, you might want to look at this thread: http://www.clubsnap.com/forums/showthread.php?t=261356

Contains most of the commonly asked questions regarding macro setups and some of the terms commonly used in macro.
 

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I'll try to answer the questions....

4) what do you mean by using telephoto and a uwa prime lens? you can't use 2 lens at the same time on a camera... (hope I didn't misinterpret your qst). For macro, most of the photographers I've met used flash for macro. Unless maybe you are shooting some still life objects that you can afford to use a tripod and take a long exposure shot.

To answer this question:

http://extreme-macro.co.uk/coupled-reverse-lens/
 

Thanks for the replies everyone!

I am curious as to whether I can turn the coupled lens into a zoom combo like the one you have in this thread t=1124244
Will I be able to zoom in and out?
 

Thanks for the replies everyone!

I am curious as to whether I can turn the coupled lens into a zoom combo like the one you have in this thread t=1124244
Will I be able to zoom in and out?

Try the setup and you'll know the answer. Yes you can.....
 

Does the lens hack to turn a 35-80mm into a macro lens work on any other zoom lens?
 

Does the lens hack to turn a 35-80mm into a macro lens work on any other zoom lens?

Tried on EF-S 18-55mm before and that worked :)

Should be able too on any zoom lenses.
 

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