# Stir crazy lockdown macro.



## Valvebounce (Apr 9, 2020)

Hi Folks.
Macro shots of stuff found in the house! No cropping.

The full stack of extension tubes is 65mm!

I’m afraid on some of the shots I have missed critical focus slightly, I had the camera set up looking down on to a window sill in the sun and as the session progressed the lubrication in the lens must have been thinning in the heat as the lens zoom started to move unaided and I didn’t notice as I was doing this whilst on a FaceTime call with my two photography buddies, trying to show them how macro is done and answer their questions, fortunately they both have extension tubes but neither of them had lens reversing rings.

Although we have done a group session on macro before it was a couple of years ago and they had pretty much forgotten all I showed them.

Orange with 17-85mm on full stack of extension tubes.


IMG_0006_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

Pound coin with 17-85mm reversed on full stack of extension tubes.


IMG_0018_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

Queen’s face all scarred up on a pound coin with 17-85mm reversed on full stack of extension tubes.


IMG_0024_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

Part number inside a Lego brick, normally nearly invisible.


IMG_0028_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

The join line where the flap is sealed down on a pre-decimalisation coin envelope.


IMG_0030_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

No not a sea anemone, a tuft from a carpet!


IMG_0059_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr

A nut found outside, looks like it has been stepped on or driven over a few times!


IMG_0041_DxO by Graham Stretch, on Flickr
More shots in my Flickr album.
Please join in if you have some shots taken during lockdown.

Stay safe, stay in if you can, be well please.

Cheers, Graham.

Ps, I should also state that although I was trying to teach my friends, I am no expert! But you could probably tell that already!


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## Maximilian (Apr 9, 2020)

Really nice compilation, Graham!

Be safe and well.


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## beforeEos Camaras (Apr 9, 2020)

it all looks great what rail and tripod system you useing


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## Valvebounce (Apr 9, 2020)

Hi Maximilian. 
Thank you for your feedback.

Cheers, Graham. 



Maximilian said:


> Really nice compilation, Graham!
> 
> Be safe and well.


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## YuengLinger (Apr 9, 2020)

We should reopen soon. Enough hysteria. But in the meantime, keep shooting!


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## Valvebounce (Apr 9, 2020)

Hi beforeEos Cameras.
Hmm, no rail, my setup is basic, real basic, some pictures of the setup.
I can’t work out why the photos have rotated on upload, sorry!

A Kennet Benbo tripod.



Putting it up is like wrestling an octopus, slacken the handle and everything goes loose!



A Manfrotto 410 geared head.



7DII, cheap macro extension tubes, even cheaper lens reversing ring and my old 17-85 as that is what I bought the reversing ring for!



A little red Lego trolley that my youngest nephew made, great for rolling the subject under the lens and back out to change subjects.



Closer shot of the camera / lens setup.



Benbo by Kennet!



The Benbo is a cumbersome ungainly thing to set up but it is very stable once up and firm enough to support the camera and lens hanging out some way past the legs, this is no where near the limit! 

Cheers, Graham.



beforeEos Camaras said:


> it all looks great what rail and tripod system you useing


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## Valvebounce (Apr 9, 2020)

Hi YuengLinger. 
I don’t think we (UK) will be reopening any time soon, we are being told that we have not peaked yet and to expect the lockdown to be extended on Monday when the first 3 week period ends.

Cheers, Graham. 



YuengLinger said:


> We should reopen soon. Enough hysteria. But in the meantime, keep shooting!


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## beforeEos Camaras (Apr 10, 2020)

nice the tube and lens system looks hard to manage but gets the job done. I use a studio manfroto 055probx with a 3 way panning head. lens is the 100mml macro. I was thinking on getting tubes.

joe


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## Valvebounce (Apr 10, 2020)

Hi Joe.
The tubes certainly work well, my trial and error technique tells me that shorter lenses react better to the tubes, something to do with tube to focal length ratios I suspect? I found a short zoom lens works best as you basically focus with the zoom and then fine focus with the focus mechanism. 
Outdoors I have used my Manfrotto with the centre column inverted, also when the lens is horizontal you don’t get the zoom creeping out!  
My thoughts on my set copied from another post.
My set is just like this but in black and silver, they are listed as metal, don’t be fooled, the barrels are some form of plastic, possibly as complicated as engineering composite, but they are not metal, only the end caps are metal, I’m tempted to say that the silver finish on mine is chrome, it looks too bright for polished anodised aluminium.
The body end of each tube has a full metal bayonet, the lens end has a metal face reinforcing the plastic receiver.
I doubt they are as strong as the Canon version, but I have just had the 24-105 f/4L mounted on them and I think I used the 70-200 f/2.8 L II mounted on them previously, I have also had the 1DsIII hanging on the tubes on the back of my 100-400 L II when I was trying to work out which lenses worked with tubes and how well!

Cheers, Graham.


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## stevelee (Apr 10, 2020)

My impression is that tubes do less for lenses that already focus rather close. I got my current tubes Sunday just before I returned the rented 24 mm ts-e lens on Monday, so of course I was keen to try it out on a tube. It did OK, and the tilt worked nicely for focusing. I then tried the lens up close without any tube. There was not that much difference.

After I returned that lens, I tried tubes on the 100 mm non-L macro. By itself the lens focuses down to 1:1. With a 25 mm tube, it will go gown to a 70% reduction, according to my shots of a ruler and rough calculation. In other words, one inch on the ruler almost fills the width of the sensor.

I haven’t tried tubes with my 100-400 mm zoom which already focuses close. Years ago I bought some cheap tubes with no electrical connections and tried them with my not so hot 75-300 mm lens. Just messing around I got a shot of a portion of a small chrysanthemum bloom that I like so well that there is a 16” x 20” print of it across the room from me as I type this. That convinced me to buy a real macro lens.


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## stevelee (Apr 11, 2020)

I tried all three tubes together with the 100mm macro. The combination appears to enlarge the image 1.75% on the sensor.


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## stevelee (Apr 11, 2020)

With 68mm of extension tubes, the 100mm macro lens focused as close as possible appears to project 1/2 inch of image on to 1.035 inches on the sensor. I'm not sure of notation. Is that a 1:0.483 magnification? Or anyway, the sensor image is 2.07 times the size of the object.




At that magnification, a US dime looks like this on a full frame:




And a 100% crop of that shot looks like this:




Both shots were taken at f/22 on the lens, so you can calculate the effective aperture with the tubes. By a quick rule of thumb, you would get something like f/70 in this situation, hence the exposure time of 8 seconds even with the ring light set on high.


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## kodakrome (Apr 11, 2020)

Lockdown shot, but not inside the house. This is from outside, a garden shot.
Foxglove flower, taken yesterday with the 100L.


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## Click (Apr 11, 2020)

I really like this shot. Well done, kodakrome.


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## kodakrome (Apr 12, 2020)

Click said:


> I really like this shot. Well done, kodakrome.


Thanks Click!


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## Valvebounce (Apr 12, 2020)

Hi Steve. 
Nice work on the shots and technicalities.

Cheers, Graham.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 12, 2020)

Hi Kodakrome.
Very nice shot, please keep posting.
Indoors or out doesn’t matter providing you are at home and not wandering the streets if you are not supposed to be!  Mine are only indoors as I was doing a group FaceTime and it would not be fair on the neighbours to hear that going on! 

Cheers, Graham.


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## SteveC (Apr 12, 2020)

stevelee said:


> At that magnification, a US dime looks like this on a full frame:
> 
> View attachment 189719
> 
> ...



With respect to the coin, is there some reason it doesn't look very sharp? I know depth of field is a challenge (and the coin does look about the same regardless of distance from the lens), but your 100% crop simply doesn't look nearly as sharp as it could be. (I say this having photographed MANY coins.)

That aside, you've certainly proved you're at better than 1:1 with that setup!


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## Valvebounce (Apr 12, 2020)

Hi Steve. 
Again, I’m no expert, but could the lack of sharpness be from diffraction, I get using f/22 to capture the full height of the coin, but a shot from overhead giving a flat plain would allow A much larger aperture. I suppose the overhead shot might reduce contrast slightly?

Cheers, Graham.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

I’ll go back and look at the whole original. I wondered about that myself. It could be a combination of things. The coin itself is worn to begin with. I purposely shot the coin at an angle, but maybe not with good reason. Maybe there is a spot in the picture that is better in focus. I don‘t know how the tubes affect diffraction. Does the result reflect the diffraction of f/70ish instead of f/22? I’ve made pictures with the lens by itself at f/22 that were sharper than I would have expected given what I have read about diffraction. Even f/32 has shown only slight softening beyond f/22 that was not unattractive in effect, maybe a bit less clinical looking. Diffraction is a likely suspect, especially if I don’t find a sharper area on the shot. The detail in the wood of the ruler looks sharper than the coin to me. I’ll see what settings I used for that shot.

I didn’t use a delay, as I would with an important shot. So there my have been some vibration. And there were a couple shots after I unplugged the remote release. Maybe I will try again using a wireless remote and a 2 second delay.

My purpose for these tests was to see how well different things worked, so I could make good choices when taking real pictures. Your comments are helpful to me, and I hope my results will be helpful to you.

I think the camera battery may be dying. I’m getting just a few shots in. When I turn the camera off to change tubes, about the second time, it won’t come back on until I recharge the battery. The battery health indicator shows 2 out of 3, so it should hold a charge better than that. I got the camera in September of whatever year the 6D2 came out. I have smaller camera batteries much older and with many more shots on them that are still going strong. I turned off GPS, though it was already in the mode that turned it off when I turn off the camera. I don’t need to be told the coordinates of my house over and over, even with continental drift. Probably I should order a new battery anyway. I mention this to explain why my enthusiasm for multiple experiments has diminished, because of the tedium of dealing with the battery.


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## SteveC (Apr 13, 2020)

Even a worn coin, when you go to 100%, will show you lots of pitting and scratches; it certainly wouldn't look blurry. If it is in focus.

This could conceivably just be camera shake.



Valvebounce said:


> Hi Steve.
> Again, I’m no expert, but could the lack of sharpness be from diffraction, I get using f/22 to capture the full height of the coin, but a shot from overhead giving a flat plain would allow A much larger aperture. I suppose the overhead shot might reduce contrast slightly?



I don't know. That's one bit of advice that someone gave me that I basically ignored. (He said to max out the number--choke down the aperture. But then he photographs the coins at a slight tilt.) I photograph head-on and use the lowest number (widest opening) I can use and still get the entire depth of the coin in focus. I have secondary reasons for doing it; it boils down to I don't want any more depth of field than I need.

I use a copy stand, and I also do tethered shooting, so I can readily zoom in and go for tack sharp focus. Also I check the entire coin to make sure it isn't tilted, if it's in a holder. (If it is, life is much more annoying.)

As far as lighting goes, you're better off going off axis with your lighting, if you want to show relief (I rarely, almost never find that necessary). If you're using a ring light, all you will get tilting the coin is the shadows from the relief will be hidden from the camera, because the light is in the same direction as your line of sight.

By the way, I don't use a ring light either. The reflective properties of metal basically dictate one to three directional sources works best, most of the time.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

Yes, if I were taking photos of coins instead of using a coin as a handy test subject, I would have it flat on. I did find it interesting to see the sandwich magnified. I had never paid any attention to that on a dime.

The ring light will shine on one side or the other, so it might give more definition that way. I haven’t tried it.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 13, 2020)

Hi Steve. 
I have an original 7D LP-E6 battery that is down to 1 block on the life indicator and that will give me almost the same performance as when it was new, maybe down by 20% if I had to guess.
Both my genuine batteries, one the LP-E6, the other an LP-E6n from my 7DII show the same on the life indicator and will give me several hours when paired in a grip, I often come home from a trip to the hide with a couple of hundred shots, lots of looking through the lens with IS enabled and 50 to 75% battery left.

Are you using a genuine charger, I opened a Chinese copy being sold as genuine, there was no where near the electronic content!
Link to the thread I created about it. 
Also as mentioned in the thread I linked, it might be your charger (that is why I had a genuine one for comparison), in which case there are cheap alternative chargers, others will help on that if you look to go down that route. 

Have you tried just keeping the camera on, (turn off sleep timer) and waiting for the camera to shut down from a flat battery, then recharge, then repeat, I have found this to have a slight but noticeable effect on my 40D batteries (BP-511A). My 1D asked me to recalibrate the battery on charging yesterday and I was lamenting the fact that you can’t do that with the LP-E6 batteries. 

Cheers, Graham.

Ps the battery mentioned in the linked thread is still going strong today, 2 years later. 



stevelee said:


> I think the camera battery may be dying. I’m getting just a few shots in. When I turn the camera off to change tubes, about the second time, it won’t come back on until I recharge the battery. The battery health indicator shows 2 out of 3, so it should hold a charge better than that. I got the camera in September of whatever year the 6D2 came out. I have smaller camera batteries much older and with many more shots on them that are still going strong. I turned off GPS, though it was already in the mode that turned it off when I turn off the camera. I don’t need to be told the coordinates of my house over and over, even with continental drift. Probably I should order a new battery anyway. I mention this to explain why my enthusiasm for multiple experiments has diminished, because of the tedium of dealing with the battery.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 13, 2020)

Hi Steve.
At the short distances I have found myself with 17-85 and tubes I have found that the ring light (Yongnuo copy of the MR-14EX) does not have the distance to completely light the subject so I have used 1 or more YN600EX RT II flashes with the YN-E3-RT placed you the side instead. Yes lighting from one side can provide some shadow detail, if you get the light too low it can cast long shadows like at sunset! 

Cheers, Graham. 



stevelee said:


> Yes, if I were taking photos of coins instead of using a coin as a handy test subject, I would have it flat on. I did find it interesting to see the sandwich magnified. I had never paid any attention to that on a dime.
> 
> The ring light will shine on one side or the other, so it might give more definition that way. I haven’t tried it.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

Valvebounce said:


> Hi Steve.
> I have an original 7D LP-E6 battery that is down to 1 block on the life indicator and that will give me almost the same performance as when it was new, maybe down by 20% if I had to guess.
> Both my genuine batteries, one the LP-E6, the other an LP-E6n from my 7DII show the same on the life indicator and will give me several hours when paired in a grip, I often come home from a trip to the hide with a couple of hundred shots, lots of looking through the lens with IS enabled and 50 to 75% battery left.
> 
> ...


Both the battery and the charger came in the box with the camera. I bought it at Best Buy for full price. There is no reason for me to suspect that either is not genuine Canon. I've had enough experience with other smaller camera batteries for this to seem unusual. 

I don't normally take tons of pictures at a time with this camera, certainly nothing close to running the battery down. So it has probably been recharged too many times when there was still a lot of charge left. Your suggestion of letting the battery run down a couple times sounds excellent, and most likely to the point. I will definitely try that.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

To eliminate camera shake, I used a two second delay and an infrared remote. I used Av mode at ISO 100, letting the camera choose the shutter time. I went through the whole aperture range in one-stop increments. I've read up a bit on diffraction with extension tubes, and everything (just about) says that diffraction is based on the effective aperture, not the marked one. My rough and ready estimate then is that f/4 becomes f/12 or smaller with this set up, so diffraction becomes a factor with the lens practically wide open. And at f/4 very little of the coin is in focus. The moral to this story seems to be that if I want sharp pictures, especially when pixel peeping, don't use all three tubes. But, looking at the pictures as a whole, I get quite usable images when scaled to fit full screen on a 5K monitor. So the setup is not useless; one just needs to know the limitations, which is the point of my tests to find out.

As for lighting, the ring light will be fine for some uses. I don't normally have occasion to shoot coins. The dime was just something small with fine detail that I happened to have in my pocket. But I have learned some things if I ever shoot anything metallic, etc. With the set up as above, the autoexposure controlling shutter time gives overexposed highlights in the raw files. There are no blacks in the picture anyway. If I do further tests, I would try a couple stops down in exposure compensation, judging from the ACR histograms. 

I first tried the tubes with the rented 24mm ts-e before I returned it. The ring light wouldn't fit on the lens, so I just stood it up near the subject as a side light. So that is an option for me anyway. In the past I have put a flash unit on the camera and put a piece of white paper nearby to reflect. That worked quite well, too. I have an LED desk lamp that would probably also work fine. I haven't tried it just because the plug is unhandy to get to. So I have several poor man's options.

Looking at 100% crops of the test pictures, I decided that the nominal f/16 hit the best compromise between getting the whole subject in focus and not being eaten up by diffraction. 




Since using all the tubes degrades sharpness from diffraction, and using just a small tube makes little difference in magnification, I conclude that for most practical purposes my best bet would be just to use the lens by itself, shoot at 1:1, and crop to whatever I want to use. I can use 1/4 the frame and still get decent print resolution for 19" x 13" paper if I so chose. I rarely need all 26.2 MP.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 13, 2020)

Steve, I don’t know if you looked at the post I linked but the gist of it is that the genuine Canon charger became available for dissection as it was faulty, my neighbour had similar issues, culminating in taking the battery off charge, putting it in the camera and the camera would not wake, my battery worked fine in his camera so we tried his battery on the cheap Chinese charger and it recovered (I wasn’t about to risk my charger to test it!). I complained about the charger not being genuine so the seller sent another non genuine item! I gave my neighbour the additional charger and all is still well.

Cheers, Graham. 



stevelee said:


> Both the battery and the charger came in the box with the camera. I bought it at Best Buy for full price. There is no reason for me to suspect that either is not genuine Canon. I've had enough experience with other smaller camera batteries for this to seem unusual.
> 
> I don't normally take tons of pictures at a time with this camera, certainly nothing close to running the battery down. So it has probably been recharged too many times when there was still a lot of charge left. Your suggestion of letting the battery run down a couple times sounds excellent, and most likely to the point. I will definitely try that.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

I looked at the thread. I had read it originally. I am not sure of its relevance to my situation. The battery charges right up, according to the blinking and then the green light. It shows a full charge when I put it in the camera. So to me it seems to act more like a battery memory issue, or whatever you call it.

After writing that, I went to the camera and turned it on and off a couple times. It seems to be acting normally. I took the tubes off and shot a series of pictures of the dime with the lens at 1:1 for comparison. The battery info looks normal. Something is 94%, and there are the two bars of battery health. I turned it back on again.

The odd factor here is that I am no longer using the wired shutter release. It doesn't sound likely that having that plugged in would sap the battery quickly. But I have not experienced the problem so far when not using it.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 13, 2020)

Hi Steve. 
My friend‘s battery charger was going through the motions, flashing amber and turning green, just it was not charging the battery, I guess if yours is showing full charge in the camera then that is not similar to the issue mentioned. It does however sound like you may have found a cause, I guess some more testing may be in order!

Cheers, Graham.


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## stevelee (Apr 13, 2020)

For comparison, here is a 100% crop from the lens shot without a tube at f/32 at 1:1. It seems to be as sharp as the one shot at f/22. Perhaps the lens itself is not as sharp as I have always thought it was. But maybe I've not pixel peeped on it before. 




And then here is the same dime shot handheld with the G5X II in its "macro" mode (therefore the original is a JPEG), 100% crop. My quick calculation suggests that it is 42.7% magnification.


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## SteveC (Apr 14, 2020)

Here's my image of the back of a 1959 dime (it grades MS66 FB). There's some cloudiness here and there because it's in a plastic holder that has been scuffed up. Using a very shallow depth of field takes a sharp scratch and blurs it out; sometimes that's a benefit.




When I zoomed in on it for a 1:1 crop I realized it was actually not as sharply focused as I would like, so I went to a different, older dime, from 1901, graded MS64.

To collectors, it's called a "Barber Dime" because the engraver who designed it was named Charles Barber. This style ran from 1892-1916.

Here's the reverse ("back") of this dime:




And here is a 100% crop:




Even this isn't quite as sharp as I sometimes get.

All images taken on a Rebel T6i with the 100mm (non L) macro f/2.8 lens. I typically shoot at about f/5.6 - f/8.0

The images are just short of 4000 pixels (top to bottom) because I start with a 24mp (6000x4000) sensor, and crop away the stuff that's not coin.


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## stevelee (Apr 14, 2020)

That is certainly a lot sharper than what I got with the same lens. I'm shooting at an angle, but at least a slice in the picture should be sharp. I'm shooting on a full-frame sensor; that's the other difference that comes to mind, 24MP on APS-C vs. 26.2 MP on FF.


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## SteveC (Apr 14, 2020)

stevelee said:


> That is certainly a lot sharper than what I got with the same lens. I'm shooting at an angle, but at least a slice in the picture should be sharp. I'm shooting on a full-frame sensor; that's the other difference that comes to mind, 24MP on APS-C vs. 26.2 MP on FF.



Yeah, if the coin is tilted at least SOME will be in focus. Whereas if *I* get it wrong the whole coin is off!!!

(Something about "broken watches" and "twice a day" comes to mind here, but it's not really a good parallel.  )


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## SteveC (Apr 14, 2020)

stevelee said:


> That is certainly a lot sharper than what I got with the same lens. I'm shooting at an angle, but at least a slice in the picture should be sharp. I'm shooting on a full-frame sensor; that's the other difference that comes to mind, 24MP on APS-C vs. 26.2 MP on FF.



Your dime filled the width of the sensor, and in spite of being tilted overflowed the height too. Even without the difference between 26.2 and 24.0 Mpx, you put more pixels on the dime. So your being on a FF should have worked in your favor. (I'm essentially really shooting a 16MP square photo. Recently I discovered I could crop it square in camera, so now I run it in that mode.)


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## stevelee (Apr 14, 2020)

SteveC said:


> Your dime filled the width of the sensor, and in spite of being tilted overflowed the height too. Even without the difference between 26.2 and 24.0 Mpx, you put more pixels on the dime. So your being on a FF should have worked in your favor. (I'm essentially really shooting a 16MP square photo. Recently I discovered I could crop it square in camera, so now I run it in that mode.)


I might try a setup closer to yours to see what kind results I get. Cropping from the 6D2 probably makes a better comparison than getting out my old T3i.

I have been very pleased with the results from this lens in the past, and I don't know of anything traumatic to happen to it. So this all is a mystery. I still don't understand why a wired remote shutter release would suddenly run down the battery, either. But nothing like that has happened since I quit using it.


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## stevelee (Apr 14, 2020)

I didn't shoot the dime when I was trying out tubes on the 24mm TS-E. Here is a 100% crop of the ruler taken at f/16 with a 12mm tube.


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## SteveC (Apr 14, 2020)

stevelee said:


> I didn't shoot the dime when I was trying out tubes on the 24mm TS-E. Here is a 100% crop of the ruler taken at f/16 with a 12mm tube.
> 
> View attachment 189818



It seems noticeably sharper in the lower right than anywhere else. Even at f/16 depth of field is a killer, apparently!

I wrote a fairly long paragraph talking about someone's setup and how what he really needed was a tilt shift lens--then realized that was what you were using! (My forehead survived my SMH well.) I may need to get one someday, because sometimes you have to photograph the coin at a tilt for best results (and then make the resulting ellipse into a circle in post). I've never used a tilt shift but (if I understand it right) it should be able to lay the plane of focus along the surface of that ruler, precisely, with enough fiddling.


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## stevelee (Apr 14, 2020)

The point of using the ruler was to see how well I could keep things sharp beyond the normal DOF range. Here is the same setup, but shot at f/22, maximum tilt down. Magnification near the lens is around 43%. Without the tube it checks out around 33%.




Cannon has a nice range of longer TS macro lenses. I may rent one to play with, but I'd have an agenda of real shots to take, not just tests with rulers and a dime. It sounds like one of those would be of interest to you.


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## SteveC (Apr 15, 2020)

stevelee said:


> The point of using the ruler was to see how well I could keep things sharp beyond the normal DOF range. Here is the same setup, but shot at f/22, maximum tilt down. Magnification near the lens is around 43%. Without the tube it checks out around 33%.
> 
> View attachment 189827
> 
> ...



Well, I doubt I'd do as well as this with a TS lens on my first couple of tries! It sounds like one of those things you struggle with until *click* you get the idea then it's easy.

Good luck with your real shots, whatever they may be.


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## stevelee (Apr 15, 2020)

The method I mostly used was to focus on a near object with no tilt, and then to turn the tilt knob to focus at a distance. If needed, then adjust the focus and the tilt back and forth. It was easier than it sounds.


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## stevelee (Apr 16, 2020)

OK, so I tried to duplicate SteveC's setup, more or less. This is what I got. the only processing I did in ACR was adjusting color temperature to make it look like a dime. Then I resized to fit the image size of his post.




Then the 100% crop:




It looks sharp to me.


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## SteveC (Apr 16, 2020)

Yeah, you've got it nailed. 

I've put a lot of effort into getting the lighting set up so I don't have to do too much color-fiddling in Gimp--but that's a totally different topic! Generally I can just focus, shoot, crop, do a circle-select, and get rid of the background. [I know that's more than you need to do for your purposes--I'm writing for the benefit of anyone reading this who might decide they want to do this on a large scale.]

Side note to others: I've found applying artificial sharpening tends to make things worse; when I see pics online I'll notice many of them have the "speckles" from over-sharpening. Of course, starting with an excellent lens/sensor makes it easy to avoid.


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## stevelee (Apr 16, 2020)

And just to push my luck, I decided to try a 1:1 magnification. (Though I was close before.) I was beginning to wonder whether I should just avoid that magnification. Apparently not. For this I used the ring light away from the lens, so as a side light. Who knows? Maybe it was the flat lighting that kept the earlier tests from looking sharp.




And 100% crop:




Maybe tomorrow, I'll try the rings on the lens again.


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## stevelee (Apr 16, 2020)

The last post was shot at f/11, and the previous one at f/8.


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## stevelee (Apr 16, 2020)

I decided to try the tubes before going to bed. This is at f/11, and just about 2:1 with 3 tubes. It's a little softer, but still usable. With more care, maybe I could focus more accurately and shoot at f/8 or maybe even f/5.6 for less diffraction. This is effectively a bit smaller than f/33.


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## SteveC (Apr 16, 2020)

Cheapass ring light: Buy one of those makeup mirrors with the light all around the round mirror, and take the mirror out.


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## SteveC (Apr 16, 2020)

Somehow my other reply got lost.

I could see both of your "full dime" pictures being published (if someone wanted pictures of a common dime); the top 100% crop is certainly usable too. Sometimes collectors want to zero in on a particular feature (like an overdate or a mint mark, especially if the mint mark turns out to have been added on by some fraudster. (There are cases where a mint mark can hugely increase the value of a coin; e.g., any 1909 S cent [there were three different kinds] versus a 1909 cent of the same type is a huge difference, also an 1914 D cent versus a 1914 cent or a 1916 S versus 1916 dime.) With increasing sensor resolution, magnification is becoming less and less necessary (though sometimes it really is needed). 

When your full image is three feet across on a computer monitor at 100%, you've got the coin under pretty good magnification from the start.


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## kodakrome (Apr 16, 2020)

Thank you valvebounce for the great title of this thread! 
This is an early lockdown shot, taken on April 4th. This little guy was in a bush right outside my bathroom window.


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## Valvebounce (Apr 17, 2020)

Hi Kodakrome.
You are welcome!  
Man I wish I had subjects like that for lockdown shots. Very nice.

Cheers, Graham. 



kodakrome said:


> Thank you valvebounce for the great title of this thread!
> This is an early lockdown shot, taken on April 4th. This little guy was in a bush right outside my bathroom window.
> View attachment 189860


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## kodakrome (Apr 22, 2020)

Life in the bush...


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## ethanz (Apr 22, 2020)

I'm glad he's outside and not in!


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## StoicalEtcher (May 10, 2020)

Good topic choice Graham,

Here's a link to a couple of spring flower shots I've posted in the Flowers and other Flora thread this afternoon, https://www.canonrumors.com/forum/index.php?threads/flowers-and-other-flora.22225/post-831966 - done to avoid duplication. Not quite the magnification others have posted, but technically 'macro' nonetheless.


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## Valvebounce (May 13, 2020)

Hi StoicalEtcher. 
Yes, very nice shots, I already gave a thumbs up on them.

Cheers, Graham.


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## stevelee (May 13, 2020)

Valvebounce said:


> Hi StoicalEtcher.
> Yes, very nice shots, I already gave a thumbs up on them.
> 
> Cheers, Graham.


As did I.


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## StoicalEtcher (May 13, 2020)

Valvebounce said:


> Hi StoicalEtcher.
> Yes, very nice shots, I already gave a thumbs up on them.
> 
> Cheers, Graham.





stevelee said:


> As did I.


Thank you both


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## kodakrome (May 18, 2020)

Warmer weather...bigger bugs.
This looks like a young lubber because it was small - less than 2 inches long. The ones I see in July and August are twice this size.


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## Click (May 18, 2020)

WOW Awesome. Great shot, kodakrome!


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## kodakrome (May 18, 2020)

Click said:


> WOW Awesome. Great shot, kodakrome!


Thank you, Click.


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## Valvebounce (May 18, 2020)

Hi Kodakrome. 
Nice photo, ugly looking subject, the green ones I see are much less foreboding.

Cheers, Graham. 



kodakrome said:


> Warmer weather...bigger bugs.
> This looks like a young lubber because it was small - less than 2 inches long. The ones I see in July and August are twice this size.


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## kodakrome (May 18, 2020)

Valvebounce said:


> Hi Kodakrome.
> Nice photo, ugly looking subject, the green ones I see are much less foreboding.
> 
> Cheers, Graham.


Hi Graham,
Yeah I know...that's the problem with bugs. Most of them are ugly.


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## HenryL (May 18, 2020)

Ugly and beautiful at the same time. A job well done!


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## kodakrome (May 19, 2020)

HenryL said:


> Ugly and beautiful at the same time. A job well done!


Thank you, Henry


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## stevelee (Jul 27, 2020)

It was too hot to go out and shoot photos on Saturday, so I just just put a 20mm extension tube on my 100mm macro lens and went out on my front porch. I took some handheld shots of the crape myrtle right beside the porch.


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## stevelee (Jul 27, 2020)




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## Click (Jul 27, 2020)

Lovely shots, stevelee.


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