Cameras, micro lenses and photo stacking

I am considering upgrading to video capability, and selling my Canon Rebel XSi (aka 450D) body for about $150. Use the rest of your budget for a decent macro lens.

 

For the compact, Olympus TG-3, TG-4, TG-5 are pretty nice. If you go with used or refurbished TG-3, you can get it <$200. All of these can do automatic focus stacking in camera. But with macro mode of most compact cameras, you have to put the camera to almost touching distance (not a lot of working distance).

For DSLR, Nikon, Sony, or Cannon might be a safe option. Since you are buying into the system and you'll be locked into the system, you want to choose the system which fill your needs. However, for mostly web-type photos, I would say Olympus E-M10 Mk 2 is the best deal for macro work. If you can wait for their refurbished sale, it is $299. The amazing 60mm macro can be as low as $400 (occasionally $350) new (not at this moment, though). 30mm macro is $199. It is very nice, and I use it when I need the maximum magnification. This 30mm has the highest magnification among the available macro lenses (except the specialized Cannon MP-E). But if I have to have only one, I would definitely go with 60mm, because you don't have to be very close to the subject (easy to adjust the framing). I also have a bulky Nikon system, including their wonderful 105mm macro, but I rarely use them (other than when I need good performance TTL speed light).

E-M10 Mark 2 has a build-in capacity to do focus bracketing. With Nikon (maybe Cannon, too), you need a computer and software for the bracketing. There is some free software for this purpose (gPhoto2, gPhoto - Doc :: Remote controlling cameras). There is also some free, open-source stacking software, too. Focus Stacking Macro Photos (Enfuse)

In addition, you'll probably need a tripod for focus racketing.

Also, I would buy used cameras and lens. KEH.com is a good place to start.

I mentioned a little bit about Olympus focus stacking in this blog post (link).

 

Great discussion! Photography is one thing I will never be great at, but I'm trying to improve a little incrementally. I purchased an Olympus Tough TG-5 compact about a year ago for outdoor all weather use and also because it had the macro/microscope mode. I found if I was patient, I could get a reasonable close up of even the smallest of Lepanthes.

I was then unhappy with color in my photos and realized that lighting had so much to do with the quality. I haven't mastered that but try to use a background when time allows and take photos on days with diffuse natural light.

I think a big help in the last few months was when Naoki mentioned focus stacking in one or more threads and I no had understanding of it. I researched (read the manual ) and saw that my camera could do both focus stacking and bracketing and it seems to have really helped, but only when patient and using a tripod. Quite often, I only have a few minutes to take a quick snap shot and the focus stacking or bracketing doesn't really work with that amount of instability, so I just go with the straight macro mode and hope I get one shot reasonably in focus.

One other feature that could be useful is that this camera has a screw on LED light ring for extreme close ups which could be quite good for identification/dissection photos, but may change the colors a bit as compared to natural light.

 

Hi Jonathan, I know nothing about the colors, but noted that Naoki's link above had discussion about lighting which I will study at some point. I show two recent pictures of a Masdevallia and note the color differences:

 

Sorry, forgot the pictures (Masdevallia bottae).

The color on the first picture is closer to what I see and the color on the second was how most of the pictures turned out. Natural, diffuse light (overcast) with only difference being magnification and orientation to the light.

 

Thanks Jonathan! But it's actually the same plant, photos less than a minute apart...just not really sure why the color is so different?

 

That's another thing I need to learn is using the right background

 

Chuck, very nice grow area! The color of M. bottie looks ok to me. But are you thinking the contrast between the yellow center and white part is weaker in the second photo because there is less light (a bit of underexposure for the flower) around the flower face?

With any cameras, I think that we need to do some post processing to see what we perceive (our eyes/brains are quite amazing).

I recently bought a "vintage" DSLR (Nikon D1 from 1999), and it is very difficult to adjust the color. So I bought ColorChecker Passport (http://xritephoto.com/colorchecker-passport-photo ) to help with the adjustment. It can make a custom processing profile (of raw files) for the given camera, lens (and light). Basically, you take a photo of this color palette under the same light condition. Then there is a Lightroom plug-in (or stand-alone program) which will make a profile (I'm getting sick of Adobe attitude, so I probably will migrate to some other program, though). When I use Color Checker with modern cameras, it does seem to improve a little bit (I need to use it a bit more extensively), but lots of the modern cameras/post-processing programs seem to do well most of the time without it. With ColroChecker, you need to use RAW instead of JPEG, though.

Looks good, Jonathan! If you want to play with lighting, you might want to play with a couple reflectors. You can use white papers, or aluminum foil attached to a cardboard. Also diffusers are very useful, too, when you want to make less dramatic images. Something like tracing paper might work.

There are quite a few resources about lighting, but I thought that this video explains well about the basic artificial lighting:

 

Jonathan...your cellphone pictures are still pretty good!

 

Thanks Naoki, you are always very helpful. I will take a look at these color programs as is is a bit annoying at times. Of course I have to find something that will work on a Mac. I guess I always thought about touching up color as cheating, but if the camera isn't getting it right, I guess it's fair.

 

Thanks! I checked and my camera does have the RAW option.