Macro Photography: springtime nature photography, setting up the shots

The sight of WDC’s studio photographer Alan McFaden without a camera is something few souls have witnessed. When he isn’t doing all our product photography he’s out in all weathers taking pictures, or trawling round boot fairs looking for photographic bits and bobs to play with. Which is how he came to develop a simple set-up and technique which enables him to get shots such as this one with relative ease.

‘I bought a small flashgun for £1 at a boot fair,’ he explains. ‘I attach this to the end of my macro lens with a blob of Blu Tack, pointed slightly downwards, and plug it into the sync socket. I’ve worked out that I need an aperture of f/32 for a correct exposure. I can then go up to a flower, fine tune the focus and shoot within a second or two. The small aperture ensures adequate depth of field and the flash provides the illumination and freezes any movement. Flashguns like this are common at boot fairs and I think they give a better light than ringflash, because they’re more directional.’

Macro accessories
A wide range of accessories is available for the macro photographer. Here is a selection...

Macro lens
The best option if you can afford it. They enable you to focus in one continuous movement from infinity down to 1:1 scale lifesize. All the major manufacturers, and independents such as Tamron and Sigma, produce their own macro lenses.

Tubes, bellows and close-up lenses
There are several ways of modifying an existing lens to achieve closer focusing, including increasing the distance between lens and body using extension tubes or bellows, or by screwing a close-up lens onto the filter thread. Both solutions are cheaper than a macro lens, though not as convenient.

Flash options
Ringflash is popular among macro photographers. Shaped like a doughnut, it surrounds the lens for soft, all-around illumination. Macro flashes have separate flashtubes on each side which can be individually adjusted. Small flashguns can be used too, if they’re placed close to the subject.

Getting close enough
Alan used a Canon EOS 1DS fitted with the Canon 100mm f/2.8 macro lens. As the camera has a full-frame digital sensor there is no magnification factor, but with APS or DX-sized sensors this lens would provide a field of view equivalent to around 150mm. While this enables you to shoot from further away, so you’re less likely to frighten off your intended target, a 50mm or 60mm macro lens would give you the equivalent of about 75-90mm, which is sufficient.

The flash set-up

Using flash proves a double benefit: it freezes subject movement, and allows you to use very small apertures for maximum depth of field. Ringflash is designed for this purpose but it is expensive, unlike Alan’s system which costs very little. Using Blu Tack, stick a small portable flashgun onto the end of the lens and angle it downwards slightly. A rubber band will provide extra support. Plug the lead into the sync socket, or the hotshoe (via an adaptor).

Camera Settings

At very close range you get little depth of field, and you’ll need every millimetre. Your subject may be moving and you’ll be trying to focus and shoot very quickly. Even a small flashgun when it’s inches from the subject will be bright enough for a very small aperture to be used, but

test your own to determine the exact exposure. If you can’t stop down enough, reduce the output by taping tissues over the lens. Set manual exposure mode, and a shutter speed of at least 1/125sec (but within the max sync speed) to eliminate any motion blur from the ambient light.