First Macro

[JohnC]

It was sunny but a wee bit breezy and I thought I must try the macro lens.I also wanted to see how the Manfrotto 454 Focusing rail worked-it allows millimetre movemets forwards and backward-last time I tried I had to kick the tripod leg Lol.-very professional.  http://www.juzaphoto.com/eng/articles/canon_180_macro_review.htm

Please feel free to give any advice. The white flower is the Hollyhock and the red  and the  purple/blue/mauve  ? are Impatiens  (which is  what  I  suffer with as the breeze blows   )

[rjgjr]

Great shots all around john. I have no experience with macro any further than zooming my 50-250 all the way in on a flower, so these are absolutely great, will be even better with a little less breeze as you mention.

[JohnC]

Thanks,Richard. Hopefully someone with macro experience can make some suggestions as to how I can improve the technique.

[markt]

Lovely shots John!  Look perfect to me

[Conor McDonald]

Great shots, marco on flowers always works well. look forward to seeing more mate

[martinastro]

John, these are absolutely beautiful, 3,4,5 and 6 are wonderful images, the detail, saturation, and exposure are perfect!, no easy task with a breeze blowing!, as Conor said, I look forward to seeing more. 

[JohnC]

Many thanks. Been away for two separate days so not been on here.  One day looking for wildlife in Somerset and the othet at the Miombles SW wales.

Not perfect,Mark lol. I wondered what the two dark lines were in photo 2. so I went out this morning to have a look,they're the struts of the greenhouse. We live and learn,I need to take more care. I tried to take the photo with my 100-400 at 180mm(same as the lens that took these) but it doesn't work. I was able to get these at about 40 inches to get so much of the flower in but to get it in focus with the 100-400 at 180mm I had to go to 97 inches.I need to see if I can find out why, the construction of the 180mm I suppose but it's got me hooked  I need to try   different subjects  close up like Conor does and John jgs.

[JohnMurphy]

Excellent first Macros.
I'm no expert at Macro photography but here are some pointers that have helped me.
1. The usual tripod and remote trigger are essential and mirror lockup if you want to get really into it.
2. Set an aperature ratio to give you enough depth of field for the area of interest in the shot, but not too much that your background doesn't blur (usually not an issue).
3. Using Manual focus will usually do away the wrong points of interest being selected by AF.

[JohnC]

Thanks John.I can't be doing too badly after all..The only thing you recommended that I didn't do was mirror lock up and it's easy  to go into the menu and enable it-thanks for taking the trouble, I'll remember that mirror lock up next time.