Hi! If you're wondering why these flowers
are on my desk, it's because we're doing macro photography. Hi! I'm Adam and welcome to First
Man Photography and before we get into the video if you haven't done so already head
over to firstmanphotography.Com fill in your details to join the e-mail list and I'll send you
a free copy of the ebook on how to capture 'Perfect Exposure Every Time". Okay let's
get into this. Okay, macro photography if you've read about
before it can seem quite complicated but it's literally just getting down in close focusing
close, magnifying the small and blowing it up larger-than-life and most cameras now have
a macro mode on them and today we're going to be using DSLR with kit lens and then I'm
going to show you a couple of little cheap items you can buy to take your macros to the
next stage on a very tight budget We've got this macro reverse ring, we've got this prime
fifty mil prime lens which is still quite cheap and this macro extender tube which can
use in get even closer.
Now this video is the first video in my series
of macro videos and the second part is going to show you a bit more of an advanced setup
and the third will get into the complex world of focus stacking. Please subscribe if you
haven't done so already to keep getting hold of these videos as soon as they come out and
there will be a couple of little competitions coming up and I'll be giving away some pretty
cool gear that will help you on your macro journey. Okay so lets get into this and start get
our little studio set up and well start shooting these flowers. Okay so here we are, weve got everything
set up and the first thing were going to shoot with your DSLR camera and a standard
kit lens.
If we talk about settings for a minute, when you're shooting macro photography
with first thing I always set is the aperture because when you get so close in to your subject
he aperture has a big effect because depth of field becomes very very small the closer
you get so I always start with the aperture first depending on what I'm shooting but a
good way to go is something like f/5.6 Or f/8 and work it from there. We're then going
to balance the exposure with our ISO and our shutter speed depending on whether indoors/outdoors
what the lighting conditions are in the period when you're shooting. So if you are shooting
indoors, you almost certainly going to need to add light because when you get those small
apertures you're really going to need to add some light to get the exposure you want especially
since we're getting so close to the subject that you block a lot of the light coming in
to the subject that we're shooting flowers in this case. So what I've got in this very
simple setup is I have this microphone stand here and I'm going to add this light or this
bulb which is on really really cheap light so I'm just going to clamp this light onto
a mike stand and use it to illuminate our subject which in this case is the flowers
so Ill just go ahead and switch that on Thats now added some light to the flower
which we can use to shoot.
Okay so lets get down and take a few pictures and see what
we come up with. I want to be thinking about my composition going in because its the
same as any time you compose a shot you want to get it right and you want to think about
what youre doing before you take the shot. Im going to take a picture of this orange
flower and youve got to think about what to have in the background as well. Im going
to try and get a bit of this rose in the background because with a kit lens I cant get in so
close that the flowers going to fill the frame.
Im just thinking a little bit about
my background and what thats going to contain. Im going to get down and take a shot and
as we can see with that its quite a nice shot.Its got the flower in the
background but the background beyond that flower is in darkness because of the small
aperture that light from this lamp is not lighting up anywhere in my background so thats
gone dark in the picture. Now one way to cope with that is to add a background much closer
to our subject and that can also add some colour. Ive got this Filofax here and Im
going to very simply stand this up and that is now going to act as my background.
Okay so now Im going to get down and Im
going to show you what I mean. I am going to do one more thing though before we do that
just to add a little bit more interest by giving it little spray with this very cheap
water spray, give that a quick spraythats itand Im going to get down and take
that shot again. Okay, so you can see that really adds an extra element to the image
with that background and that water. Okay, well will move on and will now use the
reverse ring.
Okay, so next were going to use the macro
reverse ring and all you need to do is take the ring and simply attach it to the filter
thread of your lens and then simply detach the lens and you reattach it on the opposite
way round. Now thats reversed the lens and its going to allow us to focus in much
much closer. Now, with this because weve reversed this we've removed the contact between
the camera and the lens so theres no more power getting to the lens anymore. So if youve
got a lens that focuses by wire like this one does, you won't be able to use the focus
and it also will not be able to adjust the aperture The way youre going to have to
focus is by moving forwards and backwards, closer or further away from the subject until
its in focus.
Now your depth of field is going to be extremely extremely tight because
it opens up as wide as it can and with this lens will be about 3.5 Or 5.6 Depending on
where youre zoomed in at. You can lock the aperture before you detach the lens. Set
your aperture, hold the depth of field button and then remove it and it will lock the iris
in place maintaining that aperture. Lets take a quick shot and see what we come up
with.
Ive still got my light which is still going to be necessary especially when getting
this close in. As you can see, with that shot, it is very,
very tight on the depth of field but you can still get an effective shot if you're creative
and use that depth of field to your advantage. Okay, lets move on and will use the macro
extender. Okay, so here we have our macro extender and
as you can see its just a tube through the middle that moves the lens away from the
focal point of the camera which allows us to focus a bit closer to our subject.
Now
this does work with the kit lens but it makes things extremely difficult. So if you have
a prime lens kicking about like this 50 mm f/1.8 STM lens which is only about a hundred
pounds and Ive reviewed before if you want to check that video out and this is a really
good one to combine with the macro extender. All in, this is around 120 so still not
a massively expensive way to get into macro but is obviously more than a kit lens and
reverse ring. Anyway, lets attach it.
All you need to do is take the extender, take
the lens attach as you normally would and then you attach the extender to the camera.
So then were ready to shoot. With this extender, it does have electronic contacts
so youve got your autofocus back if you want to do that. Ive got my autofocus set
and Ill have a little look at the orange petals on here and see how close I can get
in and grab that shot. Yes I like that composition, take that as you see a pretty nice shot.
Okay,
lets try another one. Ill just have a little at these red petals and I want to
get some of that a green leaf in the background which is going to work as my background. Ill
just have a little look at thatIm happy with thatcapture that and as you can see
weve added another pretty nice shot. So I hope youve enjoyed that video and
if youre wondering why I didnt use a popup flash to light the subject its because
when you get in that close the lens can physically block the light coming from your flash so
will end up with quite dark areas in your image which doesnt look good.
You can get
round this by using a dedicated macro flash and Im going to show you how to use that
in the next video where we look at a more advanced setup and then Im going to be
giving away that flash to a subscriber. So if you haven't done so already, please subscribe
to the Youtube channel so you can see that video as soon as it come out and to be in
with a chance of winning that flash. Also, please Like the video if you did, Like
the Facebook page, do what ever you need to do to keep up with up with all the First Man
Photography content as soon as it comes out. Im Adam and this is First Man Photography.Out..
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