Bridge, MFT, achromats, dSLR, primes - a journey of exploration

Yes - sorry for the black humour! Having first read you were well (I hasten to add) I then saw your comment about imminent death loosening the purse strings :)

No need to be sorry. It's fine. (And actually, joking aside, a real enough issue.)

My current rig of A7Rii and 90mm is great in many ways but somehow just not quite hitting the mark for me - I never seem to have much depth of field and the hit rate is low (although the keepers are good).

The possibility of that trade-off is why I am going to experiment some more with the MPE-65. I would be willing to trade reduced hit rate for improved image quality. It's just at the moment I'm getting near to a no-hit rate. I'm working on that this very day, indoors, simplifying things with easy subjects. (Outdoors is windy, cold - with added wind chill factor - and now spotting with rain.)

More pondering to be done there which is half the fun of course :)

Absolutely! :D
 
That’s way too sensible for the world of macro Dave ;)
The problem is the size of the market. There are just not enough people who want to take Macro photography.
If there were more people (no idea how many would be needed) everything would be cheaper to buy rather than make.

My wife made me these to take photos of things in water.
Water2IMG_6504 by davholla2002, on Flickr

(See here for more details).
https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/threads/macro-photography-of-creatures-in-water.700630/

In ideal world you could just buy them rather than having to fiddle around with them.
 
In ideal world you could just buy them rather than having to fiddle around with them.
But isn't that half the fun "re-inventing the wheel"?
 
I started macro with an SLR & primes, using dioptres, reversing/coupling rings and/or various forms of extension. The conversion to a DSLR was about 20 years later, and added macro lenses, bellows lenses & microscope objectives to the toolkit.
More recently I've tried MFT & other mirrorless systems with the same techniques - I'd rather not go back to an SLR type system for macro. Using mirrorless is much easier to both frame & focus, and never suffers from mirror slap. I've not found any advantages to a DSLR over mirrorless for macro.
 
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But isn't that half the fun "re-inventing the wheel"?

It is for me. Here is a first attempt at diffusers for my Yongnuo YN24EX that I threw together yesterday.


1571 01 _1121545_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

I spent a while yesterday evening just starting to familiarise myself with the MPE-65 and how it operates and cooperates (or not) with the A7ii and the YN24EX, and me, getting used to holding it, how it balances, photographing whatever was lying around. I started with the bare YN24EX but after getting a few results like this I decided to do a quick and dirty construction job on a pair of diffusers to try to at least take the edge off of the harshness of the lighting.


1572 1 DSC00287_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h annotated
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

I then carried on practising on the usual sort of starter stuff - choosing things that are particularly easy in terms of focusing because it doesn't really matter exactly where the focus falls.

A coin.


1572 2 DSC00276_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h AIS
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

A stone


1572 3 DSC00339_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AIC
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

A paperweight


1572 4 DSC00294_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AICMH
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

And another paperweight


1572 5 DSC00404_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AICMH
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


1572 6 DSC00406_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AIC2
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


1572 7 DSC00351_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AIC
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

I was going to go looking for small things in the garden today but we spent most of the day on the autumn clear-up and so it will have to be another day.
 
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I started macro with an SLR & primes, using dioptres, reversing/coupling rings and/or various forms of extension. The conversion to a DSLR was about 20 years later, and added macro lenses, bellows lenses & microscope objectives to the toolkit.
More recently I've tried MFT & other mirrorless systems with the same techniques - I'd rather not go back to an SLR type system for macro. Using mirrorless is much easier to both frame & focus, and never suffers from mirror slap. I've not found any advantages to a DSLR over mirrorless for macro.

That's a good range of techniques and devices you have used! I have yet to try bellows or microscope objectives. I don't know that they are really out of doors kit though, so perhaps I will never get round to trying them as almost all of my stuff is done outdoors. Although I see wonderful images from people using manual and mechanised stacking rigs, I have not so far been attracted to trying it myself. Maybe one day, who knows. As to dSLRs, I've never really used one for close-up/macro, not as a proper dSLR, in the sense that the one dSLR that I do have I have used only in live view mode for close-up/macro.
 
I have used bellows outdoors but only once that I remember. A helicoid is much more robust when a variable length extension is needed. I use them much more than just when shooting macro for adapting lenses...

Stacking is definitely needed for the highest power on my microscope (as is a smoother focus control) I think I needed more than 20 shots to get the full thickness of a fly's ankle focused - I couldn't manage the focus control subtly enough to manage more than about 5 :oops: :$

House fly ankle by Mike Kanssen, on Flickr
 
I've not found any advantages to a DSLR over mirrorless for macro.
For me its all about the weight, I got into mirrorless for macro, when I realised that my gripped 7DII was a tad heavy at close range.
 
I have used bellows outdoors but only once that I remember. A helicoid is much more robust when a variable length extension is needed. I use them much more than just when shooting macro for adapting lenses...

Helicoid, there is something else I have never used. I just had a look on Amazon and eBay and most of them seem to be for M42, M52, M65, with one reference I saw to EOS (is that the same as EF, or an earlier mount?) and a couple mentioning NEX (and M42 I think). So for example if I wanted one for an EF lens on a Sony could that be done?

Stacking is definitely needed for the highest power on my microscope (as is a smoother focus control) I think I needed more than 20 shots to get the full thickness of a fly's ankle focused - I couldn't manage the focus control subtly enough to manage more than about 5 :oops: :$

House fly ankle by Mike Kanssen, on Flickr

I use stacking a lot for flowers and other mainly botanical subjects, and that typically involves 20 to 100 or occasionally more images, maximum so far 201, for the first image below. (Mostly I use video to capture frames to stack rather than using focus bracketing). That is much lower magnification than your example though. I have tried stacking for insects, although still at a lower magnification than your example. It worked, but unlike with flowers etc I haven't really got my head (or hands) around using it out in the field for invertebrates as a regular part of my toolkit. It is on my to (maybe) do list for next season. I have seen people using hundreds of images for small scenes like your example.

201 video frames stacked


1276 06 2018_01_12 G80+60 F2.8 ISO 800 1-500 PF 201f (B,19,1+outer B,19 10)) P1140279LR6 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

91 frames for the next one


1569 04 2019_11_08 P1109659 91f B22,2+innerC3-EditPS LR 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

56 frames


1569 06 2019_11_08 P1109680 56f C2 LR 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

47 frames


1569 15 2019_11_08 P1109778 47f C2+outerB22,2-Edit LR 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

79 frames


1569 11 2019_11_08 P1109746 79f C2-EditACAI-EditPS LR 1300h
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr
 
These look very promising indeed Nick!

So far so good. But for images where I need to place the centre of focus precisely, and for small subjects like springtails and barkflies that I may have difficulty locating into the frame, it is going to be much more difficult. I know it is possible. As to whether I can do it or not is another matter. And I will need to get it right a number of times to be able to form a judgement as to whether there is any gain in image quality, and if so whether it is enough, and often enough, to justify the hassle.

I have an open mind about this, but I'm in a more patient frame of mind this time round so I'm willing to work on it more than before and see how it goes as I get more familiar with the kit and the unfamiliar techniques.
 
With the MPE-65 I'm finding the kit a bit heavy even with the fairly light A7ii.
I find it (eos M50) nice and manageable with the canon 100 mm 2.8 macro +32mm ex-tube and the ( sometimes) MR-14EX ring flash.
 
I find it (eos M50) nice and manageable with the canon 100 mm 2.8 macro +32mm ex-tube and the ( sometimes) MR-14EX ring flash.

The MPE-65 isn't much heavier than the Canon 100 macro, or for that matter the Sigma 105 which I have but don't use. I'm just used to much lighter rigs. It is manageable though, so perhaps it is just a matter of getting used to the weight. Maybe I won't particularly notice it then.
 
Helicoid, there is something else I have never used. I just had a look on Amazon and eBay and most of them seem to be for M42, M52, M65, with one reference I saw to EOS (is that the same as EF, or an earlier mount?) and a couple mentioning NEX (and M42 I think). So for example if I wanted one for an EF lens on a Sony could that be done?
I've got one that goes from MFT to EF (yes the same as EOS) and a NEX-MFT adapter so I guess the two together would work if you cant find a NEX-EF model. I expect there probably is a model that connects them direct. The one downside is there would be no way of controlling the aperture on the EF lens. Not an issue for me as I use EF as an intermediate to get to other SLR mounts, I haven't got any decent EF lenses (not even a half tenth decent one).

[QUOTE
I use stacking a lot for flowers and other mainly botanical subjects, and that typically involves 20 to 100 or occasionally more images, maximum so far 201, for the first image below. (Mostly I use video to capture frames to stack rather than using focus bracketing). That is much lower magnification than your example though. I have tried stacking for insects, although still at a lower magnification than your example. It worked, but unlike with flowers etc I haven't really got my head (or hands) around using it out in the field for invertebrates as a regular part of my toolkit. It is on my to (maybe) do list for next season. I have seen people using hundreds of images for small scenes like your example.
[/QUOTE]
Wow it seems video does have a great use after all. I'll have to give that a go sometime!
 
I've got one that goes from MFT to EF (yes the same as EOS) and a NEX-MFT adapter so I guess the two together would work if you cant find a NEX-EF model. I expect there probably is a model that connects them direct. The one downside is there would be no way of controlling the aperture on the EF lens. Not an issue for me as I use EF as an intermediate to get to other SLR mounts, I haven't got any decent EF lenses (not even a half tenth decent one).

Interesting. Thanks.

Wow it seems video does have a great use after all. I'll have to give that a go sometime!

Be aware though that I use a camera that makes this easy; I use Panasonic's Post Focus facility which racks the focus from the nearest thing it can find to focus on to the furthest as it captures a video. That is with the camera held still. You can however fix the focus and move the camera. I wasn't sure if this was possible but I did a test, written up in this post at dpreview, that showed that it does work (hand-held).
 
I did some bank note comparisons between (a) the A7ii and MPE-65 at 1X, 2X, 3X, 4X and 5X magnification versus the same scene heights and same effective equivalent aperture (FF f/45) for (b) a G9 with 45-175 and Raynoxes and (c) an FZ330 and Raynoxes. The FZ330 compared well with the MPE-65 at 1X and 2X. The A7ii was distinctly better than the FZ330 at 4X and 5X. To my surprise the G9 did relatively poorly and I decided to concentrate my next efforts on the FZ330 and A7ii.

How much better was the A7ii? One needs to be careful with individual like for like comparisons because it is (I find it) difficult to line up the shots precisely head on to the target, and this means that if the cameras are aligned differently then in a given pair of images one area of the image may look better for kit A than kit B while for that same pair another area may look better for kit B than kit A (this shows up most in the corners). That said, I think the example below fairly represents the sort of differences I saw towards the edges and corners at 4X and 5X as between the A7ii and MPE-65 (the top two images) and the FZ330 with a Raynox 250 (bottom left) and a Raynox 250 and 150 stacked (bottom right). The FZ330 images are shown at 100%, the A7ii images are shown at 100% of versions that have been downsized to the same (3000) pixel height as the FZ330 images.

What we are looking at here is the top right hand corner of each image, the two left hand images being at 4X magnification for the A7ii and the right hand ones at 5X. (The two cameras were centred at different places on the banknote, so we are not seeing the same area of the banknote in the corners, with the difference in aspect ratio also contributing to this difference in view.) There is a full size screenshot at Flickr but the differences are sufficiently large that they should be obvious even in the downsized version of the screenshot shown here.


1574 4 Corner comparison for A7ii+PME-65 at 4X and 5X vs FZ330 with Raynoxes
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

My next move by way of comparisons was to cover a small plate with a mix of cooking ingredients (sea salt, peppercorns, various herbs and powders). I then spent a while with each camera capturing images hand-held. I worked hand-held because it is much faster than with a tripod and I was not trying to shoot exactly like for like pairs of images. Also, it did not matter where the centre of focus fell as what I was looking for was any broad differences, for example in tonality. I was also interested in depth of focus. At 4X and 5X I could get significantly more depth of focus with the A7ii than with the FZ330. The FZ330 maximum depth of field is at its minimum aperture of f/8, which is equivalent to f/45 full frame. In contrast the minimum aperture of the MPE-65 is f/16, which at 4X gives an effective aperture of around f/80 and around f/96 at 5X.

The following example is illustrative of the general impression that I got from looking through the images. It is not in itself a fair comparison (different scene size, different angle of view, probably different amount of unused DOF in front of the nearest in-focus area), but it illustrates both the use of f/16 with the MPE-65 at a high magnification, and a sense with the FZ330 of a rather small in-focus area surrounded by very out of focus areas. It is difficult to judge from artificial scenes like this whether it would be practical to use such a small effective aperture on real world scenes, but results like this make it seem to me like an experiment worth trying.


1573 9 F16 DOF example with MPE-65 at possibly 5X
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

My next move was to put the A7ii with MPE-65 and KX800 flash on to my super flexible tripod and go out into the garden and look for some small subjects, springtails, barkflies and the like. Unfortunately I didn't find any. I practised on tiny pieces of dirt and blemishes on foliage, seeing if I could find millimetre size subjects when at 4X to 5X. I had more success with that than I expected. The reason I went out with the tripod was that I had thus far been photographing scenes for which it really didn't matter exactly where the centre of focus fell. With very small subjects it would be critical to get the focus placed precisely, and at 4X and 5X zoom that just seemed too difficult hand-held.

Reality bit very quickly. It might have been as long as 10 minutes before I decided to give up with the tripod. It was cumbersome, slow and very hard on my wrists. That sounds odd I'm sure, but trying to manage the whole ensemble turned out to be surprisingly muscular. This is not a nice, polite have the camera on a tripod, line it up and take hands off, perhaps using a remote release. No, this was rough stuff. I was working on plants a couple of inches off of the ground, pointing the camera down at a sharp angle. The rig was radically unstable, and in any case even when it is stable, when working at 4X and 5X it is (I find it) extremely difficult to get a precise alignment because the rig settles when I take my hands away. Trying to align it to take account of the subsequent settling can be infuriatingly frustrating. The result of all this - my hands stay on the camera, and I'm exerting pressure to combat the instability. Bits, edges of the rig dig into my hands. Yes there is some extra stability, but overall, it isn't sustainable (for me, for what I do).

It struck me that I was either going to have to work hand-held or, failing that, simply stop trying to photograph small subjects. So I worked hand-held. Because I had not found any proper small subjects I drifted towards larger subjects, and it quickly became apparent that even though I had not envisaged using the MPE-65 for lower 1X, 2X magnifications, it was actually very easy to use the A7ii and MPE-65 hand-held at those lesser magnifications. One contributing factor was that unlike at the higher magnifications, focus peaking worked very well at lower magnifications. And I was pleasantly surprised that at those lower magnifications manual focus seemed actually quite pleasant to use. That was a bit of an eye opener.

And the practicality of higher magnifications hand-held? That remains to be seen. I am finding it easier to handle the MPE-65 the more I use it, and my focusing failure rate with my (autofocusing) close-up lenses has always been pretty high at the sort of magnifications I'm thinking about here. I'm thinking that, especially with more practice, the failure rates may not be any higher than with the manually focusing MPE-65.

In the forum I have posted a handful of shots from today's practice sessions. Interestingly enough all of them turn out to have used f/16. However, this is not as extreme as it sounds as none of them used a particularly high magnification so they may all have hovered somewhere around the effective f/45 mark.

The results thus far are making me wonder if one way forward might be to use the FZ330 with the Raynox 150 down to its minimum scene width of around 13mm and from that point on use the A7ii. It is early days yet though as I have no idea whether I will find the MPE-65 a practical proposition at the higher magnifications that I have in mind for it.

One other thought. I remember @TimmyG using extra magnification with the MPE-65, on APS-C which goes to smaller scene sizes than the A7ii. Perhaps it was a teleconverter as well as extension tubes. Maybe he used a Raynox 250 as well. I wouldn't want to go that far (I couldn't handle it at those magnifications), but the thought crosses my mind that I do have teleconverters and extension tubes that should work with this setup, so I might experiment with a slight magnification enhancement, most likely a 1.4X teleconverter, which would give me access to a stop smaller aperture (not sure how useful that would be in practice) and a slightly larger working distance (not sure how much difference that would make). More things to try, and that is always fun.
 
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Well this is all proving very educational.

Yesterday's session in the garden made clear the inconvenience of using the KX800 twin flash with the MPE-65; because the MPE-65 changes length so radically I have to keep on rearranging the KX800's arms to get the flash heads nearish to the subject and to avoid the lens blocking the flash illumination. Thinking about it later I realised that my reason for not using the YN24EX flash might not be valid.

The YN24EX fits on to the front of the lens and so the large changes in the lens' length don't matter. However, the flash heads protrude in front of the lens by 30 to 40mm, and diffusers add to this. With a working distance of only 44mm at 4:1 and 41mm at 5:1, the diffusers were too often hitting up against the solid surfaces on which the subjects were placed, and that is why I switched to the KX800, with which I had lots of flexibility in positioning the flash heads. What I realised after yesterday's session in the garden was that out there I was not encountering solid surfaces. The KX800 flash heads and diffusers were coming into contact with foliage, twigs and small branches, all of which flexed when pushed by the diffusers. This meant that the YN24EX might work fine. In fact, with the flash heads closer in to the lens it might actually work better, with the flash heads less likely to get tangled up in the surrounding foliage etc. So, today when I went out for another practice session in the garden I used the YN24EX, having made another pair of diffusers for it, somewhat larger than the previous ones.

The YN24EX worked ok from the flash head positioning point of view. However, I was not convinced by the diffusion. There was not enough evidence to be sure, but a couple of times I got some nasty looking flash reflections from reflective surfaces that I didn't at all like the look of. It is difficult to know exactly what to make of this as I have never been happy with any of my flash arrangements in this respect. But I did think what I saw looked particularly rough. Looks like I will need to re-study the macro masters' diffusion arrangements to see how I might improve mine.

What I have in mind for the MPE-65 is small subjects like springtails, barkflies and fruit flies, which may be as small as 1mm long. Again today I couldn't find any, but I practised on little bits of detritus around the garden of around the same size. It reinforced the difficulty I have in getting these small subjects into the frame. I find it difficult to get the big and heavy MPE-65 exactly aligned and at the right distance to get them visible in the frame. If you get the distance wrong you can't make anything out. If you have the distance right but the direction wrong it can be very difficult to work out what you are actually seeing and which direction to move in order to to home in on the subject. And this is with little things that aren't moving. Unfortunately springtails etc do of course tend to move around.

With my setups of close-up lenses on telezoom lenses this is not a problem. I can zoom to wide angle, where everything is in sufficient focus to be able to look around and locate the subject, and having found it I can zoom in to frame it as required. If I subsequently lose it I can zoom out a bit and back again when I have found it. I can't do this with the MPE-65. I have to choose my magnification first and then find the subject. This is fine at 1X to 2X, but as the magnification increases it gets more difficult, and can be very difficult and frustrating at 4X to 5X. I suddenly found myself trying a different approach today. Rather than starting some distance out from the subject, lining up the lens as best I could and then watching the LCD screen as I moved the camera forwards and backwards, and side to side, I watched the lens barrel as I moved it in to what I thought was the right sort of distance, trying to envisage the line along the axis of the lens barrel and where it would project to, adjusting the lens position accordingly in relation to the subject. The fact that the MPE-65 is so long at 4:1 to 5:1 made this easier to do. Only then did I look at the LED screen. I only did this a few times towards the end of the session, and perhaps I was imagining it being better, but I will certainly be trying it again.

In a comment on yesterday's images @Son_of_Thor mentioned the Laowa 25mm 2.5-5x lens. This prompted me to have another look at the reviews. The more I thought about it the more it looked like it could be a good fit to my requirements. The FZ330 with Raynox 150 takes me down to scene height of around 10mm. The Laowa 25 covers from around 9.5mm to 4.8mm scene height. I am well content with the image quality and usability of the FZ330 with the Raynox 150. It could make a good pairing with the Laowa 25. For its part the Laowa 25 is significantly smaller and lighter than the MPE-65 and does not extend nearly as far. That in turn might mean I could use the same flash setup as with the FZ330, either the same design or the same physical setup moved between cameras. (The Laowa cannot use a front-mounted twin flash like the YN24EX because the Laowa does not have a filter thread. The KX800 design I use with the FZ330 cannot be used with the MPE-65 as that KX800 setup has the flash heads in a fixed position while the large extension of the MPE-65 requires movable flash heads if they are not front-mounted.) The smaller diameter of the Laowa compared to the MPE-65 means that it can be used at shallower angles relative to the ground.

I think I may be buying yet another lens.

If I did want more magnification (not sure I could handle much more out in the field) if I bought an EF fit Laowa 25 I should be able, as with the MPE-65, to use it on the A7ii with my EF teleconverters and/or extension tubes, and/or with one of my micro four thirds cameras, and of course on my 70D.

Today's exercise, post processing and cogitations have underlined a couple of things I have previously been vaguely aware of with the A7ii. One is that the A7ii's auto white balance seems a long way off sometimes. Not just a little off, but hugely wrong, horribly, ridiculously blue and cold. The other is that the A7ii raw files seem to me to be wonderfully malleable. They can take an extraordinary amount of pushing and pulling without falling apart. Perhaps that is true of all full frame cameras. I don't know about that, but it is encouraging me to be a bit more adventurous with my processing.

I did think that using a full frame camera would provide me with images which needed less muscular processing than the noisy and lower resolution files from the 1/2.3" cameras I use so much for flash-based macros. Today's session suggested that may not be the case. They way I discovered the extreme malleability of the A7ii files was that I had to push them hard to get them into a presentable state. In fact after finishing processing the only four that I thought worth keeping from today's session, I thought about how hard I had pushed them and went back to a fifth one that I had given up on in the early stages of the processing. I made the same changes to it as to one of the four keepers, and I was astonished at how it responded. With just a little more work this apparently useless original turned into something quite passable to my eye. I imagine some people think that I capture the images that I post. That isn't really how it works. For many of them the post processing is every bit as important as the capturing.

I have posted the five shareable images from today's session in this post in the forum.
 
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In a comment on yesterday's images @Son_of_Thor mentioned the Laowa 25mm 2.5-5x lens. This prompted me to have another look at the reviews. The more I thought about it the more it looked like it could be a good fit to my requirements. The FZ330 with Raynox 150 takes me down to scene height of around 10mm. The Laowa 25 covers from around 9.5mm to 4.8mm scene height. I am well content with the image quality and usability of the FZ330 with the Raynox 150. It could make a good pairing with the Laowa 25. For its part the Laowa 25 is significantly smaller and lighter than the MPE-65 and does not extend nearly as far. That in turn might mean I could use the same flash setup as with the FZ330, either the same design or the same physical setup moved between cameras. (The Laowa cannot use a front-mounted twin flash like the YN24EX because the Laowa does not have a filter thread. The KX800 design I use with the FZ330 cannot be used with the MPE-65 as that KX800 setup has the flash heads in a fixed position while the large extension of the MPE-65 requires movable flash heads if they are not front-mounted.) The smaller diameter of the Laowa compared to the MPE-65 means that it can be used at shallower angles relative to the ground.

I think I may be buying yet another lens.

A Laowa 25mm 2.5-5X lens arrived today. It is small.


Image by John Hallmen, http://www.johnhallmen.se/ - comparison of Laowa 25 with Canon MPE-65
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

It uses metal rather than plastic, so it is quite heavy for its size, but even so it is only around 400 grams. I find 700-800 gram lenses too heavy for comfort (like the MPE-65, and like my Sigma 105 macro), but the Laowa 25 feels ok in terms of weight and balance.

There are no electrical connections from the lens to the camera, so aperture is set using a clicked aperture ring at the front of the lens, with apertures from f/2.8 to f/22. Since there are no electrical connections no Exif data is passed from the lens to the camera, so there is no record of aperture or magnification.

The zoom action is smooth but quite hard work. It takes a turn of only 120 degrees or so to get from 2.5X to 5X.

I have an EF mount version. I attached it to my A7ii using a Sigma MC11 EF to E-mount adapter.

The Laowa 25 macro does not have a filter thread so I could not use my lens-mounted Yongnuo twin flash. I made a pair of diffusers for a KX800 twin flash. These were based on the design for my current diffusers for use with telezoom and close-up lens setups. These use a 1mm layer of expanded polystyrene just in front of the flash head and two layers of "plastic paper". (I don't know exactly what it is, but of the materials I tested including for example tracing paper and parchment paper, this plastic paper had the best combination of diffusion without too much light loss.)


1576 1 Larger diffusers for use with Laowa 25 macro
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

After just a handful of test shots indoors I decided that these diffusers seemed too large, preventing me from getting the flash heads very close to the subject, which I want to be able to do because of the amount of light I need on the subject to use small apertures, preferably without raising the ISO too much from base ISO. For an quick outdoor trial I used a pair of much smaller diffusers made of two layers of 1mm expanded polystyrene.


1576 2 Smaller diffusers for use with Laowa 25 macro
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

Having now done a short outdoor trial I think the larger diffusers might produce better quality of light, which might make it worth using higher ISOs that with the smaller diffusers, so I will try the larger ones out in the garden.

I learnt several things from today's session in the garden.

I find the Laowa 25 easier and more pleasant to use than the MPE-65. The weight is within my comfort zone. Far less turning is needed for any given change in magnification (although I would prefer it if the zoom ring loosens up a bit in use, it being significantly stiffer than the MPE-65). Even at 5X, finding small subjects is not particularly problematic. This is a big benefit. I think it is partly because the barrel is much slimmer than the MPE-65, and that makes it easier to see where it is pointing. Probably more important I suspect is that even when at the wrong distance and out of focus you get enough of an impression of shapes to work out where you are, and I suspect the short focal length plays into this as well. Whatever the reason, I found it much, much easier to find even 1mm size subjects (bits of dirt and blemishes on foliage rather than tiny invertebrates, but I think that is beside the point.)

You can approach subject almost horizontally even when working on a flat surface. For example for this shot the camera was on the ground. I think that extra flexibility compared to the MPE-65 will be a big benefit.


1577 05 2019_11_19 DSC01445_PLab3 SP9 LR 1300h-AIC
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

The Laowa 25 goes from f/2.8 (like the MPE-65) to f/22 (as against f/16 for the MPE-65). This means that the Laowa can produce around 40% greater depth of field than the MPE-65. Of course, as the depth of field increases the loss of detail from diffraction increases. Using f/22 at 5X gives an effective aperture of around f/128 (as against f/90 with the MPE-65's minimum aperture f/16 at 5X). The general consensus is that you should not use apertures anything like as large as these. I am not so sure about that and I have been experimenting with minimum aperture with the MPE-65 and I will do the same with the Laowa 25. In today's garden session I used f/11, f/16 and f/22, but unfortunately I didn't keep notes so I don't know which aperture I used for which shots.

Only having 2 times zoom from 2.5X to 5X is of course restrictive, but as discussed in my previous post it fits rather well with my use of my FZ330 and Raynox 150 which covers scene heights down to the size where the Laowa 25 starts at 2.5X. The question in my mind is whether I will be able to carry two cameras around, both with flashes attached. They would both need flashes because although they would both be using a Venus Optics KX800, they need different diffuser arrangements and I need to be able to switch quickly between them, and changing the diffusers is not quick to do. The alternative would be to carry just one of the cameras and restrict myself to subjects that can be covered by that camera. I don't find that an appealing proposition. I think this may just be a matter of finding a new bag with which I can carry cameras with flashes attached.

I have posted eight of the images from today's session in this forum post.
 
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I am not so sure about that and I have been experimenting with minimum aperture with the MPE-65 and I will do the same with the Laowa 25. In today's garden session I used f/11, f/16 and f/22, but unfortunately I didn't keep notes so I don't know which aperture I used for which shots.
.
Isn't that stored in the exif?
One easy thing I would change with the MPE-65 would be to have less metal and more plastic.
 
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Isn't that stored in the exif?

No, there is no lens data in the Exif data because there are no electrical connections to the camera. The Laowa 25 has manual aperture control. You get shutter speed and ISO (from the camera) but not aperture and magnification (which would need to be from the lens).

One easy thing I would change with the MPE-65 would be to have less metal and more plastic.

Indeed so. I would much prefer it to be lighter.
 
The first set of diffusers shown in a previous post were too large; I couldn't get them close enough to the subject to get enough light on to the scene for the very small apertures I am using. The second set diffusers were rather small, so I tried a larger version of the same design of two layers of 1mm expanded polystyrene with a small gap between them. In both cases though I thought the double layer of expanded polystyrene was probably absorbing too much light so yesterday I made another set, this one intermediate in size between the two sets of round expanded polystyrene diffusers, but made with just two layers of plastic paper, one almost touching the flash head and the other about 2cm away. (The distance between them seems to be surprisingly important from some testing I did with a torch.)


1576 3 2-layer plastic paper diffusers for use with Laowa 25 macro
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

This uses the plastic paper that I use in the diffusers I use with my telezoom+close-up lens setups. Those diffusers seem to work quite well; they use two layers of the plastic paper and also a layer of expanded polystyrene close to the flash heads. To get the best out of the full frame (by keeping the ISO low) I need to throw more light on the scene than with the smaller sensor cameras, which is why I have taken the expanded polystyrene layer out of this latest design for the 25mm macro. Whether just two layers of the plastic paper will provide enough diffusion remains to be seen. More testing to be done out in the garden. Unfortunately despite looking around quite carefully I'm really not seeing much by way of invertebrates at the moment (none at all in a half hour search yesterday) so testing of this latest design of diffusers may have to wait a while.
 
In this post above I concluded from a banknote test that when using my typical f/45 full frame equivalent aperture the small sensor Panasonic FZ330 with Raynoxes did as well as a full frame Sony A7ii with an MPE-65 at 1X and 2X magnification but that the A7ii was distinctly better than the FZ330 at 4X and 5X. During the course of a very helpful discussion with an astute observer in this thread at dpreview, it became apparent that my FZ330 seems to have become faulty and started producing images that are very soft. Today I did another banknote test, this time with an FZ200. This produced different results.

I photographed a £10 banknote with an MPE-65 on the A7ii at 1;1, 2:1, 3:1, 4:1 and 5:1. I then took photos with the FZ200 trying to match the vertical frame coverage of the Sony shots. To match the 1:1 and 2:1 shots I used a Raynox 150 (+4.8 diopters). To match the 3:1 and 4:1 shots I used a Raynox 250 (+8 diopters). To match the 5:1 shot I used a Raynox MSN-202 (+25 diopters).

I used f/8 with the FZ200. This is its minimum aperture and is equivalent to (giving the same depth of field and loss of detail from diffraction as) around f/45 on full frame. With the A7ii I set the f-number at each magnification so as to give an effective aperture close to f/45. (Since the MPE-65 has a minimum f-number of f/16 I could only get to effective f/32 at 1:1.)

I focused using focus peaking with the A7ii. This gave a strong signal at 1:1 to 4:1. The signal was rather weak at 5:1, but (just) usable. (I don't know how this would pan out with lower contrast subjects). I used autofocus with the FZ200, using a small central focus area.

I shot raw and processed the raw files using my usual presets in DXO PhotoLab (these are specific to particular sensor sizes and ISOs). I then exported to TIFF and picked up the TIFF files in Lightroom where I applied Lightroom's AutoTone function. I then adjusted the lightness and white balance to get them all looking similar. I also applied sharpening. I applied as much as I could without inducing artefacts when looking at them at 100%. I was able to apply a much higher level of sharpening to the A7ii images. (In general I have the impression that the A7ii raw files are much more malleable than I am used to, especially compared to my very small sensor cameras like the FZ200).

I cropped the A7ii images to the FZ200's 4:3 aspect ratio to facilitate comparisons, symmetrically chopping off the sides of the A7ii images. I outputted JPEGs at three sizes:
  • 1500 pixels high. Looking at these at 100% is similar to looking at my normal output size of 1300 pixels high after a modest amount of cropping.
  • 3000 pixels high. This is the native size of FZ200 images and by using 3000 pixel high A7ii images this allows like for like comparisons at the highest practical level of detail.
  • Full size. The A7ii has a 24 megapixel, 6000 x 4000 pixel sensor, compared to the FZ200's 12 megapixel, 4000 x 3000 sensor. My thinking was that this would give an idea of any additional cropping potential for the A7ii.
These images are in this album at Flickr.

You need to be careful when comparing the images because I find it difficult to get the camera exactly square on to the banknote. This means that even if the centre of the images are equally in focus the edges and corners can vary between the two setups. For example below we see the 3:1 A7ii image and the matching FZ200 image. These are the 3000 pixel high versions seen at 100%.

The A7ii is at the top, the FZ200 is at the bottom. On the left we see the bottom left hand corner of the image and on the right we see the top right hand corner. The A7ii is sharper at the bottom left and the FZ200 is sharper at the top right. For this reason I have used the centre of the frame in the illustrations below. I believe they are representative of the overall results.

Full size screen shots are in the album at Flickr.


_Asymmetry - Comparing top right and bottom left
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


A7ii at 1:1, FZ200 with Raynox 150


_FF at 1to1, centre of frame, 100pc of 3000 pixels high
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


A7ii at 2:1, FZ200 with Raynox 150


_FF at 2to1, centre of frame, 100pc of 3000 pixels high
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


A7ii at 3:1, FZ200 with Raynox 250


_FF at 3to1, centre of frame, 100pc of 3000 pixels high
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


A7ii at 4:1, FZ200 with Raynox 250


_FF at 4to1, centre of frame, 100pc of 3000 pixels high
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

A7ii at 5:1, FZ200 with Raynox MSN-202


_FF at 5to1, centre of frame, 100pc of 3000 pixels high
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

It seems to me that the image quality from the two setups is broadly similar. Since (like my other close-up lens setups) the FZ200 is smaller and lighter than the A7ii with MPE-65, provides effective autofocus (accurate, precisely positioned and non-hunting), and makes it much easier and quicker to change magnification, this exercise inclines me towards continuing to use my close-up lens setups rather than macro lenses for invertebrates, at least down to the smallest scene size used in this exercise.

I will do a similar exercise with the MPE-65 and Loawa 25 on micro four thirds and APS-C, because I suspect that I have "run out of road" with the close-up lens setups and that for the smaller scenes that APS-C and MFT can cover (down to the coverage of FF 10:1 in the case of MFT, around 2.5mm high), the MPE-65 and/or the Laowa 25 may be distinctly better. As to whether I will find it practical to tackle scenes down to 2.5 mm high out in the field is a different matter. I think the 5mm or so height that you get with full frame at 5:1 may be about at my limit. More experiments needed.
 
[QUOTE="GardenersHelper, post: 8577134, member: 29498"the FZ200 is smaller and lighter than the A7ii with MPE-65, provides effective autofocus (accurate, precisely positioned and non-hunting), and makes it much easier and quicker to change magnification, this exercise inclines me towards continuing to use my close-up lens setups rather than macro lenses for invertebrates, at least down to the smallest scene size used in this exercise.

I will do a similar exercise with the MPE-65 and Loawa 25 on micro four thirds and APS-C, because I suspect that I have "run out of road" with the close-up lens setups and that for the smaller scenes that APS-C and MFT can cover (down to the coverage of FF 10:1 in the case of MFT, around 2.5mm high), the MPE-65 and/or the Laowa 25 may be distinctly better. As to whether I will find it practical to tackle scenes down to 2.5 mm high out in the field is a different matter. I think the 5mm or so height that you get with full frame at 5:1 may be about at my limit. More experiments needed.[/QUOTE]

What magnification do you find that can use autofocus? When I read stuff like this I wish that macro were more popular, if it were really popular there would be programmes on TV doing this research and you would of course be able to buy better kit.
 
the FZ200 is smaller and lighter than the A7ii with MPE-65, provides effective autofocus (accurate, precisely positioned and non-hunting), and makes it much easier and quicker to change magnification, this exercise inclines me towards continuing to use my close-up lens setups rather than macro lenses for invertebrates, at least down to the smallest scene size used in this exercise.

I will do a similar exercise with the MPE-65 and Loawa 25 on micro four thirds and APS-C, because I suspect that I have "run out of road" with the close-up lens setups and that for the smaller scenes that APS-C and MFT can cover (down to the coverage of FF 10:1 in the case of MFT, around 2.5mm high), the MPE-65 and/or the Laowa 25 may be distinctly better. As to whether I will find it practical to tackle scenes down to 2.5 mm high out in the field is a different matter. I think the 5mm or so height that you get with full frame at 5:1 may be about at my limit. More experiments needed.

What magnification do you find that can use autofocus? When I read stuff like this I wish that macro were more popular, if it were really popular there would be programmes on TV doing this research and you would of course be able to buy better kit.

In this video at You Tube you can see me using autofocus with a Raynox MSN-505 on a 45-175 on a micro four thirds Panasonic G5. At 45mm this gives a scene height of around 7.5mm (around 1.7X magnification, a scene height that would need around 3.2X magnfication on full frame). At 175mm this gives a scene height of around 2.5mm (around 5.2X magnification, a scene height that would need around 9.6X magnification on full frame).

At around 14:25 you can see me using autofocus at maximum magnification. From 30:58 you can see some images of a springtail in motion that I captured using autofocus with the 505, probably at minimum magnification.

I almost always use less powerful close-up lenses and autofocus works fine with them. For example the Raynox 250 on a Panasonic FZ200/330 bridge camera goes to around 6mm scene height (a scene height that would need around 4X magnification on full frame) and I use autofocus almost all the time with that setup and with the less powerful Raynox 150, which I use most of the time.
 
In this video at You Tube you can see me using autofocus with a Raynox MSN-505 on a 45-175 on a micro four thirds Panasonic G5. At 45mm this gives a scene height of around 7.5mm (around 1.7X magnification, a scene height that would need around 3.2X magnfication on full frame). At 175mm this gives a scene height of around 2.5mm (around 5.2X magnification, a scene height that would need around 9.6X magnification on full frame).

At around 14:25 you can see me using autofocus at maximum magnification. From 30:58 you can see some images of a springtail in motion that I captured using autofocus with the 505, probably at minimum magnification.

I almost always use less powerful close-up lenses and autofocus works fine with them. For example the Raynox 250 on a Panasonic FZ200/330 bridge camera goes to around 6mm scene height (a scene height that would need around 4X magnification on full frame) and I use autofocus almost all the time with that setup and with the less powerful Raynox 150, which I use most of the time.
Thanks I will have to see that video. What do you prefer the Panasonic FZ200/330 or Panasonic G5? I have to say using zoom lens with Raynox is not something that many people did AFAIK in the past so well done for trying - and doing so well.
 
Thanks I will have to see that video. What do you prefer the Panasonic FZ200/330 or Panasonic G5?

The FZ200/330. The reason is that I can use FF equivalent focal length from a bit less than 100mm to 600 mm on the FZs, so a zoom factor of a little over 6X. On the G cameras with the 45-175 I can use FF equivalent focal length from 90 to 350 mm, a zoom factor of a little less than 4X. The extra magnification I get on the FZs from 350 to 600 is extremely useful for my subject matter. It depends on exactly what turns up during a session, but quite often I can use a Raynox 150 on an FZ for almost everything, so I don't have to change close-up lenses very often, and sometimes I can do a whole session without changing close-up lenses.

With the G cameras I find I have to switch between the Raynox 150 and 250 quite a lot. This slows things down between subjects. Worse, I like to use a variety of magnifications with an individual subject, for example moving back and forth between fully body shots and shots which are further out and more "environmental". Where the subject size is such that I have to switch between close-up lenses to do this it becomes very tiresome indeed. This is more likely to happen with the G cameras than the FZs.

The longer equivalent focal lengths with the FZs also mean that I can use the longer (around 210mm maximum) working distance of the Raynox 150 more of the time versus the shorter (around 120mm maximum) working distance of the Raynox 250.

As far as image quality goes I've never been able to demonstrate a consistent benefit (for my way of working, subject matter etc) in using the larger sensor G cameras, or an APS-C Canon 70D for that matter.

I have to say using zoom lens with Raynox is not something that many people did AFAIK in the past so well done for trying - and doing so well.

I don't think it's too unusual, in general. I suppose though that it is quite unusual amongst the people who are most "serious" about close-up/macro.
 
I suppose though that it is quite unusual amongst the people who are most "serious" about close-up/macro.
Do you know many people who use that combo a lot? (I think you do very well with it and no one would be unhappy with your images)
BTW have you ever tried printing images on a large scale to compare the different cameras?
 
Do you know many people who use that combo a lot?

No, it's just an impression. Over the years I have seen people referring to using close-up lenses on various zoom lenses, including kit zooms which are a bit short for close-up lenses to work really well, especially the smaller diameter ones like the Raynoxes which tend to vignette a lot on shorter zooms.

Amongst my "macro heroes" Mark Berkery is the only one who comes to mind who I'm aware of having used close-up lenses on telezooms a lot, for a number of years. And he uses a macro lens now. Like I think plenty of others he does use Raynoxes on a macro lens to get a bit more magnification. I quite often see references to that use of achromats.

(I think you do very well with it and no one would be unhappy with your images)

Thanks. :)

BTW have you ever tried printing images on a large scale to compare the different cameras?

No. I have never done any printed comparisons. I have only printed images half a dozen times or so in the 12 years I've been doing this.
 
During 2019 I spent a lot of time comparing various setups for use with my typical subject matter of flowers, buds, seed pods etc using natural light and invertebrates mainly using flash. I looked at:
  • Full frame, Sony A7ii with Canon EF adapter and Canon MPE-65 1X-5X, Laowa 25mm 2.5X-5X, Meike 85mm macro max 1.5X and Sigma 105 macro max 1X, including various combinations of these with extension tubes and 1.4X and 2X teleconverters.
  • Micro four thirds, Panasonic G80 and G9 with Olympus 60mm macro and micro four thirds extension tubes, and using a Canon EF adapter the same EF mount lenses etc as with the A7ii, and a Panasonic 45-175 lens with various close-up lenses including Raynox 150, 250, 202 and 505, Canon 250D and 500D, and Marumi 200 and 330.
  • 1 / 2.3” small sensor bridge cameras, Panasonic 150, 200 and 330 with the above close-up lenses.
  • For flash I compared several diffuser setups for my KX800 twin flashes, and for some of the full frame and micro four thirds setups I compared the KX800 with a Yongnuo YN24EX twin flash with several diffuser setups.
I eventually came to the conclusion that I would use the following setups, at least at the start of 2020:
  • For flowers etc, Panasonic G9 with Olympus 60mm macro.
  • For small invertebrates such as springtails, Panasonic G9 with 45-175 and Raynox 202, possibly using the Raynox 505 for particularly small subjects. KX800 twin flash.
  • For medium sized invertebrates (which is most of the invertebrates I photograph) such as bees, flies and wasps, Panasonic FZ200 with Raynox 150 and 250. KX800 twin flash with different diffuser setup.
  • For larger invertebrates such as dragonflies and butterflies, using natural light, depending of what camera(s) I have with me either FZ200 or G9 with 45-175, in either case with or without a Canon 500D close-up lens depending on the circumstances.
Here are some notes on these areas.

Flowers etc

G9 with Panasonic 60mm macro, with X-Rite ColorChecker Passport


1595 1 G9 with 60mm macro and X-Rite ColorChecker Passport
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

The G9 with 60mm macro gets me to scene sizes down to 18mm wide. This is almost always sufficient for my subject matter.

I tackle most scenes by first using several aperture bracket sequences, which provide a sequence of images from f/2.8 to f/22 with a single shutter press. These are captured raw. I then typically capture several 6K post focus videos. The camera racks the focus from the nearest to the furthest thing it can focus on during these video captures. During post processing I can then decide which version of the scene I like best, either one of the single-image captures (or occasionally more than one of them), or an image stacked from JPEGs extracted from a video.

I have the G9 set up to make it easy to set the camera white balance for each scene using the grey panel on a ColorChecker Passport, and easy to switch between aperture bracketing and post focus video.

I have the ISO set to auto such that base ISO is used as long as the shutter speed is 1/80 sec or faster. If the light is too low for this then the ISO is raised. If the ISO reaches 3200 then the shutter speed is slowed down. This works for each individual capture in an aperture bracket set, and for the post focus videos. Coupled with the fact that there is no setup needed for post focus videos, this ISO/shutter speed arrangement means that the capture process is very much point and shoot, and quick to execute.

For the video captures I use the G9's flat Cinelike D profile, which helps with the fact I am working with JPEGs rather raw files.

Invertebrates using flash

I will be using a Panasonic FZ200 rather than the FZ330 I have been using for a couple of years because the FZ300 has developed a fault. The FZ200 has (as far as anyone can tell) the same lens and sensor as the FZ330 and I have never been able to make out any significant difference between the images from the two cameras. For my purposes there is no significant difference in usability between the FZ200 and FZ330. My FZ200 is functioning well and so I will be using that for now (and I have picked up a spare on eBay for less than £100, and that too seems to be working very well).

Here are the maximum and minimum scene sizes for the small and medium size invertebrate setups.


1595 2 Scene sizes, FZ200 with Raynox 150 and 250, G9 with Raynox 202 and 505
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

For all the scene sizes covered by a particular close-up lens, the working distance is up to around 200mm with the Raynox 150, up to around 120mm with the Raynox 250, around 32mm with the Raynox 202 and around 18mm with the Raynox 505 (although I will rarely, and possibly never, be using the Raynox 505).

Both setups are relatively small and light compared to some of the alternatives. Here is the FZ200 with a Raynox 150 on its partially extended lens.


1595 3 FZ200 with Raynox 150
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

Here it is with a KX800 attached.


1595 4 FZ200 with Raynox 150 and KX800 twin flash
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


1595 5 FZ200 and Raynox 150 with KX800
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

The flash (and its focusing light) can handle all of the Raynox 150 and 250 scene sizes without needing to be adjusted. The KX800 is a manual flash, but the flash power does not need to be adjusted as the scene size changes. When the flash power does need to be changed this can be done very quickly using buttons on the back of the flash unit; there are separate up and down buttons for each flash head. These operating characteristics make the flash quite easy and uncomplicated to use.

Here is the G9 with 45-175 and a Raynox 202.


1595 6 G9 with 45-175 and Raynox 202
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

Here is is with a KX800 attached.


1595 7 G9 with a KX800 with different diffuser setup
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr


1595 8 G9 with KX800 and MSN-202
by gardenersassistant, on Flickr

This is a different KX800 with a different diffuser setup. Similar to the Raynox 150/250 setup, the flash (and its focusing light) can handle all of the Raynox 202 and 505 scene sizes without needing to be adjusted, and the flash power does not need to be adjusted as the scene size changes.

The 45-175 lens is particularly useful in this context, because it does not extend. Every close-up lens only works within a particular range of working distance, and with the Raynox 202 and 505 this range is very small indeed. With this setup I can zoom (using a conveniently placed lever on the side of the lens which can be operated with one finger) to wide angle/low magnification to find the subject and then zoom to the framing I want for the shot, all without moving the camera. I find this very much easier than finding and framing a small subject with a macro lens such as the MPE-65 which extends a lot as the magnification changes (or alternatively using it with the magnification fixed first before locating the subject, which can be frustratingly difficult at higher magnifications).

I have usable autofocus with all of these invertebrate setups and magnifications.


Next post: Why these particular choices of kit?
 
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Why these particular choices of kit?

I have discussed a lot of what follows before but it is spread out across a number of posts so I thought it would be timely to summarise the situation.

An obvious question is why I would want to use close-up lenses on an old camera with a small and noisy sensor when I have modern cameras with better sensors and high quality lenses. That is for invertebrates. For flowers etc I will be using Panasonic’s top of the range stills camera with a very good Olympus macro lens, but the question still arises of why not use a full frame camera, for which I also have high quality macro lenses.

The short answer is that, for what I photograph and the way I go about it, the better equipment rarely produces noticeably better image quality even in the circumstances where the better kit does have an advantage. And very often because of the shooting conditions the better kit does not have an advantage and there is no difference at all in image quality. On the other hand the not so good equipment has better handling characteristics for my purposes which let me work faster and with higher success rates.

Flowers etc

The key factor here is the ability to use aperture bracketing and post focus video. The A7ii and the FZ200 don’t do either of these. The FZ330 does post focus video but not aperture bracketing. The G80 and the G9 do both, but the G9 has several advantages over the G80:
  • The G80 can only do post focus video in 4K. This produces 8 mpix JPEGs to work with. The G9 can do 6K post focus, and this produces 18 mpix JPEGs.
  • Unlike the G80, the G9 has the flat Cinelike D profile. This helps with dynamic range and with normal post processing produces a subdued tonality that I very much like for my flowers etc.
  • The G9 has a better auto ISO/shutter speed implementation.
  • The G9 has a better arrangement of buttons and dials, and unlike the G80 it also has a joystick. The G9 buttons have a better profile (they are easier to find by touch) and there are two buttons that are very conveniently placed on the front of the camera. The setup of the buttons and joystick is highly customisable.
The G9's auto ISO/shutter speed and button/joystick arrangements have let me create a working setup which minimises the adjustments I have to make, speeds up those that do need my input, and lets me work fast and fluidly right through sometimes long sessions.

I did think that the A7ii might produce better image quality for single-capture images compared to any of my other kit and so might make it worth foregoing aperture bracketing and post focus video. However it turned out that the main advantage of the A7ii was that it could produce slightly less noisy images in good light, but I don’t have a problem with image noise in good light. In less than good light, and especially when it was breezy, which it often is here, equivalence kicked in and in order to get the depth of field and shutter speed I needed I had to raise the ISO with the A7ii, which negated the noise benefits.

There were some other disadvantages of the A7ii such as weight (of lenses – the A7ii is light enough) and the tilting but not fully articulated screen, which made it more difficult and sometimes impossible to work in portrait mode, which I do a great deal for flowers etc. These problems were moot though given the lack of significant image quality benefit and the absence of aperture bracketing and post focus video.

Image quality for invertebrates

For invertebrates I use single-image captures out in the field working hand-held. The reason that I don’t get better image quality for invertebrates when using better equipment is because I use very small apertures to maximise depth of field. Diffraction then becomes the dominant factor and pretty much equalises lens arrangements in terms of detail capture, which is a primary consideration for invertebrate images. I have seen theoretical explanations of this equalising effect (not that I understand the details), but my conclusions are based on numerous practical tests of capturing a bank note at various magnifications, both using a tripod so as to look at the intrinsic capabilities of a camera/lens setup, and working hand-held to see how those capabilities pan out in practice for my working methods. Basically the image quality I got with close-up lenses on small sensor bridge cameras were overall as good as I got with any other setup.

Kit for medium sized invertebrates

Since image quality is much the same whatever the equipment, the decision as to what kit to use is down to usability.

Because of the weight of the lenses, most of the A7ii setups are heavier and less well balanced than I am comfortable with for long sessions. (The Laowa 25mm macro is not so heavy.) In contrast the G80/G9 setups and the FZ200 setups are light and balanced enough to be comfortable for long sessions.

I much prefer to use autofocus. However, although I can have autofocus up to 1:1 with the A7ii using a Sigma 105 macro, as the magnification gets towards 1:1 the autofocus gets slower and can hunt a lot, sometimes being unable to gain focus at all. And with higher magnification lenses such as the MPE-65 autofocus is not available. The situation is similar with the G80/G9 when using these same macro lenses. In contrast I get usable autofocus at all the magnifications I use with close-up lenses on G80/G9 and FZ200. I can use very small focus areas, which lets me place the centre of focus/DOF exactly where I want it to be. (The focus area is movable, but I generally use focus and recompose.) The autofocusing does not hunt at all for medium sized invertebrates and not excessively with smaller subjects given the size of the hand movement effects it has to cope with.

I need to cover a range of scene sizes. This turns out to be awkward with the A7ii. The Sigma 105 only goes to 1:1, the MPE-65 only goes from 1:1 and the Laowa 25mm macro only goes from 2.5:1. For my purposes 1:1 on full frame is a rather inconvenient break point which means that with the A7ii I would need to switch back and forth frequently either between lenses and/or with additions such as extension tubes, teleconverters and/or close-up lenses.

I can do a significantly greater proportion of my invertebrate photography with a Raynox 150 on a 45-175 on the G80/G9. However, the break point between Raynox 150 and 250 is still somewhat inconvenient meaning that I have to switch back and forth quite a lot between the 150 and 250. This is especially troublesome if I want to zoom in and out between full body shots of the subject and “environmental” shots showing the subject in its natural surroundings, often using intermediate framings. It is even more troublesome when I am framing in and out on a subject that I am tracking as it moves around. With a Raynox 150 on the FZ200 I can do a very large proportion of my invertebrate photography without having to make any change to the setup. In some sessions I don't change from the Raynox 150 throughout the whole session. This is the main reason I have chosen to use the FZ200 for medium sized invertebrates.

Another, lesser factor is that the Raynox 250 has a shorter working distance than the 150, and that means that with frequent switching between the 150 and 250 with the G80/G9 I am more often using the shorter working distance of the 250, which increases the likelihood of scaring off some subjects.

Kit for small invertebrates

I don’t often photograph small invertebrates such as springtails, although I do intend to try to do more of it this year.

Similar considerations apply as with medium sized invertebrates. However, as the subjects get smaller the extension of the lens on the FZ200 becomes increasingly problematic. Being able to change the magnification/framing without moving the camera with the G80/G9 close-up lens setup is distinctly advantageous for small subjects. Also, there is rarely any magnification/framing break point issue for these small subjects. That is the reason I favour a setup using the non-extending 45-175 with a close-up lens on G80/G9 for small subjects.

I favour the G9 over the G80 in this role because of the convenience and speed of moving the focus point with the G9 joystick (focus and recompose does not work well for small subjects) and because of the slightly better cropability of the G9’s 20 mpix sensor compared to the G80’s 16 mpix sensor.

Kit to cover small and medium sized invertebrates in the same session

Taking out the G9 and FZ200 at the same time would be awkward, with each having their differently configured KX800 attached. I have been gathering the stuff needed to make a carrier that would let me take both out at the same time, but even if I do succeed in making something suitable I think I am much more likely to go out for sessions with a single camera and concentrate on either medium sized or small sized subjects in a particular session. However, both cameras can cover both roles, just not as well as one another, so by taking all four close-up lenses with me I will be able to cover both medium and small subjects with whichever camera I am using.

EDIT: On reflection I was a bit too positive here. I have different KX800 setups for (a) the G9 for small subjects and (b) the FZ200 for medium sized subjects. Whichever camera I was using, even if I took all my close-up lenses, unless I took both flash setups I wouldn't have the right setup for the alternative use. I could bend the arms around on either setup to cover the alternative use, but I really wouldn't want to do that as getting the setups just right is quite tricky, so putting it properly back in place after an alternative use could be difficult, especially out in the field. I suppose it might be easier to carry around just the alternative flash unit rather than carrying around both cameras with flash units attached. I need to look closer at the practicalities here.

Larger invertebrates

I rarely come across larger invertebrates such as butterflies, dragonflies and damselflies. When I do it tends to be quite bright and I tend to use natural light rather than flash. Given how rare this is it would not be worth carrying additional equipment to cover this eventuality. Either the FZ200 or G80/G9 with 45-175 can cover this, especially if I take one more close-up lens, the low power Canon 500D.

Choice of close-up lenses

I have looked at various options for close-up lenses.

For small invertebrates the Raynox 202 and 505 seem to be the best options, although both sometimes suffer from significant and occasionally difficult to remove chromatic aberration at higher magnifications. Even so, they have produced better results in my tests than stacking less powerful close-up lenses.

For large invertebrates, where close-up lenses are used at all the choice from my available close-up lenses would be between the Canon 500D and the Marumi 330. The 500D has a larger working distance, which is better in this context with sometimes jumpy subjects, and my tests have not shown the Marumi 330 to produce better results than the 500D. My choice is therefore the Canon 500D.

For medium sized invertebrates I have options including, singly and in combination, Raynox 150 and 250, Canon 250D and 500D, Marumi 200 and 330.

I am attracted to the larger diameter Canon and Marumi close-up lenses as they produce less vignetting on the FZ200, giving me a larger range of magnifications to work with compared to the Raynoxes. However, my tests on two copies each of the Canon 250D and Marumi 200 have shown them to perform poorly in terms of image quality. The Canon 500D is good but not really powerful enough in this role. The Marumi 330 tested well, singly and as a stacked pair which was between the Raynox 150 and 250 in terms of maximum magnification. However, and here too I don’t recall the details, the Raynoxes did better overall in my testing, and they are therefore my choice in this role.
 
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For me the KX800 set up looks very unwieldy - but obviously it works so is fine. Saying that do you often use it at ground level? I could imagine if you ever fly dismantling this would be tricky.
 
For me the KX800 set up looks very unwieldy

It certainly looks unwieldy, but I find it very convenient to use. It is quite light and because of the particular camera/lens arrangements I'm using it does not get in the way of using the lens. For example, I don't need to use focus or zoom rings on the lens, and I don't need to see any markings on the lens (magnification, or for purely mechanical lenses like the Laowa 25mm, the aperture ring).

- but obviously it works so is fine.

It works fine for me. (I think Thomas Shahan may still be using one - not that I'm anywhere near his standard of course - but I wouldn't think he would waste his time with something he found inconvenient to use.)

Saying that do you often use it at ground level?

Yes I do.

I could imagine if you ever fly dismantling this would be tricky.

I would want to pack it without altering the shape, so it would be bulky. It has taken me some time to organise them so they are aligned just right (which is why I have separate KX800 setups for the FZ200 and the G9). But I don't ever fly, so for me this isn't a problem.
 
I have usable autofocus with all of these invertebrate setups and magnifications.
That is really good.
I would want to pack it without altering the shape, so it would be bulky. It has taken me some time to organise them so they are aligned just right (which is why I have separate KX800 setups for the FZ200 and the G9). But I don't ever fly, so for me this isn't a problem.
Not interested in seeing insects and other things in other parts of the world? Although of course it has environmental costs and is not enjoyable.
I was told by people at the Herpetology Forum - that these are the only photos that anyone has ever got of this snake alive (although the guide also got some).
https://www.flickr.com/photos/14586608@N08/albums/72157648287489052

The Sierra de Santa Marta in Colombia is full of lots of endemics
 
It certainly looks unwieldy, but I find it very convenient to use. It is quite light and because of the particular camera/lens arrangements I'm using it does not get in the way of using the lens. For example, I don't need to use focus or zoom rings on the lens, and I don't need to see any markings on the lens (magnification, or for purely mechanical lenses like the Laowa 25mm, the aperture ring).



It works fine for me. (I think Thomas Shahan may still be using one - not that I'm anywhere near his standard of course - but I wouldn't think he would waste his time with something he found inconvenient to use.)
That makes sense - I think my tolerance for unwieldy things is low. Being light is quite useful I find the weight of my Canon MPE65 tricky but hopefully now I have got a way of coping with shoulder problems that will be less of an issue.
I have heard of bird photographers who do exercise to cope with the weight of lens - maybe I will do the same for MPE65!
 
That is really good.

Not interested in seeing insects and other things in other parts of the world? Although of course it has environmental costs and is not enjoyable.
I was told by people at the Herpetology Forum - that these are the only photos that anyone has ever got of this snake alive (although the guide also got some).
https://www.flickr.com/photos/14586608@N08/albums/72157648287489052

The Sierra de Santa Marta in Colombia is full of lots of endemics

It is not really practical for us to travel. In any case, we are not really into travelling. For example it is over 50 years since I went outside of the UK. Even before we ran into practical difficulties we rarely travelled anywhere in this country. I'm going to try and visit some more of the local nature reserves this year. That's about the most travelling I envisage doing.
 
That makes sense - I think my tolerance for unwieldy things is low. Being light is quite useful I find the weight of my Canon MPE65 tricky but hopefully now I have got a way of coping with shoulder problems that will be less of an issue.

I hope that works out ok for you.

I have heard of bird photographers who do exercise to cope with the weight of lens - maybe I will do the same for MPE65!

Sounds like hard work! Still, getting more exercise is always a good thing.
 
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