Spiders, flies and flowers

[clovishound]

Well, I'm trying my hand at macro photography. This morning I got up early, purloined the Pup's macro lens, and headed off to the swamp. Now, I haven't done any macro work since my film days, a couple decades ago. Even then, I didn't do much, and what I did was pretty pathetic. I had a great time this morning, and felt pretty good about what I brought back, being inexperienced at this type of photography. It makes a nice adjunct to bird photography, injecting a little change, and the ability to get some pics when the birds aren't cooperating.

A red orb weaver. Got him from several angles, but I like this one the best. Perhaps I should have waited until his forelegs were extended, but he seemed to keep them folded for the most part.

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This one may not appeal to a lot of folks, but it makes me think he's practicing for a motorcycle road race.

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Saw this guy hiding amongst the flowers.

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[BrokenolMarine]

I like this type of photography, although I don't do much of it any longer. You did great. Love the macro stuff. Consider catching the dew on the flowers, and reflections of the sun off various objects with that macro... I had good luck with it. I'll try and find some shots if I can. Again... great shots.

[clovishound]

Dew, did you say dew?

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This is just another flower picture. I do, however, kind of like the water droplets on the flower.

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Also, that first spider picture has water droplets outlining the web. It's a lot more obvious on a full screen image of it.

[BrokenolMarine]

I used to sit in the garden early in the morning to catch the bugs and flowers. I got lucky a couple times and have posted my Hummingbird moth here before. It was selected as a photo of the month in the Virginia Wildlife mag, so I'll pass on that one this time unless someone asks to see it, but these are pretty cool. Pollen duty...

I saw the bush buzzing with bees. They were rolling in it....

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Basically taking a pollen bath....

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The little pollen thieves came out covered in it....

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Then off they'd go, back to the hive...


It was a busy morning, the cycle seemed to continue, coming and going.

[BrokenolMarine]

I love that water drop pic... you can see another pic reflected in the drop. This was always one of MY favorites, I liked the water drop about to fall, and the contrasts in colors from light to dark of the mulch, and textures of the flower and the stone in the background. My wife always said I shouldn't explain, as my feminine side comes out when I do...

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[BrokenolMarine]

The Joseph's coat is an interesting flower. The flowers bloom a single color, blend into two, then change, then drop off the climbing vine. (Coat of Many Colors... LOL)

[clovishound]

Nice pictures. It's tough to get the bees right. They are constantly moving, sometimes behind things just as you hit the shutter. Plus, you need a faster shutter speed to stop motion, but also small apertures to maximize depth of field, so that the whole bee is in focus. That either means a lot of light, or a high ISO. I'm looking at getting a decent flash with wireless control and a mini soft box. That way we can introduce soft lighting from any direction.

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[BrokenolMarine]

Good on yah, I can no longer sit in the garden or the woods for any length of time. If I get down, it's too hard to get back up without help. Sigh... a crane maybe. Perhaps a stool? But the D40 I used died, and the camera I have now is WAY smarter than me and I haven't invested the time. The lenses are from an older camera and the new lenses are (OMG) expensive. I'll leave this hobby to you... YOU are so good at it. I would be genuflecting in admiration, but Miss T would have to come help me up.

[clovishound]

Thanks for the kind words. I definitely understand about being able to get up and down. I don't have any real problem with it right now, although I do feel like I need something to give me a little extra push back up if I have been kneeling or squatting down for a while.

I would point out that lots of closeup opportunities are available without getting down close to the ground. The spider pictures were all at standing height. Lots of common lenses these days are capable of fairly close focus. They probably won't go down to 1:1, like the Pup's macro, but lots of shots don't really need that kind of magnification. Not pushing you, you understand, just saying you can probably still do it, if you are interested. I also understand about moving on from a hobby. I've done that many times, without physical limitations involved.

[BrokenolMarine]

The biggest thing is the new camera body and twenty year old D40 lenses. I asked about new lenses and they ARE very expensive. I'd really rather spend that money on the hobbies we are really invested in, although a basic lens and perhaps a single decent telephoto wouldn't be bad down the road.

[clovishound]

What is the new camera body, if you don't mind me asking? Or, are you talking about possibly buying a new body?

Nikon is pretty good about lens compatibility. Unfortunately, you sometimes lose some functions. I can actually use a 70s era Nikon F mount lens on my new Z5. It requires an adapter, which I have, and would need to be used completely manually, just like we did in the 70s, but it will mount and work. What lenses do you have from the old D40?

[BrokenolMarine]

I have a D700 Body I bought several years ago from a member one of the two forums WE both belong to. My memory issues keep me from remembering who it was, but I was told I got a very fair price. I recently (in the last year) had a professional photographer check out the camera with HIS high end (Thousands of dollars each) lenses and the body is fine. He actually teaches a class at the local college on photography which I considered taking for the fun of it and to learn to use the camera, but health issues prevented it.

Lenses? I have the Nikon DX 28mm standard lens and the Nikon 55 to 200 zoom that came with the D40 kit we bought Many years ago for the camera we bought to use with the charity. "I" killed the camera on a fly fishing trip and in fact wrote a very humorous story about it that ran in the local paper (Throwaway job) but it was a favorite of the readers. I posted the story HERE on the forum a bit later and it did well here too. I might dig it up and post it again if there is an interest.

A couple problems that crop up with the D700... I'll shoot a picture, and then when I go to fire the shutter again, nothing happens. There are eleventeen hundred settings on the camera and I have NO clue if it's set up wrong or what's going on.... but it takes great pictures when it's working. I can take the lens off and put it back on and it's taking pictures again. I likely need to take a class and learn the camera AND buy at least a basic 28mm lens and a decent zoom if I decide to take real photos again. But my dang phone takes pretty good pics.


The D700

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The Zoom

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Since we spent a lot of time in the kayaks for the kayak fishing charity.... I added a nice pelican case...

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[clovishound]

One issue I see is that you are looking at a 12 MP full frame sensor. The lenses you have are DX, ie made for half frame sensors. If the D700 does like most Nikons do these days, they automatically go into DX mode when you mount a DX lens on it. IE you are only using half the sensor. I personally wouldn't purchase any full frame lenses for it, unless you plan on upgrading to a full frame body down the road. If you are interested in getting things going again with photography, you might consider getting a DX camera to match up with the lenses you currently have. The newer DX bodies are 24 MP and should deliver noticeably more resolution than the D700, even with a full frame FX lens. You could probably pick up a nice used DX body for not a whole lot, with a little luck. Sticking with the newer 24 MP sensor models would be a good thing IMO. I have a D3400, a bottom of the heap entry level DSLR. The image quality of my new full frame Z5 is only slightly better. The Z5 has lots of great features, and is more robustly built, but the image quality is nearly identical, excepting low light performance.

The only thing I could suggest on the issue you are having with the D700 is to remove the battery, then hold the shutter button down for about 15 seconds. A system reset probably would be in order as well. Beyond that, it's likely a hardware problem.

[dave77]

I have a Canon 70D which is a crop sensor camera. I got a Tamron 28-75 f2.8 lens to go with it and although its takes very good photos, every once and a while a photo will have very soft focus. Sent it in to Tamron to have it checked and they said everything was good. Saw a Tony Northrup video and he said a lens made for a full frame camera can sometimes be iffy on a crop sensor camera. Still use it but I shot some photos at a friends wedding with it, most were fine but some I took in the shade were pretty soft so I don't use it for photos I can't re-create. The kit lenses that came with it are OK just don't have the range of the Tamron

If I was starting over today I would get one of the mirrorless CanonR's (I'm sure Nikon has something similar). Full frame bodies start at around $1500, probably get a decent RF lens and then save up for their RF28-70mm F2 L USM ($2900).

As it is and at my age I just don't use my camera enough to justify that kind of money. I find I mostly just use my phone camera anymore, it takes decent photos, plenty good enough for posting online and is a lot more convenient.

[clovishound]

I am surprised at the statement that full frame lenses can be iffy on crop sensor cameras. Usually full frame lenses are sharper on crop sensor cameras, because the camera only uses the center of the image, which is always the sharpest. My daughter uses a couple full frame lenses on her crop sensor camera, and consistently gets good results. The ones you took in shade might have suffered from motion blur because lower light levels resulted in low shutter speeds.

I've been very happy with my mirrorless. Most of the major manufacturers are no longer developing new DSLR cameras. The focus is completely on mirrorless. There are many advantages.

[BrokenolMarine]

I tend to agree that for routine pictures the pictures from the camera phones are getting better and better as we go. I can take macro, panaramic shots, video and some very basic zoom shots. I have always tried to keep a decent "REAL" camera around, especially when we had the Charity so we could post HI-Rez shots of the events, but I just can't see spending the money these days.

[dave77]

Here's the video about using full frame lenses on a crop body, long and technical. Tony Northrup has been around for quite a while now and has a huge number of good photography videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8-vfiq33R4

https://www.youtube.com/@TonyAndChelsea/videos

[clovishound]

I have watched many videos by Tony and his wife.

I am very surprised by this video. The conventional wisdom I have always heard and read was that Full Frame lenses perform better on a Crop Frame camera than a comparable CF lens. The main reason I got FF lenses for the Pup was because I was thinking she may switch to a FF camera at some point in the future, and didn't want to buy the lenses twice. The 70-300 FF lens I got to replace her 70-300 kit lens is noticeably sharper than the kit lens when used on her CF camera. It also has image stabilization and a much more robust build.

Thanks for posting this, I may have to do some research.

[clovishound]

Got a couple more macro shots this morning.

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Played around with my new flash. I have a lot to learn to make this thing do what I want. The bee isn't real sharp, but I still kind of like the sense of motion effect it gives.

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[BrokenolMarine]

I love the dragon fly. Like the bee as well, is that Lamb's Ear?