Check out my little buddy. =)
It's insane how close you can get. There's quite a learning curve shooting at around 3x, but I'm really looking forward to this challenge. It's very tough to even get your lens pointed at the subject, much less get it in focus! Focusing basically requires moving forwards and backwards on the order of millimeters. It takes some getting used to to have your lens so incredibly close to the subject. Little ants like to run all over the flower petals.
I noticed that towards the end of the day, the started to wear out and slowed down, which made my job easier. Then again, after several hours of shooting, I was pretty worn out too! I've posted some of my favorite shots from this first attempt for critique and feedback. Feel free to go have a look.
It's funny.. after a little while, you get used to having your face right down in the flowers looking for ants and you get used to the scale. At one point, I saw a spider about 1cm long and literally jumped back, breathing hard. I don't have a problem with spiders, but all of the sudden it felt so huge! Once I caught my breath, I had to laugh. =)
After giving this a shot, I have much more respect for skilled macro shooters who can consistently produce beautiful results, especially beyond 1:1.
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