I'm starting to love this technique. I take my regular shoe-mounted flash that is normally pointed straight towards the ceiling. This causes the light to scatter and bounce off the [white] ceiling before illuminating objects. In this picture, however, the whole camera is turned sideways, so the flash is pointed left. It's bouncing off the carpet on the stairs and returning to Henry with the appearance of being a soft off-camera light.

September 03, 2011

I picked up some Macro Extension Tubes a couple weeks back and I'm now getting around to testing them out. The only problem I've had since switching over to a camera with interchangeable lenses is the lack of macro. Most mid-level point and shoot cameras have a decent macro mode, but when you make the switch to interchangeable lenses, you have to spring for an extra Macro lens if you want to do extreme close-ups.

...Or so I thought. There are several ways around that fact, and until recently I knew very little about them. One option is to buy extension tubes for your camera. This is literally just a tube that goes between your camera and your lens. It doesn't have any glass/optics in the tube; it's just a spacer. Adding some more space between your camera's lens and the camera's sensor changes the dynamic of your lens. It turns nearly any lens into a macro lens. For me, getting to use the lenses I already have is a fantastic arrangement because I have two very nice Canon prime lenses. The great thing about extension tubes is that they are literally just a plastic tube so they don't cost much at all.

Here is the first picture I took when I finally got them out. It's the edge of some soft toy that's meant for babies to chew on. It's indoors and without a tripod. Having a macro lens again is going to be fun.

August 21, 2011