Macro for EOS

I am a Canon EOS shooter. I would like to purchase some type of

bellows for macro work. Does anyone know of some fairly cheap bellows

that will work for macro shots of 1-2x life size? If such a thing

does not exist for EOS what lenses would be good for this project?

The only bellows system I am aware of for Canon EOS is the bellows made for Canon FD mount. You must get an EOS-FD converter to use these bellows.

 

The Canon EOS 100 f/2.8 and 180 f/3.5 already go to 1x . I did'nt do the math, but you should easily be able to use extension tubes, teleconverters, etc... to get to 1-2x with these lenses.

Philip,

 

The 100 and 180 macro lenses both go to life-size withough addtional equipment. Also, you can fix a Canon close-up lenses (filter-like) to the front of the 100 to give greater than life size (I think the 180 has too great a diameter for these lenses but no doubt someone will correct me if I'm wrong). Tubes will do the same but the close-up lenses are exceedingly high quality, easier to carry around and do not cause loss of light. Tubes are more useful if you want to focus closer with, say, a 300 lens. By the way, you can also use the close-up filters with the 90mm TS lens with good results, and the 1.4X converter also works with this lens to give greater image size (and, presumably the 2X although I haven't personally done this).

 

Best wishes,

 

Chris Mattison

I just bought a set of the Kenko extension tubes for EOS for $120 USD. You get 3 tubes, 12mm, 20mm and 36mm allowing a good number of combinations. Most postings here state the quality of the tubes to be very good (yes this is subjective) and also recommend the off-brand Kenko instead of the Canon's, since the set of 3 is about the cost of a single Canon 25mm tube. Use in conjunction with your 1.4x or 2x (as described by Shaw and Morris) and you can get 2x life magnification or greater. Also your camera's light meter will compensate for the slightly reduced light. Also a problem with the filter-like lenses is they restrict macro work to the lenses the size of the filter you purchased.. of course you could then use a step-down ring etc...

Extension tubes are a cheap route to greater than 1x magnification. There is also a reversing ring for EOS (I think it is marketted by Novaflex - Calumet sells them). A third option would be the old FD series gear. You can get the EOS-FD macro adapter, the FD bellows, and the 20mm or 35mm special bellows mount macro lenses. All are available from B&H. You can go to very large magnifications with this set up. If you want to read about EOS macro photography with the various types of equipment marketted by Canon for the EOS system, you might want to purchase the EOS Macro Book, also available from B&H and other suppliers (typically for less than $20).

Novoflex makes bellows for EOS. These

preserve the electronic connection between

the lens and the body.

www.wfv.de advertises them for 729 DEM.

Novoflex makes two types of bellows that work with Canon EOS. One is a Universal bellows that works in manual mode - Calumet sells it; I've not tried it.

 

The other is advertised by Calumet to work with the Canon EOS system but it does not work as advertised. I bought it, tested it extensively, and returned it to Calumet. When mounted to my Canon EOS A2, it maintains autofocus from "0cm" to "2.5cm" (as marked on its focusing rail). Past that mark, it loses all contact with the camera, which shows only "00" as the aperture reading. Same results with the Canon EOS 1N. The products works properly with the Canon EOS RT and EOS 630. I performed additional tests with my Canon dealer, the local Canon rep, and Canon's technical support and we're all stumped. Novoflex has no web site or technical support that I can find, and I'm too busy to write send a snail-mail letter to their office in Germany.

 

As someone here mentioned, you may wish to pick up a Canon FD bellows (careful not to buy the old Canon "FL" bellows often seen at photo swap meets) with the FD-EOS Macro adapter. It works great with Canon's FD lenses, macrophoto lenses, and reversed lenses.

As Chris mentioned, the Canon Close-up diopters affixed to either macro lens will increase magnification. The 500D <i>is</i> available in the 72mm size, and will give ~1.36:1, if I'm calculating correctly...

This is somewhat late for the original post, but....

 

Another option is to use a macro coupling ring and a reversed 50mm on the front of a 100mm to get to 2x life size. As described in John SHaw's nature Photography book. I have the 100 2.8 and it just happens to have the same filter size as the 50 1.8, so there would be one option which would give up to 1x (100 2.8 on its own and 2x with the 50 added).