Macro photography with a 135mm lens

Hi,

 

 

I�m looking to shoot some pictures of toadstools, mushrooms and other fungi

this autumn. I was wondering if I could use my Carl Zeiss Jena S 135mm lens

for macro photography with an extension tube. If so, what size tube do I need?.

 

Best wishes

 

Stephen

What mag do you want on the image? 1:1? 1:2? ???

Hi,

 

Im afraid know nothing about macro photography, but I assume that because most subjects will be quite small 1:2 would be the most appropriate. On the other hand, I think small groupings of fungi would or larger examples would need 1:1. I nearly always shoot with Fuji superia 400. Is this OK or do I need a better film.

 

If anyone has any further advice on this subject, I�m always keen to learn.

 

Stephen

Magnification = extension / focal length<p>

 

So you need 67.5 mm for 1:2 and 135mm for 1:1. However, that is only with the lens set on infinity. If you focus the 135mm closer, you can treat it as having some built in extension of its own, so in practice you will need quite a bit less than those figures.

<p><a href=https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/basu/web/links/books.html>Here are some macro books I like.</a><p>-A

Hi, Stephen,

 

I suppose your Zeiss Jena S 135mm lens has M42 screw mount. If so, you have to use an M42-to-Nikon-F mount adaptor which is fairly easy to find. Although you cannot focus at infinity with the mount adaptor, you can do macro using either M42 or Nikon extension tubes wothout problem.

 

Having said that, I suspect that 135mm might be too long for your purpose. I'm no expert of fungi photography, but if you shoot fungi that grow on the undulating wet ground, you might need to get as close to the object as possible in order to get rid of any plants and things that get in the way.

 

A dedicated 50 to 60mm macro lens seems to be able to serve you better.

Stephen,

 

The 135mm focal length lens was once the very popular length used for portraits and so they do not generally focus very closely. With that lens the best you are likely to be able to do is use a diopter/closeup lens on the front of your lens (does it have a 55mm front filter thread?). These lenses come with numbers (+1, +2, etc) as the number gets larger the closer you can focus. I even have a +10 somewhere in my bin of old photography stuff!

 

However, using diopters has its downside. Unless you pay a mint for one made by Nikon, Canon, Kenko, etc. they are usually really cheap optical devices that will have horrible distortion on the edges of the frame, and only so-so in the middle. Often these are not coated optics too.

 

For a cheap persons optics (depending on your system) all you need is a good old lens reverser for your standard 50mm lens. If you are using a screw mount setup, you can get extension tubes very inexpensively for that 50mm lens that work even better.

Oops,

 

Sorry, I thought I was in Nikon forum.

 

Of course, you don't necessarily use Nikon camera with CZJ 135mm:-)

 

However, I still think that 135mm is somewhat too long to shoot fungui.

 

Many pictures of fungui that I've seen were taken even using wideangle (thus the focal lentgh is shorter than 50mm in 135 film format) lenses.

Hi,

 

Thanks for that. I mostly shoot pictures of landscapes, so I've never bought a 50mm lens. I do have 24mm and 35mm lenses for my SLR camera, will any of them do the job with a set of extension tubes?

 

As well as a 35mm camera, I have a Bronica etrsi with the standard 75mm lens and 50mm lens. Can any one tell me what be the most appropriate size of extension tube would be for the Bronica?

Best wishes

 

Stephen

A 135mm lens on a bellows can be a good lens for macro. Of course the maximum magnification possible will be limited by how much extension you have available. Lots more versatile than using tubes.

Stephen - I do not know about your lenses so cannot comment. As to your comment on 1:1 and 1:2 I think you have got them back to front.It can be daunting reading all the very technical information and maybe an easy introduction for you can be found on - www.ephotozine.com/equipment/buyersguide/fullbuyersguide - it gives a quick run-through of the options and an idea of the relative costs ( do not know what the currency is or how upto date it is but as I said it gives a relative picture ). You can then take it on from there.

 

You also asked as to film. Fuji Superia is a pretty good all round film and will give you acceptable results. If you want to try something a little bit better you could consider the Fuji Professional Pro160s or Pro160C - google up the Fuji website and look at the relative brief specifications and see which you think might appeal to you more given your preferences and the subject matter. Many people rate Fuji Reala highly and it is a little cheaper but I have no personal experience.

 

Film choice can be a very subjective matter and you will get many differing opinions - in the end you need to try some of them out to see for yourself.

Steven,

 

Could you specify the camera brand you are using? If your camera is one with M42 screw mount, I'm afraid I don't really know if there is any appropriate extension tube for 24 or 35mm lenses because they require an extremely thin tube, maybe thinner than the thinnest tube of the usual three-extension-tube set. There might be a chance for a 35mm lens to work with the thinnest one.

 

Incidentally, Nikon used to make a very thin extension ring (too thin to call it "tube"!) named K1 ring as a part of very useful K-ring set. The K1 ring is only 5.7mm thick and can be combined even with 20mm lens safely. With K1, you have to use stop-down metering method, though.

Akira, I find your suggestion that short lenses are better suited to shooting fungi than longer ones very puzzling. This in part because I have and even use a 200/4 MicroNikkor AIS that works as well on fungi as on more mobile subjects. And in part because I used to have and use a 135/2.8 Steinheil Auto Makro Quinar that didn't much care what the subject was. And in part because these days my standard "walking around" macro lens is a 105/2.8 MicroNikkor AIS that works well on all subjects. My 55/2.8 MicroNikkor AIS and my wife's 55/3.5 (I owned one many years ago too) also do well on subjects we can get them close enough to.

 

What's the magic of short lenses? I've seen cheapo "macro"/wide angle lenses as short as 28 mm and they've always seemed pretty useless because of short working distance.

 

Stephen, the length of tube you need depends on how close the lens will focus on its own mount. To get to 1:1, you need to place the lens' rear principal plane 270 mm from the film. To get to 1:2 (half life size), the distance will be 202.5 mm. The rear principal plane is close to the diaphragm. If you can manage the extension, try it.

 

Good luck, have fun,

 

Dan

Hi,

 

 

Thank you for sorting out my confusion � yes for the most part, I would be looking to shoot at 1:1. I have a Practica BX20. I don�t think the later pentacon and practica lenses had much of a reputation; therefore my plan was to replace them with older Zeiss and Takumar M42 lenses.It seems to me that this would give me the a good image for the least cost.

 

I do have the Practica bayonet 70-210mm zoom, but I understand its not very good and besides, extension tubes in this mount are difficult to find.

 

Given that I have my Bronica, I don�t want to spend a lot of money on a lens and extension tubes, so judging by what I�ve read, I would be better off buying a standard lens and a set of extension tubes. When I buy the extension tubes, I will attach them to the 135mm and see if its any use.

 

Thank you for all your replies

 

Stephen

Dan,

 

The fungi I have ever seen in the field often grow on the wet undulationg ground and among glasses. For the fungi that grow on trees, you could use tele-macros comfortably because there are no obstacles between the fungi and the camera.

 

I'm afraid I cannot provide any link, but the most impressive pictures of fungi I've ever seen are the ones shot almost from an insects' point of view : you feel as if you are under the umbrella. In order to shoot from this kind of perspective, I think you need to use wideangle lenses and get as close to the fungus as possible.

Akira, I agree with you that low-angle shots can be very effective, not that they require a short lens. What they can require, alas, is lying face down on the ground. Perhaps I should get a 35 mm SLR with a removable prism or cobble up a reflex viewer for my Graphics in order to take such shots more comfortably.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

Dan,

 

I've found a couple of examples of the type of fungi photos that I like:

 

http://blog.goo.ne.jp/kinokoweb/c/0a2beb35aa1ff4fc5c463b1602ed4150

 

Scroll down and you'll see the photos that appears to be the macro shots using wideangles.

 

Lying face down on the ground should be indeed a painstaking job, but the results are often impressive. Maybe I'm too much infected fabulous documentary films by Richard Attenborough:-)

 

By the way, here you can see another stunning picture of Omphalotus guepiniformis glowing at night:

 

http://shindo-s.com/ending/end17_0407.html

 

Scroll down a little and you see a stunning image.

 

Cheers!

Look. there is a simple first order approximate distance formula.

 

If you are handy with fractions (and who is not, given photography), here it goes:

 

1/a + 1/b = 1/f

 

with a the distance from film plane to subject, b the distance from film plane to lens extension, i.e., f (for inf) + the actual extension, and f = focal length.

 

If you solve for b you will find that

 

b = (f a)/(a - f).

 

Or for a: a = (f b)/(b - f).

 

And if you look at the original formula you see for example that a lens has to be off the film plane 2 times f to get 1:1 (or a = b = 2f).

 

Now get your Bronica, look at an object the size you want to fill the frame with, i.e., move camera (obviously unfocussable, does not matter much) so as to fill the viewfinder and measure the distance of the small object from the front of the lens.

 

If f = 100mm = 10cm and the object ends up 15cm in front of the lens, then b = 15 + f = 15 + 10 = 25cm from the film plane and therefore

a = (10 25)/(25 - 10) = 250/15 = 16.66 cm.

 

The lens has a focal length of 10cm, so subtract this from a to get a necessary extension of 6.67cm = 67mm or so in your case.

 

Repeat with your own experiments. Simple enough? Even simpler if we rephrase the basis optics formula to give you the extension o fthe lens needed in terms of the object's distance from the front of the lens:

 

e = [(f (f+d))/d] - f,

 

where e is the extension of the lens needed to depict an object the distance d in front of the lens with a lens of focal length f.

 

In our example:

 

e = (10 (10+15))/15 - 10 = 250/15 -10 = 6.67 cm as computed before.

 

Good luck mastering simple fractions well!

 

Tell me what extension numbers you get for your object and the 135 = 13.5 cm lens and I can check your 'rithmetic out.

Akira, Nice link/image there.

 

Prof. Uhlig! Don't try to drive that poor soul out of photography. :-)

 

Stephen: There were 3 extension rings made for the Bronica (I assume it is ETR/s). Experiment with various lenses (I recommend the 40mm lens for wide angle close-ups) and various tube combinations to get what you like.

Akira, thanks for the links. You tried; I'm still not convinced I like the effect. Regardless of focal length used, face down in the mud, although necessary, isn't fun.

 

Frank, Stephen, there are easier computational forms than the ones Frank gave. Extension (rear node to film, really) = f*(m + 1), front node to film = f* (m + 1)/m. f = the lens focal length, m = magnification. With most lenses, the nodes are very near the diaphragm, the diaphragm's position is a good approximation to the nodes' position. Effective aperture, i.e., aperture adjusted for extension, is n/(1 + m/p) where n is the f/number set, m is magnification, p is the lens' pupillary magnification, and the lens is mounted facing normally, i.e., not reversed. For lenses that are neither retrofocus nor telephoto, assume p = 1; otherwise, measure.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

Just for fun, I put a Sears label 135 "macro" lens on a Pentax KX when we toured a mushroom farm. This was with available light hand-held at f/2.8. With extension tube(s), TTL metering, and a tripod, you can do better.<div></div>

Carl Zeiss Jena 35mm f2.4 can focus close to 1:2 by itself, no tube are needed. With a 13mm tube ~1:1.2 and 25mm ~1.2:1