Macro photograhpy using reversed lens

[anis]

Hello,

I am an amateur and am very interested in macro photography.

I have a Sigma 105 macro lens that I am extremely happy with. What

I would like to try is the "beyond 1:1" magnification setup.

I was reading previous posts on this subject and understand that

using "reversed prime lens" is a good way to go beyond 1:1 .

 

I would like specific setup examples (like Reversed 50mm f/1.4 using

some reversing ring (if possible the part number) that can be

give me 2:1 mag.

 

I also read about stacking two lens, but I am not quite clear on that.

Will I be able to use Sigma 105mm and a reversed 50mm to get more

magnification? (if so I would expect there are some adapters

available to do that)..

 

I would be grateful if you could post a sample image taken using a

reversed setup.

 

Oh.. btw, I have a Nikon N-80 and recently bought a D-70 .

My lens are nikon 50mm f/1.4, sigma 105mm f/2.8, nikon 80-200 f/2.8

(oldest model) and nikon 20mm .

 

Thanks in advance

Anis

[wilfred_wong]

I remember that Nikon 've a catalog about close-up accessories. They 've a chart telling which setup can achieve what magnification.

 

if you want to use extension tube, the longer the focal length, the longer the tube you need to use in order to get higher magnification.

 

a reversed 20mm would have very high magnification. Never tried a 20, but a 28. At such magnification, you better have a focusing rail.

[cole_petersburg]

I recently bought a macro coupler. It's a male-male filter-ring adaptor so that the second lens is reversed. Because one of my two lenses with the same filter size is a zoom, I can actually focus by zooming instead of by moving the camera. All I get is a dim circle in the middle of the viewfinder, and changing the final aperture ring changes the size of the circle. I think the in-focus point may be near that ring. No results yet.<BR><BR>

 

Your magnification is the ratio of the focal length of the forward-facing lens to that of the reversed lens.<BR><BR>

 

<a href="http://www.cs.mtu.edu/~shene/DigiCam/User-Guide/Odd-Stuff/Reversed-Nikkor/reverse-closeup.html">link</a>

[roland_vink]

The easiest way for you to get beyond life size is to put a close-up filter on your macro lens. Closeup filters will get you slightly closer with this lens, depending on the strength. The best quality filters are the Nikon 3T, 3T (52mm) 5T, 6T (62mm) and Canon 250D and 500D filters (various sizes). These two-element filters which give better sharpness at wider apertures and in the corners. You may need to use a stepping ring if the filters are not the right size for your lens. Single element closeup filters from most manufacturers are available in all sizes. These can give excellent results provided you stop down and the subject is central.

 

You can reverse a 50mm lens onto your macro lens using an adaptor (stacking lenses). The ratio of focal lengths gives you the magnification: 105/50 = 2.1x life size. This is with the lens at infinity, greater when the lens is focused close. The 50mm is in effect a very powerful and highly corrected closeup filter. The aperture of the reversed lens is set wide open. The rear element of the reversed lens is exposed so you need to take care not to damage it - you can 'focus' the reversed lens close, which draws the rear element into the barrel for protection.

This setup gives very little working distance - you'll need to get very close to the subject which is not always convenient or possible.

 

Another option worth looking at is using extension tubes with your macro lens. These retain more working distance and give a useful increase in magnification, depending on the amount of extension. You will need to get third party tubes which connect the electronic contacts. Unfortunately Nikon's tubes have no electronic linkages so you will loose all metering with your cameras (Otherwise I'd suggest the excellent PN-11 tube - the built-in tripod mount is worth its weight in gold. You could get a manual camera like the FE2 for macro...)

[arnabdas]

I have had good results reversing the 50/1.8 AF on the 200mm Micro Nikkor

<P>

<a href="http://www.photo.net/photo/1720090">Dragonfly compound eyes</a>

[lex_jenkins]

The simplest way to reverse mount a lens is with an adapter ring threaded on both sides. These cost about the same as an inexpensive filter - maybe five to ten bucks. This allows mounting two lenses nose-to-nose.

 

Reversed wide angles will deliver high magnification when stacked on another lens or attached to a bellows but there will be very little working distance between lens and subject. It's fine for inanimate objects but be careful to avoid bumping the rear element against the subject - it really can get that close. A solution might be to cut the bottom out of a spare rear lens cap to fabricate a hood that will also protect the rear element by making contact before the optical element does.

 

Assuming the filter threads are compatible - they don't need to be identical but should be close when step-up or step-down adapters are used - it generally works well to attach the longer lens as usual to the camera body, then reverse mount the shorter focal length lens.

 

My favorite lens for reverse mounting, until I dropped it, was an inexpensive Olympus Zuiko 50/1.8. When reversed onto various lenses it essentially served as a very high quality, well corrected close up diopter with virtually flat field results. The humble Nikkor 50/2 produced almost identically excellent results.

 

The main problem to this technique, compared with "proper" macro gear, is vignetting. The image will be circular and limited to perhaps half or less of the standard 35mm frame in total area. To prevent further vignetting (and TTL metering complications) do not use the reversed lens' aperture ring to adjust for exposures. Keep it wide open. Use the lens mounted on the camera body for making aperture adjustments.

 

There's another reverse mounting trick that involves simply reversing a single lens directly onto the camera body. This requires an adapter that is threaded on one side for the filter ring and has the appropriate lens mount on the other side. I once saw such an adapter specifically for the Nikon F mount in a thrift store - I could kick myself for not buying it, if only for the novelty. I already have a very good Micro-Nikkor but this type of reversing ring was what I used as a kid on my Miranda SLR because it was all I could afford.

[dan_fromm2]

Lex -- Perplexing Consultant -- Jenkins wrote:

 

"There's another reverse mounting trick that involves simply reversing a single lens directly onto the camera body. This requires an adapter that is threaded on one side for the filter ring and has the appropriate lens mount on the other side. I once saw such an adapter specifically for the Nikon F mount in a thrift store - I could kick myself for not buying it, if only for the novelty. I already have a very good Micro-Nikkor but this type of reversing ring was what I used as a kid on my Miranda SLR because it was all I could afford."

 

Lex, you're thinking of the Nikon BR-2 ring, which has a male 52x0.75 mm (52 mm filter) thread on one end and a male Nikon F mount on the other. The BR-2 isn't really intended for mounting a reversed lens on a camera, although it can be used that way. It was made for mounting a reversed lens on a bellows to allow, e.g., use of MicroNikkors at magnifications above 1:1 with the lens oriented properly.

 

If you really want a BR-2, used ones can be found on, for example, the great auction site. I haven't looked for a while, but I expect B&H will have new ones. Imitations have been offered too. I have a couple of real BR-2s, also an imitation. I can't speak for all of the imitations, but mine is poorly made and not particularly safe to use.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[anis]

Excellent Information. As always I highly appreciate the info..

 

"Unfortunately Nikon's tubes have no electronic linkages so you will loose all metering with your cameras (Otherwise I'd suggest the excellent PN-11 tube - the built-in tripod mount is worth its weight in gold. You could get a manual camera like the FE2 for macro...) "

I do have a nikon FE that I can use for this setup. Infact, with its split screen, the focussing will be easier than in the D70 or N80.

 

I guess with my curent lens lineup, I can try reversing the 50mm

on to the sigma 105 as suggested above.

 

But so far, I have been quite frusturated at my attempts on insect macro. For example, Arnab's image of compound eyes is awesome... but even with just my sigma I have not been able to get close to an insect (however slowly) to setup the tripod and adjust the focus without scaring the insect away.

 

So, at the moment I am just planning on macros of inanimate objects with some of the macro setup discussed here and may be I will get the hang of it to try it on an insect :)

 

 

Thanks again for the responses.

Anis

[anis]

I tried this morning the stacked lens setup.

 

Here is an image of an earing at 2:1

 

Nikon D-70 with sigma 105mm f/2.8 at 1:1 and reversed nikon 50mm f/1.4 (pressed closed in reverse position!!)<div></div>

[anis]

And here is the same earing at 1:1 (using sigma 105mm at 1:1)<div></div>

[titrisol]

Reversing lenses used to be the poor man's macro.

I used that in my spotmatic with 50, 35 and 135 mm lenses.

 

The shorter lenses gave higher magnification.

It works real well with a copy stand.

[brian_caldwell]

"The main problem to this technique, compared with "proper" macro gear, is vignetting. The image will be circular and limited to perhaps half or less of the standard 35mm frame in total area. To prevent further vignetting (and TTL metering complications) do not use the reversed lens' aperture ring to adjust for exposures. Keep it wide open. Use the lens mounted on the camera body for making aperture adjustments."

 

Although this is the common wisdom, I find it to be complety wrong. In my experience you should stop down the reversed lens while keeping the body-mounted lens wide open in order minimize vignetting. This will also minimize color fringing and other aberrations that can occur. The reason is that the reversed lens has a shorter focal length, and is less tolerant of stop shift.

 

Here is an example where I've reverse-coupled a 24mm f/2 lens onto a 105mm f/2.5 to achieve 4x magnification:<div></div>

[brian_caldwell]

Here's another example, this time with a 35mm f/1.4 reverse coupled onto a 105mm f/2.5. The 105mm f/2.5 was attached to the camera, so this combination provides a 3x magnification. Camera is a D1x.

 

In the top image I stopped down the 105mm lens to f/16 while keeping the 35mm lens wide open. Although this allows TTL metering to work normally the resulting image is an optical horror, with obvious vignetting and a large amount of blue-yellow color fringing away from the image center.

 

In the bottom image I stopped down the 35mm lens to f/5.6 while keeping the 105mm lens wide open. Due to the 3x magnification this provides the same exposure as when I stop the 105mm lens down to f/16. The improvement in image quality is dramatic. The only downside is that the iris diaphragm is no longer linked to the camera, so you have to manually set the shutter speed. Given a choice between image quality and shooting convenience I know which one I would pick.

[anis]

Brian,

The photo I posted above (the one with 2x mag) was shot with

the lens attached to the camera (sigma 105 f/2.8) stopped down to

f/22 and the nikkor 50 f/1.4 wide open.. either due to the

crop factor associated with the digital, I did not get any vignetting.. I would think if the image foot print is smaller than the recording medium you would get vignetting and with the aperture of the closest lens stopped down, that shouldnt happen (?)..

Ofcourse I am complete novice.. but hopefully there was some sense in what I think :)

Cheers

Anis

[brian_caldwell]

I've never found an example of coupling a shorter focal length lens onto a longer one in which image quality is not maximized by stopping down the short focal length lens. Vignetting is not always the main problem, as my second example shows. In this case, color fringing and other aberrations are much worse than the vignetting.

 

You may have a fortunate combination in which you can get reasonable results with stopping down the long lens attached to the body, but I would shoot something with detail all the way to the corners before making that conclusion. I have a huch that you'll get a flatter, sharper image if you stop down the front lens. Its a very simple experiment to try, especially with a digital camera, but remember that for a 2x magnification setup you'll only need to stop the front lens down to f/11 to get the same exposure, DOF, and diffraction effects as you would by stopping the rear lens down to f/22.

 

If you look closely at the lens designs the reason for this behaviour becomes clear: Short focal length lenses tolerate stop shifting much less well than longer focal length lenses. I could go into ray tracing analysis backed up with actual photographs until everyone turns blue in the face, but I think its best that I give it a rest for now.

[anis]

Thanks for the info brian. I will experiment with stopping down

the attached lens. I dont want to give you an impression that I doubted your information :)

 

Anis

[alex_lofquist]

The reason for controlling the aperture from the shorter FL lens is that its diaphragm is much closer to where the Chief Ray (undeviated ray) crosses the optic axis. The farther the aperture is from this point, the greater the chance of vignetting! Also, the smaller (absolute aperture) diaphragm is the one controlling the amount of light going through the system, and this is usually on the shorter focal length lens. This means that you will have to use stop-down metering, instead of full aperture metering.

[brian_caldwell]

"Thanks for the info brian. I will experiment with stopping down the attached lens. I dont want to give you an impression that I doubted your information :) "

 

Its often a good thing to doubt information. For instance, there may be some combinations that work best when you stop down the longer lens. This might happen if the longer lens is a zoom, because zooms generally have tougher time with stop shifts. You have to try it to know for sure.

[titrisol]

what about a bellows???

I've seen a few that are being sold pretty cheap

[dan_fromm1]

Cada persona tiene su gusto proprio.

 

And some people

 

(a) like doing things the hard way

 

(b) don't have the resources to do things the easy way

 

© have the resources (just bought a D-70? has resources) but are fixated on using equipment at hand.

 

About y'r bellows suggestion, Anis would have to reverse his 105 on it, wouldn't get lots of magnification with most inexpensive bellows, they're pretty short. If higher magnification is needed, reversed 20 mm wide open on the 105 will give 5:1 with much better working distance, viz., 46 mm or so, than a real 20 mm macro lens would.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[titrisol]

Just asking ;)

 

When I started in Macro I did it with exension tube made of PVC, painted matte black and a 50mm lens was duckltaped to them. It worked fine, until I got a hold of a bellows. My life changed and I had a better time and far more control. This was all with my dad's old Pentax Spotmatic (I still have it).

 

With Nikon I have a 50/2.8 AIS MicroNikkor and I'm pretty happy with it, even though extension rings/bellows would give me far more magnification. One of these days

[dan_fromm1]

I use darkroom tape a lot. It leaves less residue than duct tape, in fact it leaves none at all. Duct tape, though, costs much less.

 

You want to see a kludge, you should see the way I'm holding a 4"/5.6 Enlarging Pro Raptar in front of a #1 shutter. So much darkroom tape the front of the shutter can't be seen. Ugly, but it holds together well and works just fine for macro on 2x3 from 1:8 - 2:1.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[brian_caldwell]

"If higher magnification is needed, reversed 20 mm wide open on the 105 will give 5:1 with much better working distance,"

 

Dan:

Just so long as you don't stop down the 105 . . .

[dan_fromm1]

Brian, H. Lou Gibson's hard-to-comprehend nomograms indicate that stopping down a little at 5:1 is worth doing, but in my experience at that and higher magnifications its shoot wide open or don't bother.

 

Regards,

 

Dan

[brian_caldwell]

Dan:

I would agree, since a 20/2.8 reversed onto a 105 would result in an effective f/16 with both lenses wide open. However, if you *do* need to stop down a little for some extra DOF you should do it at the front, and not at the rear, if you want to avoid aberrations and vignetting.