What’s Macro photography btw? Simple you must have seen insanely enlarged images of simple objects making it look awesome. Here’s an example of such image:

Great ! This is possible by use of powerful camera zoom lens, good camera (oops! too pricy) and professional hands. Here I’ll tell you how you can gear yourself to shoot these macro photographs without burning a hole in your pocket and need of learning photography. These are the few things that you will require; most probably you would be already having at least one of them:

Why only digital camera? Because its cheap, results can be seen faster and since this technique sometimes involved trial and error so you won’t be embarrassed (just delete the bad pic ) I have used a 3.2MP Kodak C300 Digital camera which does not have optical zoom or whatever and is purely for home use (strictly unprofessional camera) and one cannot even think of taking macro pics with this camera. You can use any other similar camera ranging from 2MP to 4MP which starts from Rs.3000 to Rs.5000. You can also use those cheap Chinese unbranded digital cameras which come around Rs.1500.
The role of hand lens here is to act as a optical zoom lens for the camera since the camera we are using do not have it. Digital Zoom is do included but it’s a big no no. Don’t even touch the digital zoom function. So get yourself a pair of good scratch-less hand lens (convex lens). Both of these hand lenses must have exactly the same kind of lens in it. Point to note here while choosing hand lens is often some hand lens have lens made of some kind of plastic. This is not a good lens, use only those which are equipped with good quality glass lens, it don’t cost much. I can easily get one of those in nearby stationary shop for just Rs.30. How to make difference between a glass and a plastic lens? It’s simple, look at the lens from side and if it’s a glass lens, it will have a slight green tint; otherwise it will appear white in case of plastic one. Ok you got all the info now, here begins the procedure of making a camera lens out of hand lens.
Take both the hand lens and using duck tape fix them one over other. Before you do so make sure the lens are clean without any sign of finger prints and dust particles. Once done it should look something like this:

You are all set to do the photography now! Just go out and see if there is fair amount of sunlight and some flowers. What no flowers? Then try on leaves with some sprinkled drops of water on them (to mimic the dews). Sunlight is very important, camera inbuilt flash is never successful in macro photography. While taking shots just keep those hand lenses in between the camera lens and object, look in LCD display and move hand lens a little but to get sharpest shot possible and click! While clicking try to keep your hand as firm as possible and hold camera & lens tightly to avoid any blurr caused by hand shake.
Just try few times and you will be taking great shots in few minutes of practice. I have many flowers in my garden so here’s how my macro photography result looks like:

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 15th, 2007 at 1:24 pm and is filed under Photography. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.