Jump to content

Macro photography by HeavyD


Heavyd

Recommended Posts

I finally got all my gear together to take macro photography. Bits were were coming from all over the world. I had a chance to sit down this evening to experiment with the lense and the flashes I'd bought. I've attached a few photos below as my first attempts. I'd also like to thank Watfish and Nogi for the advice they have provided about what gear to buy and tips on how to use it.

I intend to keep adding to this thread, and I hope over time my photos will improve beyond beginner and I will start to understand better how it all comes together.

Feedback is welcome.

Cheers,

D

8b564948.jpg882442fd.jpg09c14137.jpg203ce5f3.jpg6a508e39.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 117
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • Heavyd

    36

  • Squiggle

    9

  • NoGi

    8

  • ineke

    5

man let be the first to say AMAZING! i cant wait to get a new camera..

may i ask how much it cost roughly for all your macro gear??

Link to comment
Share on other sites

wow, first time macro's !!!! very nice pics already mate.

all you people taking sweet pics of your shrimp and i still dont own a macro lens dam it ........... need to buy one :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

great first attempt heavyd! :)

a little bit of CC (i hope you don't mind...)

- with macro photography, the DOF is very thin, so try to get your subject as parallel to the lens as possible so that most of it can be in focus. eg in the 4th photo, most of the shrimp is in focus, while in the 1st, only the head is.

- try to isolate your subject.. extra shrimpies in the background can be distracting.

- are you taking photos in RAW, and if so, did you use any post processing? if you aren't, that can be your next step :) some of the noise in the photos can be removed in pp, and also the shadows and exposure can be improved.

keep them coming! it's great to see more people getting into photography.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hey watfish what is CC, DOF,? remember some of us have no idea about photography, but would like to learn please!!! spell it out for us dummies,

Regards

Link to comment
Share on other sites

CC = Constructive Criticism

DOF - Depth of Field

I would definitely appreciate CC watfish, as I know there's many of us willing to learn and follow this thread by Heavyd. Gread post !

Heavyd, do you mind listing the equipment and setting for the pics ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Brado: Thanks mate. Not including the camera body, about $1400-$1500.

@Sprae: Thanks. It's great fun. Looking forward to seeing your shots.

@Fishmosy: Cheers mate.

@Dean: Yes you definitely need to buy one considering you probably have the most photogenic shrimp!

@Watfish: Your criticism is most welcome. That is one of the main reasons for this thread.

In respects to your comments: .

> getting the shrimp parallel to the lens make complete sense and the photo above is a great example.

>Trying to isolate the shrimp is great if they are not feeding :) I think I'll need a lot of patience to get the perfect solo shot.

>I didn't take these photos in raw. I will probably give that a go down the track. I did do some basic post processing. I cropped, adjusted levels slightly, brightness, contrast, saturation and sharpness. Just playing around really.

@Bluebolts: I'm using a Canon EOS400D with a Canon EF 100mm f2.8L Macro IS USM. I have a Hakuba LH1 flash bracket. 2 x Yongnuo 565-EX flashes and 3 xYongnuo RF 603 receiver/transmitters for remote triggering of the flashes. Also from memory, the camera was in Manual mode, F-stop around 9-11, shutter speed 128 maybe, Auto white, ISO 400, manual focus.

@Trav80: Thanks mate. I've been wanting a macro lense for many years. Pretty excited at the potential!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Envious as hell about your euipment, I am getting to old to comprehend all this new gear Absolutly love the pics, I recon they are perfect but I am not a connoisseur of these things, I just love to get this result someday.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Loach: Cheers mate.

@Nogi: Pretty much what we discussed earlier.

I'm using a Canon EOS400D with a Canon EF 100mm f2.8L Macro IS USM. I have a Hakuba LH1 flash bracket. 2 x Yongnuo 565-EX flashes and 3 xYongnuo RF 603 receiver/transmitters for remote triggering of the flashes.

@Wayne: Thanks. I think you'd be right with the gear. You just keep everything on manual settings and away you go.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

An update:

Played around some more with the camera today. Also finally got around to taking a few shots using the lens extender. Good fun!!

Couple of things I learned today (no laughing please......I dont know much about flashes);

Firstly, I didn't realise last time that I can adjust the strength of the flash output. It is default to the minimum. Wow they are bright!!

Secondly, I played around with the flash positioning to see the effect on the subjects.

Thirdly, I discovered that if the shutter speed isnt synchronised with the flash speed, you end up with a black bar down the bottom of your photos. Let me tell you, I thought my camera was broken for a little while lol

Anyway, some of the better shots I took:

IMG_5458_zps63c94cc0.jpgIMG_5514_zps92a4ce37.jpgIMG_5500_zps9f2da8bc.jpgIMG_5499_zps090eb663.jpg

Anyone ever wonder what seed shrimp looked like up close? Well here they are....I used the lens extenders on these shots.

IMG_5515_zpsd2e99689.jpgIMG_5525_zps3ec5bc71.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks!

Nogi, only the seed shrimp are with the kenko tubes. I used all three tubes for those 2 shots.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

A couple more shots today of my yellows. Very happy with the way my selective breeding is going with the yellows. Managing to get stronger colours, thicker shells and coloured legs. I also started using new software to post-processing: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. Seems like a great program and has everything I need to process the RAW shots.

My favourite yellow male:

IMG_5540_zpse3a0976e.jpg

One of the females:

IMG_5553_zps59018b02.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank you for the positive feedback. I really enjoy sharing this journey with you.

@Northboy: I am a beginner. It has really helped me to be pointed in the right direction regarding equipment and I do a lot of reading online to get a better understanding of how it all works. Really helps to have a good lens though :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yep the lens makes the difference between a good shot and a great shot.

I do a lot of under water video (freshwater) and the lens makes or breaks it.

Bob

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now

  • Join Our Community!

    Register today, ask questions and share your shrimp and fish tank experiences with us!

  • Must Read SKF Articles

  • Posts

    • sdlTBfanUK
      Thats a great photo, beautiful blue bolt, I hope it survived the molt without dropping the eggs! I think I can just about see some black dots (eyes) on the central egg but can't be 100% sure. I used to (and plan to again) do weekly water change of 10-15% but if you do too large or quick (not drip in new water) that would likely trigger a molt. What KH are they in, my new setup is sitting at (and refusing to budge) KH 3 and PH 7.5 so I may have to settle for neocaridina shrimp this time as opposed to the caridina I want, though not looking/deciding just yet, give the tank a bit more of a run in! Tap water here starts at kH 14, tds 320, when filtered goes to KH 0 and PH 6 but when put in the tank keeps going to KH3 and PH 7.5 despite 3 x 50% water changes???? You may be at 'maximum capacity' with only 20L tank especially if the tank is a cube type rather than shallow type?
    • beanbag
      Right now this tank only has blue bolts and golden bee (red bolts?).  The eggs start off all brown, but at the end, I notice that some are kind of a clear pink-ish color.  So I don't know if that is the egg color of dud or golden bee.  Picture of shrimp only about half hour before molting. The water is always RO + remineralizer, so it should be ok. The tank seems to still be on a "good streak" ever since I started the regimen of weekly water change, monthly gravel vac and plant trim.  The point being to keep the amount of waste low and removing moss / floating plants so that the nitrates go towards growing algae.  At one point, I had three berried females, but only netted about half dozen babies by the end, due to this early molting problem.  There might be about 30-40 shrimp total in 5 gallons, but still very few full-sized adults.
    • ngoomie
      Alright, I've done a bit more research on gentian violet's cancer-causing potential but I haven't yet done research on malachite green's to compare. But from reading the California propositon 65 document about GV (North Americans incl. some Canadians will recognize this as the law that causes some products they buy to be labelled with "known to the state of California to cause cancer", including the exact product I bought) it seems that the risk of cancer is related to internal use, either injection or ingestion. Speaking of ingestion, I think GV bans mainly relate to its use in treating fish/shrimp/etc. which are intended for human consumption, because of the above. And in countries where GV isn't banned for this purpose, it does seem to get used on various species of shrimp without causing any issue for the shrimp themselves (at least enough so for shrimp farming purposes). See the following: In February, the FDA Began Rejecting Imported Shrimp for Gentian Violet and Chloramphenicol (2022 article by Southern Shrimp Alliance) FDA Starts New Calendar Year by Refusing Antibiotic-Contaminated Shrimp from Three BAP-Certified Indian Processors and Adding a BAP-Certified Vietnamese Processor to Import Alert (2024 article by Southern Shrimp Alliance) Southern Shrimp Alliance and some other organizations have tons of other articles in this vein, but I'd be here for a while and would end up writing an absolutely massive post if I were to link every instance I found of articles mentioning shrimp shipments with gentian violet and/or leucogentian violet registering as contaminants. That being said, I know shrimp farmed for consumption and dwarf shrimp are often somewhat distantly related (in fact, the one time a shrimp's species name is listed that I can see, it's the prawn sp. Macrobrachium rosenbergii, who at best occupies the same infraorder as Neocaridina davidi but nothing nearer), but this at least gives a slightly better way of guessing whether it will be safe for aquarium dwarf shrimp or not than my bladder snail anecdote from the OP.
    • sdlTBfanUK
      I would hazard a guess that perhaps those eggs were unfertilized and thereby unviable? Did the eggs change colour, usually yellow to grey as the yolks used up, or any eyes in the eggs. Is your water ok, using RO remineralised and the parameters in range, as I have heard others say that if the water isn't good it can 'force' a molt? How is it going overall, do you have a good size colony in the tank, you may have reached 'maximum occupancy' as a tank can only support so many occupants.
    • beanbag
      Hello folks,  The current problem I am having is that my Taiwan bee shrimp are molting before all their eggs have hatched.  Often the shrimp keep the eggs for 40+ days.  During that time, they lose about half or so, either due to dropping or duds or whatever.  Shortly before molting they look to have about a dozen left, and then they molt with about half a dozen eggs still on the shell.  Then the other shirmp will come and eat the shell.  These last few times, I have been getting around 0-3 surviving babies per batch.  I figure I can make the eggs hatch faster by raising the water temperature more (currently around 68F, which is already a few degrees higher than I used to keep it) or make the shrimp grow slower by feeding them less (protein).  Currently I feed Shrimp King complete every other day, and also a small dab of Shrimp Fit alternating days.  Maybe I can start alternating with more vegetable food like mulberry?  or just decrease the amount of food?
×
×
  • Create New...