Actinic Macro Shots - Pic Heavy

[usfpaul82]

I was playing with the macro tonight trying to get some decent shots with only actinic lighting. Thought I would share. Thoughts (good or bad) welcome! I have only been into photography for about about a month now so any suggestions would be great.

Alien Eye Favia

Prism Favia

Lunar Eclipse

Red People Eaters - Growing!

 

[usfpaul82]

King Midas

Tubs Blues

Radioactive Greens

Keds Reds

 

[usfpaul82]

they are not as sharp as I have seen, not sure why..any ideas? I use a nikin d50 with the sigma 105mm EX

 

[Reef Bass]

Nice pics. Lovely corals. I like the Alien Eye Favia in particular.

Are you shooting absolutely straight through the glass, not at any angle other than perpendicular to the glass? Sometimes I'll push my lens hood up against the tank and loosen the ball mount on my tripod head until the lens is entirely perpendicular to the tank.

I'd also suggest using the lowest ISO possible. IMHO you could bump up your exposure a tad more in some of those.

 

[usfpaul82]

I think i could be a little more concious about how perpendicular I am...i try to be, but i think i could do better at that. I was shooting at ISO 400 because it was so dark with my actinincs. Next time I will go down to 200 and bump my in camera exposure some more to try and lighten it some before post processing. Thanks!

 

[jkeating2005]

i really like the Radioactive greens. that is a great photo! and the alien aye favia!

great photos

 

[fkshiu]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15138467#post15138467 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by usfpaul82
they are not as sharp as I have seen, not sure why..any ideas? I use a nikin d50 with the sigma 105mm EX

Depth of field (DOF) can be razor thin in macro shots with low aperture settings. Bump up a couple of f-stops for greater DOF, but you'll have to increase your exposure time as well.

 

[MrSandman]

These were shot at f/13 and at that point you're dealing with diffraction. That may be one reason why they aren't as sharp as expected. Here is a short read on lens diffraction: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/u-diffraction.shtml

I personally wouldn't go higher than f/8.

The sharpest picture of the bunch was the prism favia and if you look at the settings you took that photo at you'll see what i am talking about. Hint: f/6.3.

Also, don't forget to turn off your pumps and make sure that whatever you're shooting is absolutely still especially seeing that some of these images had a shutter speed of 1 second or more.

HTH.