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| | | Macro lens is no doubt a big investment for casual photographer as a decent macro lens would cost almost a bomb. You can almost get a DSLR camera body at that price. For this short and easy-to-follow tutorial, I will save you big bucks by transforming your default kit lens or prime lens into a macro lens. This technique is commonly known as "reverse lens macro photography". (What's macro photography?)
Caution
First and foremost, keep in mind that you are about to do is all at your own risk. But I can be almost certain that this technique would not damage your DSLR camera and lenses. I have seen people doing this on their Nikon DSLR and I have tried it on my Canon EOS 450D DSLR.
Reverse The Lens!
As the title suggest, simply reverse your DSLR lens and it will automatically become a macro lens. Shown below is my reversed EF f/1.8 50mm prime lens placed on top of the Canon EOS 450D body. I did not use my EF-S 18-55mm IS kit lens because it is too big. It's really that simple, so what's the catch? Read on... No Lens "Auto Focus" and "Manual Focus".
You cannot use the AF and MF on the lens to focus with this technique because the lens is not electronically connected to the camera body. You will have to hold your camera & lens and then move back and forth in order to get the correct distance and focus your subject.
Two rock steady hands required. (Use an adapter + tripod alternatively)
Since the lens is not physically attached to the body also, you will need to use your right hand to hold the camera body and your left hand to hold the reversed lens. Rock steady hands required to take sharp macro shot. If you do not want to hold the camera, you will need a reverse lens adapter so that you can mount the reverse lens onto your camera body and then attach the whole device to a tripod. (Remove the lens filter if you have the adapter).
No Electronic Aperture Control, So Use Brute Force!
When you detach a lens from a camera body for Canon EOS DSLRs, the aperture (think your eye's iris) opens widely and you will get a small F number. A small F number makes focusing extremely difficult in this particular case because of the VERY narrow depth-of-field (DOF) and we have to use 'brute force' (keep in mind that the lens is not electronically connected to the body) to make the 'iris' of your lens smaller by increasing the F value. I find anything from F5.6 to F8.0 is good enough.
To do so (the brute force method), attach your lens to your camera body as you would normally. Switch "ON" your DSLR and set it to Aperture Priority mode and change the F value to 5.6 or higher. For Canon EOS user, press the DOP preview button which is located at the front bottom-right of the camera body. Other DSLR models such as Nikon, Sony or Panasonic should have similar button located somewhere there too. It is a rarely used button and I am sure many people do not even know that it exist. While holding down the DOP preview button, detach your lens as usual while your DSLR is still "ON".
Note: The bigger the F value, the slower the shutter speed is going to be. Slow shutter speed tends to lead to blurry image due to hand shake. Flash is highly recommended if possible. If not, you may increase the ISO value if you do not mind 'noise' in order to acquire faster shutter speed.
| | Above: The F value has been stopped to 5.6.
(see the pentagon hole?) | | | Above: Reversed prime lens placed on top of my Canon EOS 450D body
(the above image has been rotated 90 degree counter-clockwise) |
I did not have the time to shoot bugs but I managed to take these macro shots as below. I did my shooting at 6 mega-pixels with no resizing and then cropped these photos so that they do not screw up this blogsite's layout. The reverse lens method is capable of capturing details that cannot be seen with naked eyes.
| | Above: My ruler
(Original size, cropped to 640x640. Impressive details.) |
| | Above: My ruler
(orignal above image resized) |
There are hidden security features for both Visa and Mastercard credit cards and if you shop a lot with your credit card, you should have probably seen merchant verifying your card by using a magnifier looking for "Visa numbers" and "MC rings" on your Visa and Mastercard. If you have one in your wallet, whip it out and try to look for these security features. Both "Visa numbers" and "MC rings" should be barely visible to naked eyes.
| | | Above: Mastercard credit card |
| | | Above: Normal shooting of my credit card. |
Other setups and parameters that you can experiment with would be putting two lenses together to produce even greater macros, one on normal position and the other one on reversed position. You can also mess around with the focus length.
Have fun reversing your lenses before getting a real macro lens! | |  Read or post comment (18 Otaku comments)  | gordon
(Singapore)
Posted June 27th, 2008 10:33 pm (Fri) | another interesting read. i'm planning to get the EOS 450D as well later this year. i'll be using it mostly to shoot my figures. 1 thing i would like to ask, is the default lens that comes with the kit good enough for closeup figure photography? i don't think i really need reverse lens to get that close a detail as discussed here right? ^^;
|  | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted June 28th, 2008 2:41 am (Sat) | Gordon,
The default kit lens (EF-S 18-55 IS) is good for shooting figures, I'd say more than enough. I bought the EF f/1.8 50mm prime lens because it is 'fast' and could produce good 'bokeh' effect when shooting figures or portrait.
Btw, you can actually reverse the default kit lens too!
|  | UltraBeast
(Proud Son of Cheras)
Posted June 29th, 2008 12:18 am (Sun) | Another neat tutorial once again. Glad I could get the 'real succession technique' 真传 from you that day! ^ ^
BTW how's your marimos doing? When taking macro shoot of that? Eagerly awaiting to see the close-up detail. Do remember to give them some sunlight for them to photosynthesize.
| | UltraBeast
(Proud Son of Cheras)
Posted June 29th, 2008 12:21 am (Sun) | The original size macro shot of the ruler marks, one can readily see the machining details on it. Appealing to people with technical background ^ ^;
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted June 29th, 2008 1:30 am (Sun) | Thanks UltraBeast! I will most probably make an entry dedicated to marimo, with macro shots of them of course. Btw, the marimos are very genki!
| | UltraBeast
(Proud Son of Cheras)
Posted June 29th, 2008 6:05 am (Sun) | Genki meaning like this? --
o(^_^)o
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted June 29th, 2008 7:00 am (Sun) | UltraBeast,
へえええ... that's a kawaii Marimo ASCII art!
Btw, if you remember well, my PHP script removes the 'more than' inequality character for security reason.
|  | Fariz Asuka
(Singapore)
Posted June 29th, 2008 11:48 am (Sun) | Wow.. I must make use of this tutorial when I get my own DSLR camera.. My current cameraphone doesn't even have any external lens to begin with..
Anyway, great job in this entry. Now I know how a Master Card looks like up close.. ^^
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur)
Posted June 29th, 2008 12:27 pm (Sun) | Fariz Asuka,
Thanks! Btw, I just came back from your blog and I didn't realize that you actually use a camera phone to shoot good photos at Toys & Comic Convention 2008!
| | C.I.
(Singapore)
Posted June 29th, 2008 4:17 pm (Sun) | An awesome tutorial! I'm using this when I get my own DSLR. Two thumbs up!
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur)
Posted June 30th, 2008 9:47 am (Mon) | C.I.,
Many thanks! :)
|  | Zeroblade
(Manila, Philippines)
Posted July 14th, 2008 11:02 am (Mon) | Whoa, that's actually pretty awesome. A shame I only have a point and shoot though _
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted July 14th, 2008 12:03 pm (Mon) | @Zeroblade
Thanks! I'm planning to put more macro shots in the future using this technique :)
|  | samanosuke
(London)
Posted July 16th, 2008 1:25 pm (Wed) | a very intriguing technique you have here! I will be trying this out myself sometime! Thanks
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted July 16th, 2008 3:03 pm (Wed) | @samanosuke,
Thanks! And oh.. it seems like we possess the same 'weapon', the Canon DSLR 450D :) (Read that at your blog)
|  | Alphan
(Kuching, MY)
Posted January 12th, 2009 3:26 am (Mon) | Excellent tutorial there. Never knew the kitlens can do so much too. Can play with the zoom and focus too. BTW, where is the DOP for Sony A200?
| | Divine Fang
(Kuala Lumpur, MY)
Posted January 12th, 2009 9:50 am (Mon) | @ Alphan,
Glad that you find this useful but I do not know the DOP button for the A200 :p
| | Alphan
(Kuching, MY)
Posted January 12th, 2009 8:08 pm (Mon) | No need now. Instead I take off the lens, turn Mode Dail switch to M, power on and shoot. Even the light mettering and shutter speed adjustment works.
Save me a fortune on Macro lens (mine can even zoom).
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About This Blog: |
Shin-Otaku
is a blog site belongs to the author, Divine Fang
who is a super otaku wannabe. Here he shares his
thoughts just about anything related to otaku
in this very portal -figurines, anime, games,
computing, jpop, Japan e.t.c. As of time of writing,
he is especially obsessed with:
• Ayumi Hamasaki (since 2000)
• Tekken
6 (hard-core player)
• Suzumiya
Haruhi's figures (all
his figures)
• Learning
Japanese
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