Prepared for the compulsion? Well, maybe a little... I
really wanted a microscope when I was a kid. These lenses aren't
quite that strong, of course, but magnifying the bleep outta things is still a lot of fun.
Taking pics in the process? Bonus!
The wide-angle lens I bought is actually a two-piece -- a wide-angle half and a macro half. I'm not sure what strength that one is [the label simply says "Macro"], but it still means that I actually have five macro lenses now. Of course I've stacked 'em up, and I've found that I can also use the wide-angle at the same time, so I get a "wide macro" setup. Using all of them together gives me a field width [not depth-of-field -- I'm referring to the area being photographed] of
maybe 1-1/2" at a distance of about 3/8" away. But then I have a real lighting problem -- the camera gets so close to the subject that most of the ambient light is blocked by the shadow of the camera. Too much of a good thing...?
Without the wide-angle and its macro, I've taken shots that cover a vertical area roughly width of my thumb. Using the macro lenses gives me some real depth, of course, which I usually can't achieve on this camera without using the manual settings, but with these lenses there's going to be depth whether I set the camera for it or not. With the full stack, my DOF goes down to... um... I'm not exactly sure, actually. 1/4" or so...?
re: Shooting every tiny little thing I can find... Okay, I haven't really done
that yet, but I imagine that a little bit later in the season, when certain plants around here start to bloom, I can probably get some pretty good flower shots, and maybe an insect or two if I can get 'em to say "Cheese!" for me.
To be honest, I don't travel much [/understatement], I don't get out to very many places where there may be good photo opps, and I generally don't bring the camera with me unless I
expect to be taking pics when I get to where I'm going. The best part of about having these macro lenses is having the ability to shoot something that's
not just the same old thing, because I've just about run out of "same-old-things" to shoot. The worst part? Not having TTL, and having to guess at the focus via the LCD [what
looks sharp on the screen might not be so sharp after all when unloaded and viewed at 1600 x 1200].
Here's a link to my "
Best Shots" album on Facebook. [It's viewable by all; no need to be in my friends list or even a Facebook member. I prefer to limit my "friends" list just to people I actually
know anyway.] This is all point-and-shoot stuff, taken with a ViviCam 3500 or an HP C618; only a few have had any PP done on them, unless you count cropping and resizing as PP. Only one pic so far -- the very last one in the album -- was taken with any attachments. No macro pics posted yet.