Various practice shots...

[Adec]

I am new to photography. (I just bought a Canon Powershot G9...)
But here are a few pictures I got from it with a lensmate adapter and a Raynox 202 macro lens on it....



a little closer.....



closer yet.... I don't like where the focus is on this one...(The bottom of the main kernel blurred....But I am going to try again as soon as I get/make a light box.

[HockeyFan]

Good test shots, in my opinion. I enjoyed them.

[PhotoNewt]

The problem is not the focus but the shallow depth-of-field (DoF) which is the area in front and behind the focus point that will have acceptable sharpness, everthing outside this area will be blurred.

As you get closer, the DoF for a given lens aperture will become less so in order to keep the subject sharp you need to use a smaller aperture - perhaps f/5.6 or f/8 - the get a deeper DoF.

In your first photo, the subject was farther away from the lens so is reasonably sharp at an aperture of f/4. On the second and third shots, as you got closer using the same aperture there is less DoF available, the camera is unable to keep the entire subject sharp.