Hello from new member Shane

Lets get to know each other better. Here's a forum to post images and short autobiographies of ourselves as well as any other info you would like to post about yourself.

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Shane C
Posts: 11
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2016 2:00 am
Location: Hockenheim, Germany

Hello from new member Shane

Post by Shane C »

Hi. I am a recently joined member, Shane Castle. I currently live in Hockenheim, Germany, but I am a US citizen. How I landed here is a bit of long story, but before this I lived 30+ years outside Boulder, Colorado. I am officially a retired person and can finally devote some time to my long time hobby of photography.

While in Colorado I acquired a 1:1 capable macro lens (Canon Macro EF 100mm 1:2.8L IS) and took the odd high magnification photo but I only got a focusing rail recently. I have been using it in the house and the yard, setting the lens at max magnification, turning off AF, and using the rail only for focusing.

I immediately started doing focus stacking experiments, in which I realized that everything I thought I knew about depth of field was only vaguely correct and for high magnification work was pretty much totally wrong. So now, in addition to the classic "thin lens" formula relating object and image distances to focal length I have learned the effective f-stop formula and the primary DoF formulas using only magnification, pupil ratio, and circle of confusion.

My current "lab work" project is to measure the pupil ratio of my macro lens accurately. Just this morning I took some test shots, mounting the lens by itself on a rail with a white wall behind it and taking some shots with the camera and another lens on another tripod.

I have posted my first real focus stack photo, the rosemary flower. Nobody has commented on it so far; perhaps I should have solicited them.

I feel humble now next to the obvious expertise that I see here. I hope to be able to contribute something myself, eventually. To that end, I have a question: would anyone like to see a review of the focusing rail I got, the Novoflex CASTEL-XQII? Or is everyone familiar enough with the Novoflex gear that it would not be needed by anyone?
Shane

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