As an aside, I find it interesting that in a "Beginners" forum, everyone posting their edits is not what this forum is about It would seem to me that this is exactly what this forum should be about. How else do beginners improve without critical feedback? Perhaps a separate forum could be establish...

Gedaliah, Another good piece of work. I do have some ideas for your image, though--take or leave them as suits your vision for your work. I've taken the liberty of editing your image. Normally, forum etiquette is to ask before doing this, but since you asked for "any and all feedback," I'm assuming ...

Gedaliah, Welcome to the forum! :D I agree with the others--nice job for early in the macro journey. And since you're here asking for constructive feedback--bravo for this, sir--you're going to get even better. We've all experienced the frustration of fighting with equipment. Once you get a solid ma...

. . . unfortunately, it is too unwieldy, even without tubes. The tripod collar is near the mounting flange, and reversing it puts the collar at the far end away from the camera, throwing the whole thing way off balance. If I still had my specimen of this lens, I'd try fastening a longish Arca-Swiss...

Tim, have you tried using a reversing ring to mount the 200mm micro-Nikkor reversed on the extension tubes? This would be likely be unwieldy, given the size of that lens, but it might work. I sold my specimen of that lens--despite its excellent reputation, my copy was something of an optical dud. --...

Yusuf, welcome to the forum!

I don't see an attached image.

--Chris S.

. . . there are very mixed reviews when it comes to its use as a macro lens - which I think is mostly due to its behaviour when used with the aperture wide open at 4.0. While it's quite sharp at 4.0, that's not the 'taking aperture' that Rodenstock had in mind. They designed the lens to be used at ...

Alan Smith wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 03, 2023 6:42 am

I bought this Nikon SMZ-2 on Ebat for £49 delivered.

Well done! If I find such a beast, I'll hit "buy" in an instant.

--Chris S.

Ksparks519, welcome aboard! :D I don't disagree with anything Mark said. Older macro lenses tend to be both good in quality and friendly on the budget. In my experience, close-up work is easier, and quality is better, with a dedicated macro lens that has a longish focal length. The 50mm macro lenses...

Guessing, here--maybe C-Ring Reticle Retainer?

--Chris S.

Helium2, welcome to posting! :D I don't know your specific subject interests for macro and close-up photography. But let me suggest that you strongly consider buying a dedicated, long-focal-length, standard "macro" lens. (I put the word "macro" in quotation marks because this use of this word has ma...

Regarding Robert's demonstration of his Makro-Symmar 180: Agreed, the lens looks remarkably sharp. But that's not all that's sharp. --crop.jpg A hand-held 180mm lens, at 1:1 magnification, at 1/80 of a second--and this sharp? Wish I could still do this, but not since my twenties. Meanwhile, I'll car...

. . . people swear by the Nikon AF Micro-NIKKOR 200mm f/4D IF-ED, as the best lens ever? The copy I tested had pretty severe CAs (CAs and LoCAs) even at f/8 at 1x. Funny. My specimen of that lens was fuzzy at macro ranges, and a disaster at infinity. After I remarked on this in the forum, a member ...

. . . the performance gap between the PN105A, the best ever, and a consumer market macro lenses is narrowing to the point its pretty shocking how close high-end macro lenses have come in a few years. Just a decade ago the PN held a significant lead in strict CA correction and center to corner consi...

I sent the piece to a friend who studies spiders at a university. Will quote a portion of his response here: "The study referenced basically proves the theory of how spider legs were thought to move—nobody had explicitly tested it." Cool! I wonder if there is a photographic application, here. I've b...