So I'm really beginning to fall in love with the lens. Today I decide to shoot exclusively with it.

The camera is a Canon 400 (Rebel XTi) and this lens is the 100mm/f2.8 Macro.

First thing I did was setup about 10 feet from the tank and wanted to try the photomerge command. At this distance it took 4 shots to get my 10 ft long tank but photoshop did a great job stiching them together.

http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/fullsmall.jpg

The I took a few "normal" macros:

http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/tricolor.jpg


http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/bottlebrush.jpg


http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/colby.jpg


Next we headed to the botanical gardens where I was very hesitant to take a no zoom no IS lens. All I can say is wow. I took over 100 pics and at least 75% were great. Not good but great. Here is just a couple.


http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/violas.jpg


http://kwl1763.com/Reef/Mar_07/orchid.jpg


Anybody contemplating a macro I would highly recommend. As always critique and comments of the pics welcome!

WOW!!! Great shots and I love your tank.

Nice pictures.

WOW! Those are some top-notch pictures. Great work!

Wonderful pictures, where did you pic the lens up at?

I bought mine from here.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=productlist&A=details&Q=&sku=194451&is=USA

Cool, glad to hear that it's good. It's the next lens I have my eye on.

is that a bare bottom tank?

Ya. It's got black starboard on the bottom but you wouldn't know it because it's 100% covered in purple coralline!

thats pretty awesome never thought a BB would look so cool...do you have to add more LR to compensate for the lack of LS for filration and good bacteria growth

Nope, no issues. In fact I would say I have less rock then "normal". I have lonly around 300 lbs in there. You have to stock a little lighter and make sure you have a rocking skimmer (which I do) but other then that nothing. After the intial cycle I have never had any detectable level of nitrates in the tank.

Great shots...You are a pro now!! can I barrow it?

Hrmm, are there any tips to using this thing? I'm not sure if it's me or if it's the lens I got but I find it very hard to focus on objects and it doesn't get as close as I'd like it to get. Maybe I'm too close to the object? What's the min distance you guys use to take pictures?

You have to be at least 6" away. I really haven't had a focusing issue. Every once in a while it will try to focus on the background or something but you can always switch to manual focus if you have to.

Hrmm, I'm having trouble focusing completely on one single object. Either the front part would be focused but the back wouldn't or vice versa. I will have to play around with it more.

Try using a larger apeture. The smaller the apeture is (esp a 2.8, like on the 100mm lens), the smaller your depth of field will be. Bump up to f/8 or f/11 and see if you have better luck focusing.

keep in mind that the smaller the aperture (larger number... :) ), the less light you will allow into the lens so if you are shooting in F-priority, you will see you shutter speed go down. If you're shooting a canon, don't be afraid to bump up the ISO to 800-1600 if need be and do a little noise reduction in PP.

the ideal situation, imo, is an ste2 and 580 above the tank w/ a diffuser... :) then you can shoot low ISO and still sync at shutter speeds fast enough to produce crisp images...

also, in macro photography, try getting used to manual focus, once you get familiar with it, you may find you get more keepers... :)

hth,

Matt

True. I always forget that I have all the available light I ever need with 1000w lights.... :)

Chris, I'll bring it over tonight so you can show me. My other friend said the same thing about aperature... but it's still a bit confusing.

Cool pix and tank. I like that clean look in a tank.

This a couple shots I use for wall paper.