the macro world
Or should it be, the micro world? In the world of photography, the word macro has been adopted to apply to the idea that you can take a photo of something small and make a big image of it. Lots of people do it. You can find images - often in stunning colour and detail - of flowers, insects, all kinds of stuff that you'd normally just walk by.
Years ago, I bought a camera lens that had the word macro on it; I believed that that was it. I took photos that were close-ups of things - usually flowers or leaves. Then, just recently, I found a website with lots of stunning shots of really small things - and I realised that my so-called macro facility on my lens couldn't produce anything like that. So I turned to that wonderful source of so much information - the web - and found out how they do that - those wonderful shots. I found that you can pay huge sums of money for very fancy bits of kit. I also found you can do it on the cheap. And then I found the world of extension tubes; I picked up a set this week for very little money. At first sight, they seemed impossible to use. But I stuck with it for a few hours more - and came up with an image of rare beauty. I'll share it very soon - here's a thumbnail.
What you see here is about the actual size of the object; now imagine it blown up to be the size of your screen. Now imagine that you can sit, bathed in the light from the screen alone, and maybe you will see the light in a new way. I printed this out on a sheet with the image 8 by 10 (inches) - and then realised that I was looking at a print that was eight times the size of the original object! Wow!
So, now I have yet another dimension of this world to explore - not just words, music, photos of nature, but now also photos of the smallest, slightest glimpse - the world within a world.
The journey continues.
Simon
Years ago, I bought a camera lens that had the word macro on it; I believed that that was it. I took photos that were close-ups of things - usually flowers or leaves. Then, just recently, I found a website with lots of stunning shots of really small things - and I realised that my so-called macro facility on my lens couldn't produce anything like that. So I turned to that wonderful source of so much information - the web - and found out how they do that - those wonderful shots. I found that you can pay huge sums of money for very fancy bits of kit. I also found you can do it on the cheap. And then I found the world of extension tubes; I picked up a set this week for very little money. At first sight, they seemed impossible to use. But I stuck with it for a few hours more - and came up with an image of rare beauty. I'll share it very soon - here's a thumbnail.
What you see here is about the actual size of the object; now imagine it blown up to be the size of your screen. Now imagine that you can sit, bathed in the light from the screen alone, and maybe you will see the light in a new way. I printed this out on a sheet with the image 8 by 10 (inches) - and then realised that I was looking at a print that was eight times the size of the original object! Wow!
So, now I have yet another dimension of this world to explore - not just words, music, photos of nature, but now also photos of the smallest, slightest glimpse - the world within a world.
The journey continues.
Simon
posted by Simon | 11:34 pm
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