Macro Experiments

One of my photo magazines had an article on macro photography, and in particular focus stacking.  One of the featured photographers used an Olympus OM-D camera with the Olympus 60mm macro lens and extension tubes, plus its built-in focus stacking/bracketing options.

This got me wondering about the capabilities of my recently purchased Olympus E-M5 mark III camera. I don't have the macro lens (yet!), but do have my old Canon EF-S 60mm macro, set of extension tubes, plus an adapter for the Olympus, so it was time to experiment.

Unfortunately, the automatic focus stacking doesn't work in this case as the adapter only provides manual operation - another day I will have a go with the standard lens. For today I set the lens to F8.0, added all three extension tubes (65mm total) and took the camera for a walk round the garden.  It was too breezy for any successful shots, but gave me an idea of the possiblities when mounted on a tripod etc.  My main image is a shot of the tiny flower on a Zebra Plant succulant taken inside using a tripod.  I ran out of time to do a stack, so this is a single shot, but it does give some idea of the eventual capability of the set-up.

Technical bit: to manually set the lens aperture, you have to mount it on the Canon, activate DOF preview to close the aperture and then remove the lens while still holding the DOF button - only works with older lenses with micro motors. Newer lenses with "fly by wire" stepping motors also have to have their focus set while on the Canon, which significantly reduces their usefulness and usability when mounted on the Olympus