becca | they/them

Rather than relying on the camera's autofocus like in bird photos, or using the lens focus ring as is often used in landscapes, we do this tiny dance that adjusts the camera's distance from the subject very slightly. The hope is that one or two of a burst of shots will get the distance just right.

Now let's shoot! 1. Prep your camera settings beforehand. We don't want to miss an opportunity because we were birding yesterday with 1/2500 shutter speed. Take a few test photos of a leaf or other proxy subject to get your exposure (ISO, shutter speed, aperture, flash, white balance) right. 2. Approach your subject and roughly frame the shot. Adjust the manual focus ring on your lens to roughly have the subject in focus how you want.

3. Now, we start shooting photos. Stop trying to focus with the focus ring. The depth of field here is too precise to set up perfect focus and take a single shot. Instead, get the focus just right by gently rocking your body/camera forwards and backwards while taking bursts. You only need to move the camera about an inch- even less for very small subjects, perhaps millimeters. I usually do bursts of 7-10 shots in each set, then 1-2 of those will have the subject in focus how I like. You can take bursts of more photos, but I find that cumbersome to sort through later. 4. Take as many bursts of photos as you want! Err on the side of more photos rather than less. 5. Delete the photos in which the subject was not in focus, and keep the good ones. I generally keep less than 10% of my photos when shooting macro in burst mode.

we found a little guy, and it's finally time! here, i describe the rocking motion that IMO is completely unique to the macro experience. it feels a little odd at first, but this is what unlocked decent bug photos for me.

🌎 🌿 #wildlife #nature #photography #bugsky

Start by finding a subject! I was amazed by how many insects I found when I slowed down to look around in dense vegetation. Look in sunny places on warm days, gently look through leaf litter and near fallen logs, or on blooming native flowers. Spend as much time on this stage as you want- hours, days, weeks. After you find a subject, take a moment to pause and consider how you want to set up your photo. Don't rush it unless they're scurrying away! Do you want to focus on the face or body? What's the best angle? What do you want the background to look like? You only get this moment to decide on your composition, so give yourself time to be intentional.

One hot tip: take as much time as you can with cooperative subjects that are doing something cool or don't move much. That could be the most exciting thing you see that day, so don't rush off. I have spent hours with a single insect because I know what it's like to snap a few photos of something, walk away, and then wish I had spent more time with it. You never know when you will see that critter again, so don't take that chance for granted! Screenshot includes a photo of many bright orange bugs on a milkweed pod.

get outside! look around! check in leaves and flowers and on warm surfaces or cold surfaces or between rocks or under mulch.
they're everywhere! bugs are so great, but they are often very shy. practicing the approach without scaring them away is part of the process.
#bugsky

beginner macro part 3: take the shot We have our equipment, we have some basic settings, and now it's time to go actually go get our macro shots. Part 1: equipment Part 2: settings Part 3: take the shot! Part 4: troubleshooting Start by ...

we've got the camera set up, and we're ready to shoot. let's take the shot! (well, hundreds of blurry shots to get a single good one.)

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yes! thankfully its rechargable, and i find that it recharges pretty quickly. at some point i need to get backup batteries...

i have never experienced dread like showing up to a moth night and realizing i have low flash battery. its so distressing!!

HMMM I gotta check it out. I love your videos!

Do you use a tripod or take the videos handheld?

thanks!

Read the full post and see the images larger here!
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Check your white balance (I basically always use the Sunny or Cloudy options). Turn focus peaking on if you have a fancy camera (it usually only works while Manual focus on selected.) I don't use in-camera vibration reduction. Play around with different Continuous burst speeds. More on this in part 3.

Other notes on settings. Check white balance and use focus peaking if it's an option. I like shooting in 10-shot bursts or less because I hate file bloat/hoarding. I'm trying to get good iNat photos and see new things, not a single once-in-a-lifetime shot for Nat Geo.

shutter speed. When taking photos of motionless subjects, the shutter speed can be as long as you want. This is especially true with tripods, but I'm a lazy bum that hates carrying tripods around. My shutter speed is limited to how still I can handhold my camera- usually around 1/125sec if I'm not trying to take tack-sharp photos. You can go lower if you brace your body/camera against a tree/rock/etc. Fast subjects require faster shutter speed to avoid motion blur. Small subject + fast subject + dim light is the perfect storm, but you can still get a shot by using flash. That said, flash will limit your shutter speed so that your flash can accurately sync to your camera. Using my GODOX, I cannot shoot faster than 1/250sec.

Shutter speed varies depending on if your subject is still (a bug hanging out on a branch) or quick (a bumblebee in flight.) Same goes for if YOU are in motion (holding the camera in hand) or if the camera is still (on a tripod or unmoving surface.)

When using flash, SS is limited as well.

For larger subjects like butterflies during daylight, we can take photos with a more open aperture (like f/8) and see most of the subject clearly. This is especially true if those big wings are flat to camera- the same distance from the lens from wingtip to wingtip. Flash is so important for a lot of macro because it allows you to shrink your aperture without having to greatly increase your ISO or shorten your shutter speed. Focus stacking (taking a bunch of photos with parts in focus, then blending them together using software like Photoshop) is a pro-level workaround, but that is a chat for another day.

When we make our aperture very narrow, less light enters our camera and the image becomes darker- this is a big part of why it's helpful to use flash for macro photography, even during bright days.

#bugsky #photography 🌎🌿🐞🦋

aperture (why macro requires so much light). When you shoot a landscape during the day (or even a person who is a few feet away), your lens is taking in a huge amount of light. When you take a photo of a tiny subject like a ladybug, you are working with an infinitesimally smaller depth of field and volume of light. That razor-thin depth of field drives this lack of light. While you can take a photo of a landscape with a narrow aperture with the whole scene (perhaps miles deep!) in focus, you may take a photo with the same aperture of a ladybug and see only a fraction of it is sharp.

A photo of Zion National Park in which the entire landscape is in focus. Zion National Park's scenery is entirely in focus (other than the Virgin River's motion blur.) Depth of this image is almost 3 miles deep. The volume of light bouncing off of a landscape is huge.

Photo of a mantis in which only the face is in focus. A mantis less than 7 inches from my camera disappears into blur. Depth of this image is a few inches deep. The volume of light bouncing off of a single bug is miniscule.

Let's talk aperture.

For BIRD photography, we like our aperture to be wide open so the subject is in focus while the background is blurry.
For MACRO, aperture should be narrow so that *any* of the image is in focus because our depth of field is so tiny.

Compare the blur on pics both taken at f/16

Shoot in manual mode. I've talked to beginner photographers that said they had extremely variable results from their camera. 95% of time, it is because they are not shooting in manual mode. Explaining how to shoot in manual (when you control the ISO, aperture, and shutter speed) is beyond the scope of this post. There are already a lot of really great, free resources out there to explain how, and I promise that it becomes intuitive with practice. You absolutely can play around with Auto ISO to ease into manual, but shooting in manual is the only way to get truly predictable results. This is very important with macro bug photography because if one of your settings is jumping around, you're going to get blurry photos, you'll get disappointed, and it'll be hard to keep going.

shoot with manual focus. "Another thing I have to do manually??" Okay, okay, don't yell at me. For really small subjects, it's just not worth fighting autofocus. Shooting with manual focus actually is easier for macro than autofocus. I'll explain it step-by-step in part 3.

The cops will not show up at your door if you don't shoot in manual mode, but here's my case for it. You can get great shots with auto modes! But results will be less consistent because you are not controlling all the variables.

Also, use manual focus. This actually makes macro easier, I promise.

TL,DR: Here are my short, sloppy lists of my approximate settings for when I am shooting bugs. I usually start here and then adjust accordingly. Daylight (without flash). Manual mode & manual focus. Aperture: f/11-f/16. Shutter speed: 1/200-1/250s. ISO: 650-1000. Multiple exposure (10+fps). Focus peaking ON if your camera is fancy enough to have it.

Dark/dim (with flash). Manual mode & manual focus. Aperture: f/11-f/16. Shutter speed: as fast as flash will allow. Usually 1/250s. ISO: as low as possible, always under 500. Single exposure (if the subject is still, to avoid blasting through my flash battery). GODOX flash, TTL mode, power between 1/16 and 1/8.

Just want the quick list? Settings vary depending on if you're using flash. I always shoot in manual mode. Generally you want:
- Narrow aperture
- Low ISO (or low enough for denoise software)
- Shutter speed adjusted according to subject. Slow bugs can get longer SS, quick guys need fast SS.

beginner macro part 2: settings Insects like to move quickly, hide in leaf clutter, and leap away as soon as you get them in focus. There are a lot of challenges in macro photography, but practice and patience will make the process ...

Camera settings for bug/macro photos can be very different than for birds or other wildlife! Here is how I set up my camera for the little guys.
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#bugsky

will do in the future!

flash/no flash is definitely a major factor re: backgrounds! ladybug was taken with flash, bumble bee without flash in similar lighting conditions on a sunny day.
using flash can be nice because the dark background pops the subject forward, but it will generally be dark, yeah

the trick is often to squat low, getting my camera at the same elevation at the bug, or just to look for subjects on taller flowers. this way i get the bright colors in the background, but they dont distract from the subject by being too noisy.

oh that would drive me NUTS

deleting response to quote reply and fix typos in original response! sorry if i gave you duplicate notifs haha

you can get those blurry simple backgrounds that emphasize the subject by getting "a lot" of depth between the subject and the background. this can just be a few feet in macro photos.

second the AK diffuser rec! storytime, I ordered a diffuser from them and neglected to mention that I was using an adapter between my camera and my flash, which made the flash taller, which made the diffuser not fit properly. I reached out to their customer support and they remade it for free!

this is so good to hear! i kept using the same diffuser after switching to my mirrorless and adding an adapter, which is not 100% ideal but has worked for now haha. i should get a properly sized one at some point.

AHH the bumble baby, so cute

i hope its helpful! i found the process pretty overwhelming at first but it does become more intuitive with practice.

i enjoy doing macro for good inat shots, rather than professional-level photography. for me, macro is about seeing new things. there are plenty of awesome blogs out there about focus stacking and more complex setups, and i recommend checking them out!

🌎 🌿 #wildlife #nature #photography #bugsky