Which kit do i need for macro photography?

[ACEparts_com]

Hi

We sell small car parts; bulbs, spark plugs and stuff (biggest being wiper blades) and would like to take CONSISTENT decent pictures of them but really struggle with lighting.
What we would really like to invest in is some decent studio lighting, maybe a softbox/tent thing and perhaps even a new camers - I currently have a Fuji5500 as well as a small sony which i find gives better results than the fuji. I've also tried a small light box with the tubes in it but this gave very poor results.

Budget is about £1000 for everything. Ideas welcome!

Thanks

Alan

[Whitefly Swatter]

have a look here to start http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a... a nice little tent

[DIW35]

Shouldn't need to spend anything like £1000 to get decent results.

This was taken with an ordinary camera with the model placed in a light box that was lit from outside by two flashes.



As long as the camera you have is able to focus at the distance you will be working from, a few white sheets and a couple of flashguns is all you need. The rest is just experimenting to get the settings sorted for consistent exposures.

[4hero]

You don't even need a lightbox and flashguns

Edited by 4hero on Friday 10th April 12:56

[Simpo Two]

I could take an awful lot of photos for you for £1,000, and that would give you more time to run your business, sell more stuff and make more money...?

[LongQ]

Unless you are going to do something arty with the wiper blades I can't see that they would benefit from a macro treatment other than for details of the fittings.

A tilt and shift lens might be more appropriate for blades - but that would blow the budget.

[mas99]

For consistent results, you need consistent settings - So you need to use the same lighting and the same camera settings every time.

Take some pics using Av or P mode and play with varying the aperture and shutter speed until you are happy with the results. You dont want to have arty farty depth of field so start with an aperture of f/8 or something and vary to see how you get on.

Make a note of the shutter and aperture you are using and then put the camera into manual mode with those settings - this means that you can be sure that you will get consistent results - as long as you are shooting in the same place with the lighting.

Read up on setting the white balance on your camera because having a colour cast due to bad white balance is one of the most irritating but easily fixed issues.

Using a large sheet of white paper and a lamp as shown above can be very effective. The problem is that you can get bright spots from the light - thats why shooting through a light tent or similar is a good idea.

I would also think about getting a cheap tripod - then you really can have consistency of a sequence of shots.

[CarreraKid]

Here's my homemade macro studio set up and the results. Richoh GX100, DW6 wide angle lens, Gorilla pod tripod, some small l.e.d lights, total cost somewhere around £350.

[L4MBOLUV3R]

CarreraKid said:

Here's my homemade macro studio set up and the results. Richoh GX100, DW6 wide angle lens, Gorilla pod tripod, some small l.e.d lights, total cost somewhere around £350.

that is immense, how did you get that effect?

[CarreraKid]

Thanks L4MBOLUV3R, glad you like them,

They were all shot on long exposures of between 30 seconds & 1 minute at f10.4 in my living room with the lights off, then I just quickly moved the little key ring l.e.d lights back and forward behind the car and these results are all in camera. I mucked about with different models for a week then finally tried it on my real car at the Ace Cafe one night to similar results.

Thanks
Tom

[Bernie-the-bolt]

These were taken with a 400D and 100 2.8 Macro and a Macro ring flash - cost would be about £650 all in. You could then add a Maplin white box studio or whatever it's called for £20 and a tripod for £50 or so.

These were taken at home either in the kitchen or on the sitting room floor....





I think I then added Kenko tubes on these two (about £100)

£2 coin



Tip of a pair of nail scissors



Macro doesn't have to cost the earth