Deep Macro

I would like to get some moderate macro shots of two deep sea pen species. I already have some wide and medium shots of them.

I never filmed macro (please don't shoot on the piano player). I have a Panasonic GH3 in Nauticam housing and the pana-leica 45mm. I should borrow a proper port for it.

These two species are Veretillum cynomorium and Funiculina quadrangularis. Veretillum colonies lies at about 65/70m while Funiculina lies at 100/104m hence you understand that I haven't too much time to get the shot and diving gear will be my main PITA.

Could you give me some suggestion on how get the job done as quick as possible?

Light position and number?

Should I carry a small tripod?

The Funiculina is 1,5 meter tall so I should posistion my camera tall enough to frame its polyps.

Last but not the least I should avoid to be killed by my diving buddies for this

Thank you in advance

Sounds like you might actually want super macro? For that, you are going to want a tripod I would think if you can't use the sea floor to stabilize yourself. In any case, I think the only way to consider doing something like this is practice, practice, practice. Find a similar subject (overall size and size of detailed features) in much shallower depths and learn how to take photos of that. Go back and do it again once you've had a chance to learn from your mistakes.

If you are only interesting in an ID shot then you should be fine with a focus light and a single strobe over the lens.

Hi David,

tripod sounds great, but must be big and heavy....
Not what you really want on a trimix dive...
Do you aspect current?
Otherwiese you could try a monopod, or a modified nordic walking stick.

Two lamps, better four on long, best elastic arms, so you can get the light in front of the port without getting a shadow from the port.

Port for the 45mm Panasonic i cannot offer,
but if you like a 60mm Olympus macro and the fitting port for the Nauticam m43 system.

Regards,
Wolfgang

Hello Davide

If those are what u need,i filmed them in Istanbul about 25 meters deep

if you want to come and film you are more than welcome ,also the dive company owes me 4 dives ,we can share it as well

regards

Lutfu

I cannot bring with me a large tripod because I need a scooter to get there. Usually for my wa shots I mount everything on the scooter. I could bring something like a gorillapod or a very cheap tripod as disposable. I have to minimize efforts while operating at depth.

Luftu thank you for your offer. Which lens did you use for those shots? Is it the GH4?Unfortunately a trip to Turkey is out of budget right now. It's incredible that the same animal is so shallow there. I think it depends on water viz. Here water it's so clear that they live at 60+ meters. Insee the same kind of sea bottom. I know that the even Funiculina lies at 20m in north UK.

Those two species used to be very common but bottom trawling has completely destroyed most of them. New studies prove that in pristine habitat these kind of animals are nursery for whitebait schools hence very important for fish stocks (and fisheries).

This is me while filming Veretillum at 70+ m in Tuscany.

That scooter is fat enough to act as your tripod unless you specifically want shots of the top of the sea pen. Lay it down and if it won't settle in a stable position, weigh it down or wedge a rock or something under the side of it. Set the front of the port about 30cm from the polyps and start there. Do an auto focus then lock focus and ease the whole rig forwards or backwards for fine adjustment if you need to. Even lighting from each side will tend to make the subject flat. I would try with one light from the front and one from the side, but you may well get a more pleasing shot with just one light either from the side or from directly above, so after the shot with 2 lights, you can simply turn one on at a time. Try and get the lens's aperture "somewhere in the middle" of the range. Avoid very small aperture which will soften the image. If you follow your camera's exposure, this may well make the subject a little overexposed since it will be bright, relatively small subject against a darker background. This is a mistake I often make. If anything, drop the exposure down a little from what the camera says is correct. Perhaps try a shot with auto white balance and one with a manual white balance suitable for your lights' colour temperature, unless you're already confident in which will work best. Let the shots run long enough to remove the wobbles in post-production and to let any sediment settle down.

That scooter is fat enough to act as your tripod unless you specifically want shots of the top of the sea pen. Lay it down and if it won't settle in a stable position, weigh it down or wedge a rock or something under the side of it.

Thanks Nick. Good suggestions

I hope the scooter will be high enough to reach the polyps of the Funiculina. Moreover the sea bottom is mostly mud down there Regarding exposure, you are right. Even for WA I ruined several shots relying on the camera exposure filming animals like these. They reflect lights like a road sign!

I cannot bring with me a large tripod because I need a scooter to get there. Usually for my wa shots I mount everything on the scooter. I could bring something like a gorillapod or a very cheap tripod as disposable. I have to minimize efforts while operating at depth.

 

Luftu thank you for your offer. Which lens did you use for those shots? Is it the GH4?Unfortunately a trip to Turkey is out of budget right now. It's incredible that the same animal is so shallow there. I think it depends on water viz. Here water it's so clear that they live at 60+ meters. Insee the same kind of sea bottom. I know that the even Funiculina lies at 20m in north UK.

Those two species used to be very common but bottom trawling has completely destroyed most of them. New studies prove that in pristine habitat these kind of animals are nursery for whitebait schools hence very important for fish stocks (and fisheries).

 

This is me while filming Veretillum at 70+ m in Tuscany.

 

1477954158676.jpg

Hello Davide

No i was using a sony hvr z1 ..i think that was like 3 or 4 yrs ago....

conditions were hard...it is really dark water...

regards

Lutfu

Hello Davide

No i was using a sony hvr z1 ..i think that was like 3 or 4 yrs ago....

conditions were hard...it is really dark water...

regards

Lutfu

I thought it was a proper camcorder. Thanks.

My last question: usually, what is your preferred AF choice for macro? For WA I use only a single small centered AF area. I missed several shots with multi point AF: the 8mm fisheye is able focusing even a small dust particle on the dome.

Yesterday I was playing with my lenses and I discovered that the pana-leica 45mm fits perfectly into the 4,33" fisheye dome. Front element seats very near to the dome. I made some test in a bucket and I'm able to focus at few cm from the dome. Any cons?

Thank you all.

My last question: usually, what is your preferred AF choice for macro? For WA I use only a single small centered AF area. I missed several shots with multi point AF: the 8mm fisheye is able focusing even a small dust particle on the dome.

Looking my U/W GH4 menu now. I can't say what would be different on the GH3 I'm afraid:

AFS/AFF = AFS

Continuous AF = ON

AF/AEE Lock = AF LOCK

AF/AE Lock Hold = ON

Shutter AF = ON

Quick AF = OFF

Eye Sensor AF = OFF

Pinpoint AF Time = MID

Direct Focus Area = ON

Focus/Release Priority = FOCUS

AF+MF = ON

MF Assist = Use the AF mode button

MF Guide = ON

So many blummin' focus options on this thing. It does my head in! Took me about 100 dives to find a way of working with it that suited me and I still have to relearn it at the start of trips.

In AFS mode, with my general medium/macro lens (Oly 12-50), I change the size and position of the square focus box a lot while I'm diving, depending what's in front of me, using the 4 cursor buttons on the back and the thumb dial. It's quick to do. Usually I keep the box large and central between encounters to cover whatever might show up. I reset it with the DISP button.

With the thumb lever on the housing I operate the AF/AE Lock button which switches between AFS and AFL (see the current mode with the tiny text top right of screen that I definitely need my prescription mask for!). With a macro encounter where I have TIME, I shift and size the yellow box onto the critter's eye (for example) then do a back-button-focus with that lever so it's locked into AFL mode. With an encounter where I don't have time, I just start recording in AFS. But then the focus will continue moving, often nasty little micro-shifts, even if it doesn't look like it on your little monitor, so as soon as I can I lock the focus manually by physically moving the rotating focus control to AFS/AFF to MF. You can do that in the middle of at shot (or before) when you know focus is right and it will keep recording. This will usually wobble your camera a little and leave a clear audio trace in your recorded file, which can actually be useful in post-production to know when you locked focus. Also MF mode then displays peaking which is useful.

With this lens I badly long for a proper manual focus knob that works with peaking. All these fancy features and it's missing that hugely important feature. Crazy really.

Yesterday I was playing with my lenses and I discovered that the pana-leica 45mm fits perfectly into the 4,33" fisheye dome. Front element seats very near to the dome. I made some test in a bucket and I'm able to focus at few cm from the dome. Any cons?

Sounds unusual. I would expect the image to not be sharp all the way across into the corners so check that. Might not be too bad.

Looking my U/W GH4 menu now. I can't say what would be different on the GH3 I'm afraid:

 

AFS/AFF = AFS

Continuous AF = ON

AF/AEE Lock = AF LOCK

AF/AE Lock Hold = ON

Shutter AF = ON

Quick AF = OFF

Eye Sensor AF = OFF

Pinpoint AF Time = MID

Direct Focus Area = ON

Focus/Release Priority = FOCUS

AF+MF = ON

MF Assist = Use the AF mode button

MF Guide = ON

 

So many blummin' focus options on this thing. It does my head in! Took me about 100 dives to find a way of working with it that suited me and I still have to relearn it at the start of trips.

Hahaha. Same here!

I haven't my camera here now but as far as I can remember, except some "exotic" option like "Eye Sensor AF" and "Pinpoint..." I have more or less the same on both GH2 and GH3. (Thanks to Panasonic, if I will upgrade to GH4 I will feel at home, more or less...).

In AFS mode, with my general medium/macro lens (Oly 12-50), I change the size and position of the square focus box a lot while I'm diving, depending what's in front of me, using the 4 cursor buttons on the back and the thumb dial. It's quick to do. Usually I keep the box large and central between encounters to cover whatever might show up. I reset it with the DISP button. With the thumb lever on the housing I operate the AF/AE Lock button which switches between AFS and AFL (see the current mode with the tiny text top right of screen that I definitely need my prescription mask for!). With a macro encounter where I have TIME, I shift and size the yellow box onto the critter's eye (for example) then do a back-button-focus with that lever so it's locked into AFL mode.

Same approach as you. Most of the time I focus with the rear lever/button that I set to AF Lock.

With an encounter where I don't have time, I just start recording in AFS. But then the focus will continue moving, often nasty little micro-shifts, even if it doesn't look like it on your little monitor, so as soon as I can I lock the focus manually by physically moving the rotating focus control to AFS/AFF to MF. You can do that in the middle of at shot (or before) when you know focus is right and it will keep recording. This will usually wobble your camera a little and leave a clear audio trace in your recorded file, which can actually be useful in post-production to know when you locked focus. Also MF mode then displays peaking which is useful.

With this lens I badly long for a proper manual focus knob that works with peaking. All these fancy features and it's missing that hugely important feature. Crazy really.

Hummm... Of course, GH2 and GH3 doesn't have focus peaking but once I press the shutter release button or movie button (being in AFS) I get a completely different behaviour: the camera acts exactly like being in AFL. It focus while starting th recording and then the focus remain locked. It works exactly like shooting photos. I would kill myself if the focus would continue moving. Is it something peculiar to GH4 or some nasty combination of the above options? IMHO the main culprit would be that

"Continuous AF = ON"

However glad to know that we work in the same way. I remember a good post of Peter on GH4 AF use: http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=55392

Sounds unusual. I would expect the image to not be sharp all the way across into the corners so check that. Might not be too bad.

Yesterday i was speaking with the Nauticam Italy's representative and he confirmed that it should be good enough.

Few years ago, I mad some test in a pool for fun placing the pana 20mm pancake in the same 4.33" dome. Distance from the glass is grater but the image was tack and sharp. Now the 45mm has an even narrower FOV so I guess it should be better. Maybe you already saw it. I have a small video on Vimeo of those tests:

I leave continuous auto-focus on so I don't always have to do a back button focus for every shot. Maybe I should re-think that, as the auto-focus is so poor.

Agreed the DPV should be a pretty good tripod on its own. But depends how you have it sent up. Buoyant or Negative (reminds me to add more nose weight to mine [emoji848]) so you will have to have it a negative.

AF for macro. A small aperture and a manual AF to get you in the ball park should give you focus and enough dof.

A little tabletop tripod I've used is the Manfrotto ones. They have a ball head on top and are pretty good. Just need to wash well after diving.

Re the GH4. The Continuous AF is pretty good if in HD but sadly poor in 4K.

I had it on, on a trip to Sri Lanka. Didn't think much about it as the rear screen looked okay. It was only when I got home and reviewed the footage, every now and again it would refocus and sort of spoil the shot. Plus you can hear in the audio the focus motor always going.

So now it's off, with the switch on MF, the back button set to 'AF-ON', which following the latest firmware works while recording now and shutter AF on. (That was another mistake, having that off... a bit narked and happily recording everything out of focus for a whole dive as I had forgot to set focus....!)

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I revive this old thread because I see that macro novice questions arise often (http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=59361&hl=tripod&do=findComment&comment=380913).

During the last weeks I started filming again after nearly one year stop (Sometimes life bite you hard). Yesterday I decided to try some macro in few meters of water. I tried with the setup I discussed above and results were simply a disaster Reading on some uw photo guide that macro photography is one of easiest it makes me chuckle.

Anyway...this is what I learned:

• I need macro for a specific idea/project so It is not something which I would wish to make a practice of. Following the suggestion of my Nauticam dealer I tested my GH3 with a panaleica 45mm with 4.33" dome (specific for the 8mm fisheye lens). It works. I can focus few cm form the dome. The lens sits very close to the dome and dome curve doesn't affect image quality: corners look good to me. Probably the narrow lens FOV helps.
• First error: my scooter was slightly positive buoyant and trying to keep it as still as possible with the correct angle to frame the subject resulted in a tango dance.
• Second error: I mounted the camera on the scooter as usual: aligned with scooter handle so I can film when scootering. A scooter when traveling rotates of 45 degrees. I have no problem to apply a slight force to rotate it of 45 degrees when filming WA but with a macro lens even the lightest force produced a tango dance again.
• Ball arms and clamps are not the best one to find a correct light position. Too many things to adjust. I wish I had a locline type arms. I need exercise, exercise exercise.
• In a real scenario my subject will be very far away form the boat so a scooter is paramount. I have to bite the bullet and bring my camera setup clipped to my d-ring. Hence camera anc scooter separated.
• I will buy a gorillapod and I will remove a couple of floats from my arms so the whole setup will be slightly negative buoyant.

One question:

I have a couple of old Luna 8 CRI. They are 6K lumen I guess. I adjusted them to sit on top and on one side of the dome. Both very close and at max power. nevertheless I had the correct exposure working at 800 ISO and F8/F11. Reading similar threads on macro shooting I see that you set your lights at minimum power. What I'm doing wrong?

In the end I felt really a novice using my beloved camera for the very first time. I came back at the boat down at heel Next time it will be better