In Focus

There are very specific technical requirements for capturing objects in close-up. This article is intended to be an introduction to this style of photography only, so forgive me if I don’t go into too much detail for now. Hasten to add, it takes many hours of practice in order to gain consistent images, and more so for moving pictures where my focusing technique is more conventional. I will discuss my experience and the equipment I use, however the good news is there are many products on the market, such as mobile phone camera attachments and portable lighting, that can make this type of photography accessible at an introductory and more affordable level than ever before.

I am a self-taught photographer, first picking up my brother’s Olympus OM10 SLR camera around 40 years ago. The knowledge I share here is not studied at school, it is just my way of doing things to get the results I want.

Let’s start with stills photography. When I shoot macro, even outside, I will normally take with me around 400 watts of lighting. Even on a sunny day! You see, when you take pictures of miniature things, you very quickly lose what we call depth of field. That’s how much detail you can see in the image. This can isolate the subject, or force you to

...when you take pictures of miniature things, you very quickly lose what we call depth of field. That’s how much detail you can see in the image. This can isolate the subject, or force you to only get in focus the eye of an insect for instance, not allowing the viewer to fully understand what you have captured.

Whilst landscape photography has for a long time been my main interest, macro photography, the capturing of small objects in close-up, has been my passion. So much so, that I have transferred the skills that I’ve developed over the years taking stills, to my filmmaking work. I also use the techniques I’ve developed, to capture more interesting angles of larger objects too.

Article and Photos by Mick Child

only get in focus the eye of an insect for instance, not allowing the viewer to fully understand what you have captured. To compensate, we decrease the size of the hole in the lens called

the aperture. The result is more depth of field. The down side of this is that the smaller your aperture, the less light you let into the camera. It all gets very tricky from this point forward, so for now just trust me, we need as much light as possible to do this properly. Focussing; for 90% of the time I will use manual focus. To do this I judge the distance I want to be from my subject, say 50mm, and I set the focus

Mick is a local creative who left his 30-year career 5 years ago to follow his passion in photography and filmmaking. He also writes and directs documentaries and dramas, which have been screened over the past 2-years at film festivals around the world. His latest production, Villa the Volcano screened at Australia Film Festival in March this year, and he and his team are hopeful for many more screenings at other festivals later in 2022.

You can learn more about Mick and his company at; forgephotography.co.uk

accordingly. Because the lens is in manual, it is locked at 50mm. Anything shot closer or further away will be out of focus. I move the camera to the correct distance I need when tracking a subject, bringing it into focus without readjusting the lens. If I’m shooting bees for example, I might spend around 3-6 hours in their company with my kit before I start snapping, so that they get used to me being there. It also gives me time to get to know their pattern in order that I can second guess where they’ll be. It’s all about increasing your chances of getting that “killer” shot.

The lenses; I use the same two lenses for both stills and moving pictures. The first is my 100mm lens. It is a beautiful lens with a spectacular colour range. I can open the aperture really wide, allowing lots of light in. It is not however my 'go to' lens normally. Whilst the colours are amazing, it does isolate the subject as described above. My 'go to' lens is a probe lens. It has 22 pieces of glass within the tube, which allows me to obtain much more depth of field. This kind of lens was developed for wildlife photographers, and it gives a real sense of your surroundings. You’ll have no doubt seen images from similar lenses on nature programmes like Blue Planet, capturing small bugs and placing you right in their world. This lens requires a lot of light however, because the aperture is very small. Inevitably, a lot of the shots you see on TV have to be filmed inside a controlled environment like a purpose-built tank in a studio to enable this.

One of my sources of income is to create 4K video content for filmmakers. It is the macro I enjoy doing the most, although the time I spend making each 5-45 second clip, far outweighs anything I ever earn from it. It really is a labour of love. A pastime that really hooks me and draws me in. Once I start creating, I can’t stop.  villagetribune 15