Close up... then even closer up
At Court Square in Harrisonburg, Virginia
Prepare to see spiders!
I use a bellows system (sometimes multiple bellows) to extend the lens from the camera body. The bellow seen here is a Minolta mount film enlarging bellow attached with a Minolta to Canon adapter, which conveniently adds an extra couple centimeters to the extension.
This system creates a very shallow depth-of-field, so a large aperture is often needed.
Separating the camera from the lens combined with the large aperture greatly reduces the amount of light that enters the camera, so I often add light with an off-camera strobe.
In order to manually focus the lens, I use a bright flashlight and a very steady hand.
I typically will mount it on my regular tripod, but with some setups, I am able to handhold which is how I can get some images out in the field, like the butterfly seen above.
© 2026 Austin Bachand