Last updated 6/04/2007
Closeup Shooting
Closeup Shooting
Author: Cyrill Harnischmacher
Publisher: rockynook From: OÕReilly
122 pages ... $24.95
ISBN: 978-1-933952-09-3
A Guide to Closeup, Tabletop, and Macro Photography
If you are at all interested in Closeup photography, you will want to read Closeup Shooting
by Cyrill Harnishmacher. It will not take long to read, but you will want to read it more than once.
The quality of the images in Closeup Shooting has to be seen. An example is not just an image of dragonflies. It is incredibly sharp, beautifully lit, clearly shows the dragonflies and is a work of art. Each the image illustrates a lesson. To photograph dragonflies, filling the frame with a magnification of 1:3 is completely sufficient and is possible with most modern telephoto zoom lenses and/or bridge cameras. A tripod or image stabilizer is important. 1//90 sec at f13; 300 mm telephoto macro lens; tripod; fill-in flash.
Closeup Shooting
covers more about closeup photography than I knew existed, and more than you could expect to find in 122 pages:
The Basics,
Choosing the Right Camera,
Standard Lenses,
Closeup Lenses,
Extension Tubes and Teleconverters,
Reversed Lenses,
Closeup Lenses,
Specialized Equipment,
Zoerk Multi Focus System,
Closeup Equipment,
Tripods - Flash Tilts and Ball Heads,
The Most Important Filters,
Daylight,
Artificial Light,
Flash Lighting,
Controlling Flash,
Flash Lighting Used Creatively,
Closeup Paradise in the Meadow,
Strategies for Sharp Pictures,
During All Seasons,
Travel Closeup Photography,
Tabletop Photography,
Product Shots,
Comparison in Lighting,
Imaging Techniques, and
Building Your Own Equipment.
In only two pages, Comparison Lighting illustrates how Closeup Shooting
provides a lot of information in so few pages saving you reading time. On one page are 9 pictures taken by the author using a hot-shoe flash. The facing page includes the labels telling how the flash was controlled. It becomes apparent that the larger the area of illumination, the softer the resulting light.
Cyrill Harnishmacher has made equally good use of tables that he created to show, for example, different types of cameras and camera lenses and how suitable they are for different kinds of closeup photography.
The writing is clear and easy to understand. I have to admit that I am still struggling to understanding some of the basics of magnification ratios and depth of field, but I cannot blame that on this book.
For more information or to use your user group discount to buy Closeup Shooting,
see
