What is the best camera for ultra-close up macro photography?

Question

I need something less than $1000 prefer digital for my hobby pursuits + Ebay sales. I know $1000 isn't much to work with but I need the best I can get for around that.
Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

I'm going to combine two of my stock answers, because they are both appropriate for your question. The first one regards intra-oral photography, which is "ultra close macro" photography of high quality. The second one is about using almost any camera to take acceptable photos for eBay.
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I'll tell you what I use and what you might consider. I got a Nikon D70s for personal use, with the thought that I could also get a macro lens and use it in the office. I got myself a new camera for personal use, as I found that I wanted to leave this setup in the office at all times. I would say that a Nikon D40 or D50 would be perfectly adequate for intraoral use, but you might find a good buy on a D70s, as they are being closed out right now. 6 MP is PLENTY for intraoral use. You would not need a huge memory card for limited use, but I'd still suggest a 1 GB card with accelerated write speed, like a Sandisk Ultra or Extreme or a Lexar 80x card.

I am using a Nikon 60 mm Macro lens, which translates into about 90 mm in "35 mm equivalent." This gives plenty of working distance. Nikon also has a 105 Macro and the brand new 105 VR Macro, but you said, "simple and effective."

I use the built-in pop-up flash rather than a $400-600 marco lighting set-up. It's free. "Simple and effective."

Set the camera in Aperture priority and choose f:11, f:16 or so, depending on personal preference. Set the EV at -0.7 stops. Perhaps you would like a different EV setting, but this is what works for me. After that, in autofocus, it's a point and shoot with wonderful results.

These prices are from a major retailer as of December 2006.

The Nikon D40 is $600 _with_ the 18-55 kit lens.
The D50 sells for $450. That's a recent price cut of $100.
The D70s sells for $640. That's a recent price cut of $60.
The D80 sells for $930.
The D200 sells for $1,350.
The Macro 60mm f:2.8 lens is available for $400.
The Macro 105mm f:2.8 lens is available for $660.
The Macro 105mm f:2.8 VR is out of stock, but sells for $830.
A 1 GB Sandisk Ultra II CF Card (D70 & D200) sells for $40.
A 1 GB Sandisk Ultra II SD Card (D40, D50 & D80) sells for $40.
A 2 GB Sandisk card (either CF or SD) sells for $65.
(Due to a rebate valid through 12-31-06, the faster Extreme III cards are actually cheaper than the Ultra II cards.)

SO - pick your price and find a match. If you can find a D50 and 60mm Macro lens, you would have an excellent intraoral camera for less than $900. I have seen kits to modify point and shoots that cost more than that.

Here's a sample shot from my D70s with the 60mm lens. I admit that it is not "presentation quality," but it was just a quick shot to communicate with the lab.

http://www.members.aol.com/swf08302/d70ssample.jpg
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Jewelry Pictures

If you are not going to go with a DSLR, almost any point and shoot with a macro mode will serve you well. The thing is, I feel that you need to use the flash to force the aperture to close while still having enough light for an exposure. Many here will tell you different, but follow this advice and see what you think.

Use your macro setting and experiment. Let's say you have a point and shoot camera with macro and a flash on the camera. You might have to go to a manual mode to do this, but...

Put your ring on a nice background surface. I like to just put it in a ring box. Zoom out at least half-way so that you will be working about a foot away from the ring. Be sure that you get focus confirmation. Shoot a picture USING flash. Check the LCD for the result. If you have overexposed the ring, use the EV adjustment to reduce the exposure. For small items, I often find that I need to reduce the exposure by about 1.0 EV. (That's -1.0 EV.) It is better to have the ring properly exposed and the background underexposed, so just worry about the ring for now. Using a deliberate underexposure will cure the "too shiny" appearance of the stones and metal.

If you know how, you can use either full manual exposure or just Aperture Priority and choose a smaller aperture (larger number) to make the ring show up in better focus.

If you have a DSLR, post your question again stating the kind of camera that you have and the lens that you are using and we will give more details.

If you are doing any image processing at all, such with Photoshop or it's cousins, you can crop the image to 800 pixels by 800 pixels and use Supersize images on eBay. I always use the Picture Pack when I am selling anything of any value.

Check out http://www.members.aol.com/swf08302/heartring.jpg which I did a while ago using a Nikon Coolpix 5400 exactly as described above. I do NOT think this is acceptable, but we decided not to sell the ring anyhow, so I didn't bother to do a better job. It's still better than some I've seen. I don't keep old photos of sold items around, so I don't have much to show you, but at least you know that it's possible to get an acceptable result even without spending huge dollars on your equipment.

The key things to remember are:
-Macro setting
-Zoom out to get about a foot away from your subject
-Use flash
-Try different EV settings and expect that you will end up with a negative EV setting, such as -1.0 EV.

Here are a couple of coin photos done exactly as described:

http://www1.snapfish.com/slideshow/AlbumID=57759389/PictureID=2801041875/a=75953750_75953750/t_=75953750
http://www1.snapfish.com/slideshow/AlbumID=57759389/PictureID=2801041874/a=75953750_75953750/t_=75953750

Here are a couple more auction photos done as described:

800 x 800 http://www.members.aol.com/swf08302/yorkie01.jpg
800 x 800 http://www.members.aol.com/swf08302/montblanc05.jpg

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Answer 2

Many digicams have a very close focusing ability, and with it maybe just a tad more depth of field (than film). . My Canon Powershot focuses about a cm or so from object on the "super-macro" mode.

You can also get a film SLR and a close focus attachment. You could also get a macro lens, but true macros are costly. You will see several consumer grade lenses listed as macro, which means they focus a little closer at some focal lengths, might even get you to 2:1.

Look at www.dpreview.com for digital camera reviews. The closest focus measurement should be listed with all the specs.

Answer 3

By close work I suspect you need something that has a macro setting. many of the digital cameras have such a setting.The only down side I find is that when you enlarge macro pictures to 11 x 8 1/2 they tend to be grainy.

Answer 4

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Answer 5

In all seriousness, rather than spend a HUGE amount on a digital camera, you should think about getting a film camera with a manual focus, especially if you are taking very close pictures of very small items. On the flip side, you can invest in an extremly high megapixel camera, photograph the item from a distance and just zoom in on the photo and crop it with a photo editor. I recommend the Olympus S710 (Stylus) 7.1 Megapixel camera. Easy to use, high megapixels, 24 light settings, and very cheap (around $250 at Target).

Answer 6

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Answer 7

the canon a710is camera
can go milimeters away