Every photographer is familiar with the common sets of screw-on close focus filters of various magnifications that can enable macro or near-macro on standard or mild telephoto lenses. They vary in quality but all tend to introduce problems such as CA (chromatic aberration), field curvature, corner softness and general image degradation and distortion.
There are better alternatives to them that don't involve the inconvenience of extension tubes, bellows or teleconverters which interfere with the metering function of your lens or severely curtail it's maximum aperture.
Achromatic close-up lenses are more sophisticated doublet optical designs that retain the quality of the original lens to a greater degree. Of course you lose infinity focus but you get to experience the undoubted goodness of a 200mm macro lens (for example) as in the shot above. They come in various magnifications and filter sizes; step-up and/or down rings can aid fitting a slightly wrong sized one to your intended lens.
Only $40 for the Nikon 6T attached to my lovely Tamron 70-300 vc (zoomed to 200mm at f8).
I got lucky on the Nikon 6T since it's discontinued but there are several alternate brands that are not the more expensive Canon and Nikon ones; in particular the Sigma 58mm that was made for their old 70-300mm APO lens (less magnification than the 62mm 6T but it cost me all of $15, which is typical) and a wide range of Marumi options.
A good summary of most of the available types is found here.
I like them.
There are better alternatives to them that don't involve the inconvenience of extension tubes, bellows or teleconverters which interfere with the metering function of your lens or severely curtail it's maximum aperture.
Achromatic close-up lenses are more sophisticated doublet optical designs that retain the quality of the original lens to a greater degree. Of course you lose infinity focus but you get to experience the undoubted goodness of a 200mm macro lens (for example) as in the shot above. They come in various magnifications and filter sizes; step-up and/or down rings can aid fitting a slightly wrong sized one to your intended lens.
Only $40 for the Nikon 6T attached to my lovely Tamron 70-300 vc (zoomed to 200mm at f8).
I got lucky on the Nikon 6T since it's discontinued but there are several alternate brands that are not the more expensive Canon and Nikon ones; in particular the Sigma 58mm that was made for their old 70-300mm APO lens (less magnification than the 62mm 6T but it cost me all of $15, which is typical) and a wide range of Marumi options.
A good summary of most of the available types is found here.
I like them.
RSS Feed
