Any recommendations for a Nikon D5300 owner?

[Ranjib]

Hell R2R community,
I have a couple of pico and a nano tank. I have been using my D5300 for some of the FTS, but mostly iPhone. I use an iphone specific macro lens, and I have been happy with it. The images are not very crisp or sharp, but it has been a good value for the money (alongside the 4$ Camera+ iPhone app).

I am still new to photography, and took some time to teach the basics. I am hoping to use my d5300 for macro. Any suggestion?

Following is my tentative list:
- Must have: Tube (kenko or other cheap tubes)
- Should have: Filters? CPL to help with reflection? .. or not needed?
- Must have, but later: A macro lens, either Nikon 85 or Tamron 90 .. prohibitively expensive :0(

any suggestion or specific vendors/brands you'll recommend? Experience? or some of this is not needed, and I should just get a cheaper macro. My initial readings led me to think I should get a extension tube first, they are cheap and effective. I threw in the CPL filter without any evidence, but with an assumption that it will help to fix reflection issue. My biocube has curved surface and there are three tanks located together.
Also, any cheaper and relatively OK macro lens options?
My tanks are small so, I don't need images of corals that are further than 1-1.5 feet. My picos let me take shots very close , which is why the iphone + macro lense has been good for pico, and unusable for biocube (especially the corals in the center, top etc).
Thanks in advance

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Welll......
There are some better lenses for the iPhone. Tough to figure out what the best one is. Mine was $9 and also sells for $40.
Try cleaning the lenses first. Bad plastic is just like dirt.

Some folks swear by the extension tubes. Get great shots. I cannot figure them out for the life of me. But for the low cost it's worth the shot trying.

There are also close up filter /lens sets. Just small lenses that screw on like a filter and increase magimification. Also cheap and Hit and miss.

No filter takes out reflections. That's all bout eliminating the sources. So turn of lights , wear a black t shirt. I also use a black show card with a hole in it for the lens depending on the subject.
I have a lot of them so you can use them to block other lights. In tv and photography, they are called scrims sometimes. I also use black cloth and tape a lot.
A LOT of tape. Lol.

The key to macro is to understand the lens is designed to have a close focus.
Close focus +high magnification =macro.
Some prime (non zoom) have a natural close focus. You have to look at the specs or it's usually on the lens. On the front or the barrel.

I don't recall if toir camera will take manual focus lenses. I have a 55mm that has a close focus of about 6-8 in. It's not super macro sps polyps, but it's great for fish and colonies.
If the camera will take those , you can use a doubler.
That makes the 55 a 110mm. With a cropped sensor it makes it about a 150 175.

A vintage 55mm Nikon Micro(Tm)
Is for a full sensor (film actually )
Is under a $100. (Just Chek compatability.

Adding tubes , and doublers needs more light to expose.

There is a difference in lenses today , some are for a cropped sensor , some are for a full sensor.
So a 90mm macro cropped sensor lens has less maginification than the
55mm Micro and a doubler.
But the 90 macro you will lose less light.

And yup. Photography is just like Reefing. Nickels and dimes or dollars.

You should be able to het very good quality FTS and closer pics with the phone and the kit zooms, but you will have to deal with the reflections manually.

Unless you have a good grip department.

 

[ahmed.boomer]

Honestly, for macro in a reef tank, you'll be shooting RAW and manually focusing (use the live view to do it). So I wouldn't worry too much about the filters if you have decent LED lighting or T5/Halides. I'm not a huge fan of the macro filters either. If you can get a dedicated lens, that'd be best. Use extension tubes for now if that's whats in your budget. Use Lightroom to correct white balance as the camera will usually be off.

My personal suggestion would be to get the 60mm 2.8D Nikkor (~$225 used) or the 100mm Tokina ($300 used). The old manual focus Nikon lenses are great too if you can find a old 55mm AIS Micro for cheap. Tamron 90mm 2.8 is good too ($200 used, Di SP), but I sold it after trying to tokina. Both are incredibly sharp and I doubt you'd notice a difference for casual use. None of the lenses I listed will autofocus with your body though if you wanted to use them for photos of family or kids. Look into the 60mm 2.8G if that's what you're after. You can probably get away with the 60mm on a crop body in a Pico system.

Don't worry too much about the technicality of how you're shooting or magnification if you're going to get a macro lens. The images from a macro lens will come out cleaner and produce an overall smoother image than extension tubes or magnifying filters

When you shoot make sure to use a tripod or have a really steady had. Use the smallest aperture to can (f-stop) so you get a sharp image that also have some depth of field. My settings were f/16, 1/30, ISO 400. It will depend on your lighting, but find what works best. At 1/30 it's hard to sharp images without a tripod. Less than 1/30th you start picking up some motion even with pumps off.

 

[Ranjib]

Welll......
There are some better lenses for the iPhone. Tough to figure out what the best one is. Mine was $9 and also sells for $40.
Try cleaning the lenses first. Bad plastic is just like dirt.

Some folks swear by the extension tubes. Get great shots. I cannot figure them out for the life of me. But for the low cost it's worth the shot trying.

There are also close up filter /lens sets. Just small lenses that screw on like a filter and increase magimification. Also cheap and Hit and miss.

No filter takes out reflections. That's all bout eliminating the sources. So turn of lights , wear a black t shirt. I also use a black show card with a hole in it for the lens depending on the subject.
I have a lot of them so you can use them to block other lights. In tv and photography, they are called scrims sometimes. I also use black cloth and tape a lot.
A LOT of tape. Lol.

The key to macro is to understand the lens is designed to have a close focus.
Close focus +high magnification =macro.
Some prime (non zoom) have a natural close focus. You have to look at the specs or it's usually on the lens. On the front or the barrel.

I don't recall if toir camera will take manual focus lenses. I have a 55mm that has a close focus of about 6-8 in. It's not super macro sps polyps, but it's great for fish and colonies.
If the camera will take those , you can use a doubler.
That makes the 55 a 110mm. With a cropped sensor it makes it about a 150 175.

A vintage 55mm Nikon Micro(Tm)
Is for a full sensor (film actually )
Is under a $100. (Just Chek compatability.

Adding tubes , and doublers needs more light to expose.

There is a difference in lenses today , some are for a cropped sensor , some are for a full sensor.
So a 90mm macro cropped sensor lens has less maginification than the
55mm Micro and a doubler.
But the 90 macro you will lose less light.

And yup. Photography is just like Reefing. Nickels and dimes or dollars.

You should be able to het very good quality FTS and closer pics with the phone and the kit zooms, but you will have to deal with the reflections manually.

Unless you have a good grip department.

Thank you, I have to read through some bits to better understand your inputs .
I did some more reading yesterday night, and I think I'll skip most of these, and go to straight for a tokina 100mm , like this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000CMNL52/ . The extension tube has good feedback from everyone, but I am not sure if i'll need it if I have a macro lens. And a decent extension tube will cost around 70$ .
My learning from the youtube videos was CPL aka polarize filter can reduce the reflection from glass surface. I have to educate myself about full sensor bits, I was only focusing on the 1:1 ratio .
thanks again, this is very useful

 

[Ranjib]

Honestly, for macro in a reef tank, you'll be shooting RAW and manually focusing (use the live view to do it). So I wouldn't worry too much about the filters if you have decent LED lighting or T5/Halides. I'm not a huge fan of the macro filters either. If you can get a dedicated lens, that'd be best. Use extension tubes for now if that's whats in your budget. Use Lightroom to correct white balance as the camera will usually be off.

My personal suggestion would be to get the 60mm 2.8D Nikkor (~$225 used) or the 100mm Tokina ($300 used). The old manual focus Nikon lenses are great too if you can find a old 55mm AIS Micro for cheap. Tamron 90mm 2.8 is good too ($200 used, Di SP), but I sold it after trying to tokina. Both are incredibly sharp and I doubt you'd notice a difference for casual use. None of the lenses I listed will autofocus with your body though if you wanted to use them for photos of family or kids. Look into the 60mm 2.8G if that's what you're after. You can probably get away with the 60mm on a crop body in a Pico system.

Don't worry too much about the technicality of how you're shooting or magnification if you're going to get a macro lens. The images from a macro lens will come out cleaner and produce an overall smoother image than extension tubes or magnifying filters

When you shoot make sure to use a tripod or have a really steady had. Use the smallest aperture to can (f-stop) so you get a sharp image that also have some depth of field. My settings were f/16, 1/30, ISO 400. It will depend on your lighting, but find what works best. At 1/30 it's hard to sharp images without a tripod. Less than 1/30th you start picking up some motion even with pumps off.

Thank you so much :-0) . I was going for tokina, after some reading last night. I have a tripod, as well as an adapter to do the click thing without touching the body ( my hand shakes a lot :-( ). I'll educate myself with the aperture settings, I mostly go with auto mode without the flash, and do post processing on GIMP (linux person). Everytime I tried going manual or aperture or shutter priority mode, I put myself in irrecoverable state, and end up reseting everything. I think I'll go slow this time,, and only explore/learn one thing/aspect at a time
Thanks again,

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Thank you, I have to read through some bits to better understand your inputs .
I did some more reading yesterday night, and I think I'll skip most of these, and go to straight for a tokina 100mm , like this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000CMNL52/ . The extension tube has good feedback from everyone, but I am not sure if i'll need it if I have a macro lens. And a decent extension tube will cost around 70$ .
My learning from the youtube videos was CPL aka polarize filter can reduce the reflection from glass surface. I have to educate myself about full sensor bits, I was only focusing on the 1:1 ratio .
thanks again, this is very useful

Cool!
Fwiw a decent extension tube set should cost about $15.
Really. It does.

 

[Ranjib]

Cool!
Fwiw a decent extension tube set should cost about $15.
Really. It does.

Really ? I was looking at Kenko etc. I read that it should have the pins, for auto focus to work. I'll browse through amazon

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

I'd highly reccomend the manual ones.

The way a tube works auto focus is even harder to figure out. (It narrows the field that you can actually focus on.)
But again, you'd have to look to as if that camera will take manual focus.

 

[ahmed.boomer]

Thank you so much :-0) . I was going for tokina, after some reading last night. I have a tripod, as well as an adapter to do the click thing without touching the body ( my hand shakes a lot :-( ). I'll educate myself with the aperture settings, I mostly go with auto mode without the flash, and do post processing on GIMP (linux person). Everytime I tried going manual or aperture or shutter priority mode, I put myself in irrecoverable state, and end up reseting everything. I think I'll go slow this time,, and only explore/learn one thing/aspect at a time
Thanks again,

Haha, you should be fine shooting in manual. It's just trial and error till you get the setting right. The camera usually has a hard time exposing the image correctly because of how to light falls in an aquarium.



Best of luck!

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

Haha, you should be fine shooting in manual. It's just trial and error till you get the setting right. The camera usually has a hard time exposing the image correctly because of how to light falls in an aquarium.



Best of luck!

A lot of pictures in the words were shot in manual focus.

Just balance the asa sensitivity , the f stop , and the shutter.

Fwiw , light falls no differently in a tank than anywhere else.
It's the intensities that change from tank to tank.
If you have a lot of light in the tank , you won't have an issue. If you have an Led you dial it up while you take pics too. I have a preset on my lights I use for better color and intensity just for pictures.