This thread is moving to more general aspects of DOF and macrophotography:
Rogier, if you are considering buying new macro equipment you should consider the following option(s): The real wizard of macrophotography is Mr. Zoerkendoerfer in Munich http://www.zoerk.de/ To solve the problem of Depth of Field [DOF] (or the lack thereoff) he sells tilt adapters for 35mm SLR cameras. These adaptors take enlarger lenses (Schneider, Rodenstock) which are usually excellent for macrophotography. Go to the following page to understand what tilting does for DOF: http://www.zoerk.de/pages/p_mfs.htm Additional gadgets for improving DOF are his pinhole set (which you just screw in front of your lens): http://www.zoerk.de/pages/g_pinhol.htm It is amazing how much this can do for you. The LX by the way is the predestined camera to use with the pinhole set, as only it has a metering system that can cope really well with low light and long exposures. A very recent development adresses the problem of light loss at close close focussing distances. Since tube extension increases with all macro lenses at close focus, availlable light decreases. You can test this yourself: Focus on a piece of paper with f=4 at 2 meters and note the corresponding schutterspeed. Then go close (1:1), avoid shadows, and measure again: schutterspeed will have gone down by 2-3 f-stops! At close distance an f2.8 Macro lens only has a speed of f5.6 or even f8. Manufacturers don't talk about this. To get around this problem Zoerk now produces and sells an Aspheric (!!!) close up lens to be screwed into a lenses front thread. Due to the aspheric construction image quality does not deteriorate (as compared to normal screw-in close up lenses) and the f-stop of 2.8 is maintained. Great for availlable light macrophotography! Send Mr. Zoerkendoerfer an Email if you want to know more about this. These possibilities are suprisingly unknown but definitely have revolutionized my macrophotography. Knut . _________________________________________________________________ Testen Sie MSN Messenger f�r Ihren Online-Chat mit Freunden: http://messenger.msn.de - This message is from the Pentax-Discuss Mail List. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.pdml.net and follow the directions. Don't forget to visit the Pentax Users' Gallery at http://pug.komkon.org .
