In that search, I found that using either a Nikon teleconverter or a Kenko extension tubes with my nikkor 300mm lens, would produce a 1:2 close-up photo with the front of the lens 48 inches from the subject being photographed.
In that post, I stated that my 300mm lens was sharp. I did not know how sharp it was until I photographed the Quiller Wheel in my computer room, to test my new found combination for 1:2 close-up photos at 48 inches.
To show how amazingly sharp this lens is, I photographed the Quiller Wheel with the following setup.
I used a Nikon D500 camera and a Kenko 68mm extension tubes attached between the Nikkor 300mm f/4E PF lens and the camera. The camera ISO was set to 100, and the lens aperture to f/8 (effective f/10 due to extension tubes). I used Live View to manually focus the lens by rotating the Lens Focusing Ring. A Nikon MC-36 Cable Release was used to fire the shutter. The camera was mounted on a tripod and the front of the lens was placed 48 inches from the Quiller Wheel.
Now, you have been wondering, what is a Quiller Wheel? Here is a photograph of the Quiller Wheel:
I do painting with Stephen Quiller's acrylic paints. The Quiller Wheel shows all of the paint colors and names he has given his colors, that he makes and sells.
So I setup the 18 by 18 inch by 1/8th thick card board Quiller Wheel as my first subject to test my newly found close-up equipment.
Here is my first 1:2 photo of the Quiller wheel:
This photo covers an area of 1.85 by 1.24 inches. Not bad, but not very exciting.
Here is another 1:2 photo:
I noticed that the blue strip in this photo appeared to show ink spots. To verify this, I used Photoshop CS6 to crop the photo to a 1:1 photo and then resize it back to 1024 by 1024 px. Here is the 1:1 crop:
Sure enough, those are ink patterns laid down by the printing press.
I looked at the Wheel 6 inches from my face with my reading glasses, and all I could see was a solid blue colored strip. I could not make out any ink structure. Amazing, this lens resolution was great enough to see ink spots a 48 inches.
To make sure this was not a fluke, I continued to photograph other colors. Here is another:
Again, it looks like ink spots, but I cannot see them, it is just a light red color on the Quiller Wheel. So I cropped this photo in Photoshop to a 1:1 photo:
Then I cropped it again to a 2:1 photo:
Those are definitely red ink spots. I wanted to measure the distance between the spots. I used a Bausch & Lomb 7x Magnifier with a mm and inch scale to measure the distance between the red spots on the Quiller Wheel. I brought the Quiller Wheel over to my desk and measured the distance between red ink spots. As typed on the photos, which I typed on the photos using Photoshop later after my readings, the measured distance was 0.1mm or 0.004 inches!
Here is the final clincher photo:
I crop this photo to a 1:1 photo:
And I cropped it again to a 2:1 photo:
This unbelievable. I cannot see any ink structure with the Quiller Wheel 6 inches from my face, but this imaging equipment can resolve ink spots that are 0.004 inch apart with the lens 48 inches from these colors being photographed.
This Nikkor 300mm f/4E PF lens is extremely sharp!
Next up in future posts are details of internal parts of flowers photographed 48 inches from the flowers. And, also coming up, my attempts to do 1:2 close-up photo stacking at 48 inches.
I made this post to help people, who cannot get close to a subject, realize that you can take close-up photographs at a comfortable distance.
Leon