A few folk have asked why close-up shots of small things are called macro (big), and not micro (small). They are big, because the lens they are taken with is specialised to focus sufficiently close such that the subject will completely fill the frame on which the image is being recorded -- either film or digital sensor. A true macro lens might be classed 1:1, and at that a photo of a postage stamp would, at the closest point of focus, exactly fill a postage-stamp sized sensor. Nowadays, the term macro has been borrowed to mean simply close-up work. Digital compacts, by their very design, are perfect for macro work, as they usually have minimum focusing distances of only 2 or 3 cm, and the small sensor is easily filled by the subject.
In the field, it's a bit awkward to carry a separate macro lens for an SLR when out for a day's fishing -- on top of everything else. The simplest solution is to carry a close-up filter, which is just like a monacle for the camera. The downside is that depth of field is very very narrow. The shot of the single grousewing below was taken with a close-up filter on a standard zoom lens. It might look like I was trying to be arty with the shallow depth of field, but the truth is, I didn't have any other option. The house spider was taken with a proper macro lens. It was taken with a deliberately shallow depth of field. I took others with a deep field, but they looked boring in comparison. The olive was taken in the field as well, and it would have benefited from getting the whole insect in focus. Unfortunately I had a narrow miss with the most important thing -- if you only get one thing in focus, make sure it's the eyes! The problem here was that I was hand-holding the camera, and deep focus would have increased the exposure time to way beyond what I could manage to keep steady.
Click on thumbnails for larger images
 Greater reed mace, Lincolnshire |
 Lindores Loch |
 Grenadier, Blagdon (its wings got a bit bent, posing it) |
 Assorted flight paths, loch Leven |
 Edinburgh zoo |
 Edinburgh zoo |
 Edinburgh zoo |
 Grouse-wing sedge (note the red eyes) |
 Poppy field, Pencaitland, East Lothian |
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 Common house spider |
 Common gulls (which actually aren't all that common) |
 Egg-laden buzzer |
 Early summer orchid |
 Fly agaric |
 Lake olive |
 Tawny grisette |
 Ceropegia woodii |
 More insect light trails, Loch Leven |
 Rather a lot of grouse-wing sedges, Chew |
 Last winter's forgotten grayling bait
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 Peacock butterfly
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 These 2 are of a pike jaw bone found at the water's edge. It was a fish of only 3 or 4 lb! |
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Loch Craggie mayfly |
 woven Czech nymphs |
Shield bug |
2-spot ladybird |
 common wasp |
 Count Duckula (OK - Goose-ula!) |
 This and next one - a wee beetle that saved our day's fishing |
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 Sulphur tuft |
 Heather fly |
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 Not a photograph, but made using a flat bed scanner |
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| A trout's-eye view of a fly. On the left, an adult buzzer. On the right, an Adams hopper | |||
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 A size 26 sparkle gnat next to a 1p |
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| French partridge | Dance fly | ||
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| Four shots of a large brook dun from the Annan | |||
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Stone fly from the Annan |
Two shots of an alder larva, rescued from a trout's stomach - I put it in a dish of water, and it lived on quite happily! | ||
5x macro of a thrips...
These things
are about 1 mm long and come out at harvest time on warm windless muggy days -
giving them their common name of thunderbugs. Note how they don't have
membranous wings like most insects, but appendages more like feathers.
Close-ups of some of Andrew McGall's salmon flies...
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| Ragged Robin | Loch Craggie mayfly | |
