First experiments in close-up photgraphy.

 
 
Cool stuff.
 
:-)

That coin ought to fetch what you paid for the extension tubes, no?
 
 
Noice pics mate.

What fun. I love shooting macro.
You're quite right about manual focus. Where you are with these, the depth of field must be insanely shallow.
I really like the shot with the stepping second hand. I haven't messed with filters much. How does the neutral density filter play into that?

Great pictures.I have trouble getting my lighting nice and even.
 
Are the tubes Canon or aftermarket? I'm thinking about some aftermarket because the Canon tubes are pricey.
 
Musical instruments can be great for close ups and macro work. Did anyone else realize the watch was running on a quartz movement? Guitar pickups give it away as well.

Very nice, Steve.  

Cool stuff.
 
I bought an old Canon F manual 35mm SLR from a friend with a bag full of lenses. It was a hobby for a period of time that I enjoyed, and even made some money with. 
 
I didn't have the money to buy a bunch of accessories but I found one cool trick that allowed me to do closeup stuff.  Simply remove the normal 45mm lens, reverse it, and hold it in place against the lens mounting ring. Waa Laaa.... an extreme closeup lens. Not the best or a perfect lens, but it works.

Hi,
 
My "close-ups" have always taken a cue from the film industry. When you see the stuff on my web pages, I am not much for posing, and only one picture that I posed, would ever be worth while for me, but I was always interested in the "moment" that you saw things happen, and the person was tuned to it. You can see that in some of the pictures, although I did not have the camera lens I would need to be able to have it done better.
 
All in all, the close-up, for me, was about the moment, not the picture itself. But it is neat to see. 
 
Still one of the best I have ever seen as a close-up can not be mentioned here! And it was so well done that you could not figure it out at all! Those are the most fun!
 
There was a film, that played with a bunch of shorts in an Erotic Film Festival once, that showed this beautiful skin, and the camera slowly came around it and caressed it and all that, and it was sweaty and such, and got you really going ... and after 5 minutes of it, it finally starts coming out of the close-up shots, and it was ... an orange!
 
With musicians, I have always liked the "detail" and my favorites still are Daevid Allen doing his glissando, on my webpages, and Burke Harris' hands playing the piano on an afternoon I could see the sun shadows and flares around the piano keyboard, and that shot is primo for me, but not one that most photographers like ... my boss, where I worked at his photo lab at the time, even said, that a teacher of photography would have downgraded me for those flares ... and they made his hands float on the keyboard! 
 
Just tells you what the close-up sometimes, is all about. I, however, have never done plants or "things" in close-up a whole lot, but I can tell you that I have caught some down right nice things, which to me, are a part of that "personality", and often more important than anything else.
 
I have some more "portraits" that I have not posted, or shown, and all of them show more of a personality, than a picture, and for me that is better.
 
Sometimes I wonder why some musicians are afraid of that. Porcupine Tree, refused to have pictures taken of them in 1999, but the shot I got of Richard Barbieri back stage setting up 2 synthesizers to replace the Prophet 5 that took a nasty spill, is, still, one of my favorite shots of all ... you know he is paying attention, and you know he cares, and is worried about its quality! On the same show, the set of pictures of Christian Vander nailing down his drum set prior to the show are also priceless, and then his tears at the end of the show during a standing ovation, are even better and I also took a shot of Stella looking at him, and looking very proud of it all ... and she is no less the massive presence that Magma is than he is! 
 
I would never trade those moments, for anything! It tells you more about the music, and the work they do, than anything else.
 
I had, once, hoped to do something similar with the CHB, unfortunately, the ideas and the thoughts were not to be. That's how it all works ... one minute it's there, the next it isn't. 
 
Folks I would like to photograph one day ... Mike Oldfield and Vangelis. Most of the pictures of them are not good shots showing their intensity and play at all! But this might be because they do not want the flash going off and distracting them, but I can tell you that Gong, had no such problems, and neither did many others!
 
In all instances, I have given the band a full set of 5x7's of the shots that came out. The Gong group picture, was used in a world tour of theirs, for over a year, even though Pip Pyle was no longer there, but having taken the picture of Pierre Moerlin on their next tour was just as valuable for me. Best drummer I have ever seen and heard.
 
Wanted to take pictures of Tangerine Dream, but was not allowed to. Same for Nektar. Same for Hawkwind. 
 
Funny thing ... some local bands I was thinking of doing, got so intimidated with the shots of Gong, that one member even said ... we can't play that good!
 
Go figure! It's about them, not me!

Your camera journey sounds very much like mine. I had that 35mm f2 Canon lens and it was a favourite. I also sold my film stuff consisting of a Nikon F2 and Canon EF. They were both great cameras but the Nikon was getting hard to maintain and as my income shrank I couldn't afford the film processing. Digital was an affordable way to go.
 
I now use the Canon t3i, also sold as the 600D. I'm just starting to use it for video work to produce some tech videos about tubes. I sold my Nikon D60 to buy the Canon and have to say I wish I'd done it sooner. That Canon is a real nice camera.

SteveStrummerUK, thank you for sharing. That is some good stuff! I would like to see more if you have some.

My only trick was to place a piece of frosted gel over the flash to soften the harshness of the xenon flash.

I was frightened to click on this fred for a long time in case it was close ups of plummy and john ! ;)