Macro Park

We hit the dog park on Sunday...



I always bring the camera on these walks, to try and catch whatever bits of natural wonder or beauty we come across.



...big or small...



...sturdy or delicate.



...but this time, I came equipped with a new gadget in my growing bag of tricks; one which allows one to zoom in ever closer on the oft-overlooked, wild world of the miniscule...







Real macro (or micro) lenses can get pretty pricey, so I had to put off getting one in favor of a much cheaper, neat little cheat called a reversing ring. This adapter screws onto the front of a regular lens, and has a connector on it which allows you to reverse the lens body and screw it onto your camera backwards.

With the proper amount of light, and the risk of getting your nose stung; attaching a camera lens on backwards allows you to take very, very close up shots of, sayyy, bumble bees...



The reversing ring trick is really more suited for still life and tripod-mounted shots with plenty of added lighting. But on a bright sunny day, with the camera flash to assist, and a little bravado, you can get all up in a bug's grille...as it were.



...but one of the the caveats of the reversing ring cheat is that you have to physically get very close to the subject, and the only way to focus is to move the camera body back and forth, peering through the eye-peice until it looks sharp. So, you have to stick your face right in there, bobbing back and forth within a couple inches of that very active, possibly now annoyed, bumble bee.



But it's worth a swollen and infected eyeball to be able to get to see the moving parts, gears and levers of one of nature's most valuable creatures.



...close enough to be the bee, man.



...Or any of the other, less-risky specimins one might happen upon.



Look out flowers, bugs, and other hitherto living-under-the-radar critters...



...we'll be comin' to get ya'...