# Olympus M.ZUIKO 60mm f/2.8 Macro Lens and Raynox 250



## davholla

I am thinking of going to Panasonic and using this combination.
However the thread of the 60mm lens is 46mm so how would I attach it to the Raynox 250?
Has anyone done this?  Any advice?


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## Overread

From what I can find the lens itself has a rear thread mount of 43mm. Typically you'd screw this into the adaptor and then mount the adaptor to the lens. However for your 46mm front thread you could use a stepping ring which would screw between the two, taking your front thread from 46 to 43 and thus letting you mount the Raynox direct.


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## DigiFilm

The Raynox 250 is a snap-on lens and fits 52-67mm as is. Stepping rings can be used for other sizes, but I believe you need to use their rings. Scroll down a bit in the link below and you'll see a selection with the model #'s, 46mm is included.

DCR-250 Super Macro conversion lens for D-SLR cameras, 4K and HDV Camcorders


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## BrentC

I snap to on to the lens hood of the 60mm.   This way I can remove it fast and easily.   But I also have a step down ring that I have used as well.


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> I snap to on to the lens hood of the 60mm.   This way I can remove it fast and easily.   But I also have a step down ring that I have used as well.


How did you do that?  Also how do you cover your lens?  Do you have a spare lens cap?


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## BrentC

The Raynox comes with a snap-on that will snap from 52-67mm.   You can either snap it on to the lens itself or in my case I use the hood.   The raynox comes with lens caps.   If I have it on the lens with the step down ring then I use the lens cap that comes with the Raynox.


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> The Raynox comes with a snap-on that will snap from 52-67mm.   You can either snap it on to the lens itself or in my case I use the hood.   The raynox comes with lens caps.   If I have it on the lens with the step down ring then I use the lens cap that comes with the Raynox.


I understand now what hood do you use?  Was that easy to attach to the hood?


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## DigiFilm

BrentC said:


> The Raynox comes with a snap-on that will snap from 52-67mm.   You can either snap it on to the lens itself or in my case I use the hood.   The raynox comes with lens caps.   If I have it on the lens with the step down ring then I use the lens cap that comes with the Raynox.



What kind of hood are you using that would clear the pushbuttons on the Raynox quick mount?


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## BrentC

I use the retractable hood specifically made for the lens.  I leave the hood retracted and just clip on the Raynox


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> I use the retractable hood specifically made for the lens.  I leave the hood retracted and just clip on the Raynox


Did that come with it or did you buy seperately?  Was this easily done?
I like the idea but I doubt I could do it.


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## DigiFilm

BrentC said:


> I use the retractable hood specifically made for the lens.  I leave the hood retracted and just clip on the Raynox



You're referring to the 60mm lens, not the Raynox, correct? Is this one of those rubber thread-on lens hoods?


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## BrentC

The lens hood is made for the lens.    It does screw on.   The hood is plastic and you can push it down or pull out.   Unfortunately the hood you have to buy separately.   There is a identical third party lens hood that I know others have used and is just as good.

https://www.amazon.ca/LH-J49-Profes...0mm+lens+hood&qid=1554231458&s=gateway&sr=8-1


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## davholla

Trying Panasonic GX8 with Olympus 60 mm so far the results are not good - more due to me I guess.

Neither of these were good (both the same fly)

Canon 550D




IMG_4086Conopidfly by davholla2002, on Flickr



Panasonic






ConopidflyPanasoniccropped by davholla2002, on Flickr



Same species but due to my mistake different individual

Panasonic




PanasonicLibethra strigiventris by davholla2002, on Flickr



Canon 550D






CanonLibethra strigiventris by davholla2002, on Flickr





Thinking I might send these back, any thoughts particularly on what settings to use?  I would say that this was the least enjoyable day I have had since I got my first decent photos in 2013.


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## Derrel

Looks like the gear is doing the job, but the shooter needs better technique and better lighting gear/methodology. True "macro" work (not close-up work, but true 'macro' work) is _very_ demanding, and requires impeccable technique and flawless understanding of multiple aspects of photography. I would stress understanding that, over the last 10 years, we have started seeing MANY "stacked" images (as opposed to pre-digital,or earl-digital-era single-frame images) which are NOT labelled as such, and quite possibly, you have fallen into the trap of mis-conceptualizing how "easy" it is to take single-frame Macro shots of live insects.


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## davholla

Derrel said:


> Looks like the gear is doing the job, but to shooter needs better technique and better lighting gear/methodology. True "macro" work (not close-up work, but true 'macro' work) is _very_ demanding, and requires impeccable technique and flawless understanding of multiple aspects of photography. I would stress understanding that, over the last 10 years, we have started seeing MANY "stacked" images which are NOT labelled as such, and quite possibly, you have fallen into the trap of mis-conceptualizing how "easy" it is to take single-frame Macro shots of live insects..


How would you suggest that I improve them?  Normally with my Canon lens I can get better than this



Hoverfly IMG_7703 by davholla2002, on Flickr

I would have expected to get equal with the Panasonic.


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## Derrel

davholla said:


> Derrel said:
> 
> 
> 
> Looks like the gear is doing the job, but to shooter needs better technique and better lighting gear/methodology. True "macro" work (not close-up work, but true 'macro' work) is _very_ demanding, and requires impeccable technique and flawless understanding of multiple aspects of photography. I would stress understanding that, over the last 10 years, we have started seeing MANY "stacked" images which are NOT labelled as such, and quite possibly, you have fallen into the trap of mis-conceptualizing how "easy" it is to take single-frame Macro shots of live insects..
> 
> 
> 
> How would you suggest that I improve them?  Normally with my Canon lens I can get better than this
> 
> 
> 
> Hoverfly IMG_7703 by davholla2002, on Flickr
> 
> I would have expected to get equal with the Panasonic.
Click to expand...


Research, education, practice, and time...

Look at this video,and how SHALLOW DOF is used,creatively...plus, how the majority of the images were made with a small flash connected via a pigtail cord...a relatively standard set-up these days for high-magnification work.


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## Derrel

I am now on my phone using speech to text. The first really high magnification super detailed medical files I ever saw that weren't as good as many of today's digital files we're done with the hybrid method, which was to take a close up using Kodachrome 25 in a flash   Unit from 1 to 2 feet away, and two then take a high magnification close-up of the slide. I first saw these photos in 1990 or 91 in amazing close of detail of insects and other macro subjects. 

      At the time, the photos were absolutely staggering. This was about two years before Photoshop was invented and released to the public, and the photos were probably 10 years old at the time of first publication. 

     The difficulty with the 55 or 60 mm macro lens, is that it is inherently relatively low magnification, and does not provide a highly magnified image no matter what distance it is from the subject. This is why longer macro lenses such as 90 mm 105 mm 180200 mm lenses,I have been made by several manufacturers over the years. For bugs my favorite used to be the sigma 180 mm APO F/3.65 HSM macro,which gve a 1:1 life(-size image at 18 inches from the focal plane to the subject


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## Derrel

In a nutshell, my advice would be this; practice, practice, practice. For example, you need to be able to utilize extremely small amounts of depth of field. For example,  at high magnification's, the depth of field is less than 1 mm, so even the body of a fly, will not totally be in focus. The trick is to find something that is interesting, and which may be shown in  A very limited amount of in focus picture area. Because the back of the camera is not parallel to the entire subject, either the back or the front of the focused area will be out of focus. One of the secret is to approach the subject so that the back of the camera is parallel to the greatest part of the subject. Your second fly photo above is a good example of the subject and the depth of field not being in harmony. In the video I linked to, Notice the green beetle; while only its head and antennae are in the plane of   Sharp focus, and the carapace of the insect is mostly well behind the point of sharpest focus, it is still an interesting and compelling photo. This is a good example of utilizing  very limited depth of field any creative manner. The whole area of high magnification macro is plagued by very shallow depth of field, and as I mentioned in my first post to you people have found a technological way around this, in both the Fillm era, and in the digital era.there is also a creative/artistic way around limited depth of field. Without a swinging front standard, any fixed body camera  gives the photographer only a certain amount of depth of field. Stopping the lens down to F 16 or F 22 or F 32 makes for a deeper depth of field, but without any weight to tilt the front standard i.e. the lens, there is only so much one can do in a single exposure.

     I was being totally sincere above, when I suggested more research, education, and practice.


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## BrentC

Before you give up take a look at this thread to see what kind of results you can get.   Also this might be a better place to ask your questions regarding that combo.   But you should have no issue getting stellar results from that combo.

Showcase - Olympus 60mm f/2.8 Macro


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> Before you give up take a look at this thread to see what kind of results you can get.   Also this might be a better place to ask your questions regarding that combo.   But you should have no issue getting stellar results from that combo.
> 
> Showcase - Olympus 60mm f/2.8 Macro




Thanks for that, I have asked there.  I don't just want good results, I want to see if I can get better than with my existing

So far not really any better.
Here aremore  two examples.
Canon, ok reasonable detail, single shot minimal editing



DaresCanon by davholla2002, on Flickr

Panasonic, not very good, post focus about 20 images (I think).




DaresPanasonic-1 by davholla2002, on Flickr

I think the problem is not the gear but the relative experience, now as I could send this back for the next few days I would like to get better to make it worth while

Any advice?


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## BrentC

First I would suggest take shots without the focus stacking.   See if you can get a good single shot.   How is your flash setup with the panasonic?


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## BrentC

Also tell me what setting you are using


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## Derrel

Yeah, I see that you get better results using the Cannon vs. the Panasonic. Is it a matter of viewfinder size and clarity? Or familiarity with the gear? How long have you owned each camera? How much have you shot each?


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> First I would suggest take shots without the focus stacking.   See if you can get a good single shot.   How is your flash setup with the panasonic?


Good idea, I haven't got a flash for it yet.


BrentC said:


> Also tell me what setting you are using


Looking at what other people had used, I was using aperture setting and 4.0.



Derrel said:


> Yeah, I see that you get better results using the Cannon vs. the Panasonic. Is it a matter of viewfinder size and clarity? Or familiarity with the gear? How long have you owned each camera? How much have you shot each?


Cannon years, thousands of keepers.  Panasonic 3 days and 1 keeper (if that).
It is definetly familiarity and because I am trying to do something different - use something that doesn't exist in Canon.


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## BrentC

I think light is your biggest issue.   Try single shot with flash first and get comfortable with that with the new gear.   Then go to focus stacking.   I am not sure about the Panasonic but I can use flash with my focus stacking on Olympus.

Also did you use the Raynox on this shot?   I would not have bothered.  That looks to be a decent sized insect.    Also try focus stacking without the Raynox first.

Also looks like a few of the frames were left out from the stack.   Possibly they couldn't be aligned.   I use focus bracketing more often and let PS or something else stack the frames.   But even when I use focus stacking I tend to grab the frames and use PS.  I turns out better than the in camera stacking.


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## waday

BrentC said:


> get comfortable with that with the new gear


Brent and Derrel provided great responses, and I don't have anything to add, except with the quoted section here. This is really important, especially when you're trying to get similar results from a camera that you've only known for days compared to a camera you've become extremely accustomed to using.

When I switched from Canon to Olympus, relearning the camera/menu/etc was a lot and it took several months for me to get used to it. In fact, it took me 15 minutes after I opened the box for me to figure out why the camera wasn't using autofocus and was stuck in manual focus. My first thoughts were that the camera was broken, until I realized there was a MF clutch on the lens.

Jeez, that was embarrassing; thankfully only the internet knows about it now. LOL


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## davholla

waday said:


> BrentC said:
> 
> 
> 
> get comfortable with that with the new gear
> 
> 
> 
> Brent and Derrel provided great responses, and I don't have anything to add, except with the quoted section here. This is really important, especially when you're trying to get similar results from a camera that you've only known for days compared to a camera you've become extremely accustomed to using.
> 
> When I switched from Canon to Olympus, relearning the camera/menu/etc was a lot and it took several months for me to get used to it. In fact, it took me 15 minutes after I opened the box for me to figure out why the camera wasn't using autofocus and was stuck in manual focus. My first thoughts were that the camera was broken, until I realized there was a MF clutch on the lens.
> 
> Jeez, that was embarrassing; thankfully only the internet knows about it now. LOL
Click to expand...

Why did you switch?  Apparently Panasonic is meant to be more user friendly than Olympus.


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## BrentC

Take a look at this guys photos.  He has same combination as you.

Panasonic Post-Focus Stack

Springschwänze (Springtail) Collembola


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## waday

davholla said:


> waday said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> BrentC said:
> 
> 
> 
> get comfortable with that with the new gear
> 
> 
> 
> Brent and Derrel provided great responses, and I don't have anything to add, except with the quoted section here. This is really important, especially when you're trying to get similar results from a camera that you've only known for days compared to a camera you've become extremely accustomed to using.
> 
> When I switched from Canon to Olympus, relearning the camera/menu/etc was a lot and it took several months for me to get used to it. In fact, it took me 15 minutes after I opened the box for me to figure out why the camera wasn't using autofocus and was stuck in manual focus. My first thoughts were that the camera was broken, until I realized there was a MF clutch on the lens.
> 
> Jeez, that was embarrassing; thankfully only the internet knows about it now. LOL
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> Why did you switch?  Apparently Panasonic is meant to be more user friendly than Olympus.
Click to expand...

Various reasons, including cost, size, and better features. Going for the EM1, I have a camera that is weather resistant and pretty darn tough. I have a 12-40 f2.8 pro lens that’s the same size of a Canon 18-55 f/variable, yet is much higher quality. The lens selection is great, and I can pocket most of my lenses.

I tried both Olympus and Panasonic (and several others), but the Olympus felt the best in my hands.


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## davholla

BrentC said:


> Take a look at this guys photos.  He has same combination as you.
> 
> Panasonic Post-Focus Stack
> 
> Springschwänze (Springtail) Collembola


I have, I asked him for advice but I didn't hear back.


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## davholla

I didn't have much time tonight and I realized that my mobile phone light is not a good source.  I am beginning to think that this is not the best buy ever, I will try a bit more and see if I should keep them or not.  First one with Canon second with Panasonic - not a real benefit even if you ignore the light.
I think the main problem is that I need to do free hand photos and this for me so far doesn't work like well - and I was leaning on something doing these





CanonTry. by davholla2002, on Flickr





panasonictry1-1 by davholla2002, on Flickr


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## Derrel

About equally good,  except for the yellowish WB in the Panasonic shot.


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## BrentC

If you wanted freehand you should have picked Olympus.   I do all my macro freehand


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## BrentC

And yes your white balance is way off


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## waday

It sounds like you just don’t like the camera, or you’re used to Canon and don’t want to change. Why not return your camera and buy a Canon that’ll work for you?


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## davholla

waday said:


> It sounds like you just don’t like the camera, or you’re used to Canon and don’t want to change. Why not return your camera and buy a Canon that’ll work for you?


It is a bit more complicated than that.  I thought that I could get better with the post focus feature than I can with Canon, I am now trying to find out if this is correct or not.  
The reasons for posting are two fold
1) I would like advice
2) No one else has compared Canon with Panasonic and although this is not a perfect comparison (Ideally I would have more time and a Panasonic expert beside me etc).  I thought that it might be useful.  In a perfect world lots of people would be interested in Macro and I would talk about this with my work colleagues, friends at church etc.  Sadly we don't live in such a world (well I don't other people might have conversations at work about what they have photographed over the weekend).

One complication is that we all have slightly different requirements when it comes to Macro shooting, mine are particularly unique because I visit Colombia often and I can't use tripods there because of various reasons.


Here are some more tests if anyone is interested.

Canon



MacleayIMG_4228 by davholla2002, on Flickr
Panasonic



Macleay1Panasonic-1 by davholla2002, on Flickr

My conclusion is that for my conditions and skill there is no benefit to moving to Panasonic, unless someone says to me something like "No you should do x and it will give really really sharp photos"

There are more here but I won't add to avoid boring people.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/14586608@N08/albums/72157708001501064


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## waday

davholla said:


> waday said:
> 
> 
> 
> It sounds like you just don’t like the camera, or you’re used to Canon and don’t want to change. Why not return your camera and buy a Canon that’ll work for you?
> 
> 
> 
> It is a bit more complicated than that.  I thought that I could get better with the post focus feature than I can with Canon, I am now trying to find out if this is correct or not.
> The reasons for posting are two fold
> 1) I would like advice
> 2) No one else has compared Canon with Panasonic and although this is not a perfect comparison (Ideally I would have more time and a Panasonic expert beside me etc).  I thought that it might be useful.  In a perfect world lots of people would be interested in Macro and I would talk about this with my work colleagues, friends at church etc.  Sadly we don't live in such a world (well I don't other people might have conversations at work about what they have photographed over the weekend).
> 
> One complication is that we all have slightly different requirements when it comes to Macro shooting, mine are particularly unique because I visit Colombia often and I can't use tripods there because of various reasons.
> 
> 
> Here are some more tests if anyone is interested.
> 
> Canon
> 
> 
> 
> MacleayIMG_4228 by davholla2002, on Flickr
> Panasonic
> 
> 
> 
> Macleay1Panasonic-1 by davholla2002, on Flickr
> 
> My conclusion is that for my conditions and skill there is no benefit to moving to Panasonic, unless someone says to me something like "No you should do x and it will give really really sharp photos"
> 
> There are more here but I won't add to avoid boring people.
> https://www.flickr.com/photos/14586608@N08/albums/72157708001501064
Click to expand...

It sounds like the post focus feature can be used handheld, but I've read that the feature is also severely limited to static features. So, if the camera or subject (like the insects, which are really cool by the way) move in any way, you're not going to get good photos. One thing I've noticed in some of your shots is that you'll have areas that are out of focus when they probably shouldn't be. My question would be to figure out why this is happening? Is the camera moving? Are you trying to stack images that shouldn't be stacked? And, why do you need to stack photos of such large insects? The m43 sensor should provide sufficient DOF that you may not have to stack...

There used to be a person on here that did amazing insect and reptile shots, but I haven't seen him on here in a few years. Do a search for some of his threads. His username is/was @orionmystery. I think he's still active on Flickr, so you could try him there for some advice on photographing insects.


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