When you get home, check over the flowers for blemishes and other issues. I like to work with tulips, but you can really use anything! Go to your local grocery store, and purchase a bouquet of your favorite flowers. You have to work with what you’ve got.īut if you use this DIY macro photography hack, you can capture a gorgeous set of macro flower photos. Now, when you’re shooting in nature, you don’t have much control over this. …that’s when things start to look really compelling. If several flowers are overlapping, your photo may fall flat. The way that flowers are positioned can make a macro shot look amazing…or terrible. Shoot with one flower in a vase for powerful compositions I recommend increasing the whites, to give a slightly brighter, airier look. Once you have your shots, you’ll probably need to do a bit of post-processing. Instead, mount your camera on a tripod and use a narrow aperture (i.e., f/8 and above) to ensure perfect sharpness. While you can do everything handheld, I don’t recommend this, especially if your flowers are more three dimensional. I recommend shooting parallel to the lightbox from above. Then turn on the lightboard, and place your flowers on top of it. You want your flowers to have a soft, even look. You’ll want to work in a room that has only diffused ambient light. Flowers with translucent petals work best. Once you have your lightbox, you’ll need to choose a main subject. While a bigger lightbox is generally better, anything A4 and above should work fine. You can purchase one for around 20 dollars on Amazon. Have you ever wanted to capture macro photos that look bright and high-key? Maybe even transparent?Īll you need is a basic lightbox, often used by artists for tracing. Use a lightbox for a stunning high-key, transparent look Try it yourself! And watch as you capture amazing macro images. You can work some serious magic with just a board and some paint. But you’ll need to do a bit more work in post-processing to bring down the blacks. You can still make this work with diffused (i.e., cloudy) light. If you don’t fully achieve this in-camera, you can use an editing program to drop the blacks in your images. The goal is to lose absolutely all detail in the background. That is, you want a light subject on a dark board. You want to create as much contrast as possible between the board and your subject. Position your main subject so that it’s in the sun, with the black board in the shade, a foot or so behind it. You should choose a main subject that’s fairly light (e.g., yellow and white flowers). I’d recommend two coats of black paint for that ultra-dark look. Step 3: Add the primer and paint the board. The primer is to prevent the wood from tainting the color. I recommend getting a sample paint pot (one should be more than enough). I’d also go for a decent size: at least two feet on all sides. I’d suggest something ultra-thin (because wood can get heavy, fast). Step 1: Go to your local hardware store and purchase a plywood board. Because you can use it to create a deep black background in all of your macro photos. Which is why this DIY hack is so valuable. Now, achieving a natural black background in nature can be tough. One of my favorite backgrounds is a solid, uniform color:īlack backgrounds allow you to capture somber, moodier macro photography. Because the background is what makes your main subject stand out.

In macro photography, the background matters almost as much as your main subject. Use a board for a stunning macro photography background You’ll discover 5 DIY macro photography hacks which you can use for consistently gorgeous images. In this article, I’m going to show you exactly how you can capture amazing macro photos (without breaking the bank). This provides nice contrast to the ice.Do you want to take stunning macro photos… Look for compositions where the ground or fallen leaves are showing thru the ice.For the best results use your camera’s level to ensure your lens is square with the subject. Try a medium range telephoto lens mounted on a tripod. A macro lens isn’t necessarily the best choice for Ice Patterns.Ice Patterns are a lot of fun to photograph. Curved Lines in an Old Fallen LogĪlso look for curved lines in fallen logs where snow may have gathered – this provides additional visual interest and can be used as a leading line. This makes for great contrast in your image.

Look for places where snow has gathered in the tree bark. Try Black and White to give a different look and feel to your macro photography images. They make great subjects for winter macro photographs both on the tree and the ground. They add a big of color to the winter landscape. Beech leaves don’t fall off the tree during winter.

Macro photography ideas