Macrophotos are blurry: How to fix?

[Hummingbird]

I recently came across an article of a scientific photographer who magnified the image of sand up to 300x which revealed beauty unimaginable to the naked human eye. Who knew that sand was an assortment of very diverse sorts of colors and crystals! It inspired me to try to attempt macrophotography with my Sonya6000 + kit lens.

I've heard my camera isn't the best at macrophotography but I figured I would give it a go because it is what I have. But my biggest concern is that there is an overall blur. When I zoom into my image, the details of all the nooks and crannies are just not as sharp as I would like them to be. From what I've seen from macrophotography the details are quite important. I was wondering if this would be the fault of my own settings or my shaky hands or if this would be the limitation of my camera? 

1/10 F5.6 ISO 100 

 

 

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Edited July 15, 2019 by Hummingbird

[Thad E Ginathom]

Isn't a limitation of depth of field?

Not that I'm experienced: I've done occasional experiments with the a6000, kit lens, and extension tubes, snapping flowers, and things out of the desk drawer like bolts. If you focus on a bolt there won't be many threads that are sharp, but among those that are, you can find tiny hairs and dust specs.

Macro is one of those things I've always meant to do more of and is in the big getting-around-to-it queue, which can remain stationary for years sometimes --- but a set of extension tubes, even with e-mount contacts, so you don't loose camera control and function, is a nice intro point that doesn't cost much and is not hard to use.

[LiveShots]

Did you turn on the shutter delay to stop the camera moving when you pressed the button?

[Hummingbird]

3 hours ago, LiveShots said:

Did you turn on the shutter delay to stop the camera moving when you pressed the button?

Would this be the self-timer or drive feature on my camera? I had it set to single shot. The shortest timer is at 2 seconds, would that improve the blur?

[LiveShots]

If the blur is caused by pressing the button then it may help. It just delays by 2 seconds

https://helpguide.sony.net/gbmig/45349331/v1/en/contents/TP0000508226.html?search=Delay

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[Hummingbird]

6 hours ago, Thad E Ginathom said:

 but a set of extension tubes, even with e-mount contacts, so you don't loose camera control and function, is a nice intro point that doesn't cost much and is not hard to use.

I am hoping to try extension tubes next! At the moment, I can’t spend money. I was hoping to make one with a pringles can.. if i’m craftsy enough. ha 

[Chrissie]

If you want to overcome the limits of depth of view, you'll have to employ a technique called focus stacking. Basically taking a series of images from the same fixed position, with slight variations in the plane of best focus in between them. Then you will have to do some image processing, combining the areas of sharpness from each of the images, using specialized (and often proprietary) software.

You may want to read this for more info.

 

[Normski4ash]

With a shutter speed of 1/10th of a second hand held you are asking for blurry images !

If you haven't got a tripod sit the camera on something, if indoors on a table, use the 2 second timer so the camera has time to settle down after the movement of the shutter button, or better still use a remote shutter so you aren't physically touching the camera. Again if indoors turn all the lights on, shine a torch  at your subject or use a flash. If need be increase the iso to acquire a faster shutter speed, minimum 1/100th though 1/160th is better.

[Thad E Ginathom]

Yes, a two-second delay does help.

My phone has an IR transmitter. it works well with a simple app as a remote release: no touch, no vibration. My last macro was (an attempt, it didn't go well) some bagworms in the house. The camera had to be cantilevered out from the tripod. Very shaky. That didn't spoil my pics, because of the remote, but I couldn't get the exposure right.

Maybe I should stick to bolts!

My extension tubes came from China. Including contacts. They did not cost much, but they do work. So would a Pringles tube, I guess... Fully manual and no power zoom ?

[Normski4ash]

Are you shooting AV or TV ? I always shoot manual but it shouldn't really matter. Set ISO to 100, shutter to 1/100th & aperture to suit these two. Try working on say a flower in a vase on the table, something easy whilst you experiment & perfect the technique before moving on to more challenging tasks.

I use the cheap Ext tubes from wherever, & they work fine, the pringles tube idea is for people to play with if they have no extension tubes, see if they like the concept of macro before buying ext tubes. The trick is getting the exposure correct, if you are using tripod and either wired or IR trigger there will be no shake from the camera, plus if it is a static subject the shutter speed doesn't matter either. I use Canon 7D with Sigma 150mm macro lens. Neewer ext tubes and a yongnuo YN14EX TTL macro ring light. Slhutter is 1/160th aperture is set to F5.6 as a minimum but F8 or even F11 trying to get better depth of field & let the flashes ttl capabilities give me the light. I now shoot with Sony A7 series cameras for everything else, but still use the canon for my macro as I have all the gear for it.

https://insectmacro.wixsite.com/macro