Great. You’ve got your lens. What’s next? Well … I’d say frustration and satisfaction. I must qualify that in the next few paragraphs, what I’m discussing is mostly in the context of insects and mushrooms, two of my fav subjects.
My personal preference is to shoot insects because I find them so fascinating, and so challenging to shoot. Tiny mushrooms and moulds are also very interesting. I do my shooting at whichever place I go to. I do not use set-ups – meaning I don’t bring my subjects home and shoot them in an artificial environment. I used to do that with wild flowers during Covid-19 Phase 1 but I stopped doing it as I felt it wasn’t right and it wasn’t natural. I also try not to destroy any part of nature when taking photographs. Eg I see some photographers break branches and leaves with insects on it for their macro shots – I think that is unethical.
Blurry Photos – Causes and possible solutions
When I started out, it was very frustrating because 99.5% of my photos were all blur. You’ll probably face the same frustrations initially. But not to worry, with practice you’ll get better and then the % of blur photos will be less. Never perfect, just better!
Photos are blur for many reasons eg shaky hands, focusing and poor light conditions. Or if your lens quality is not good – this one nothing can help – you’ll need to get better lens. Wind is something we cannot control so no choice, you need to wait for the wind to die down. Here are some ways I deal with blur photos.
Take many photos
You’ll need to take many many photos to get one right
The thing is that for every situation, you’ll need to take many shots, 20, 30 … even 50 if you’re patient enough. Or if your subject is patient enough. And then pray like hell, or pray to heaven that a few will turn out ok. Now multiply that with a morning walk in the park, and you’ll have hundreds of photos to look through at the end of your walk. So you need to decide how many photos you want to deal with at the end of your photo-taking trip.
For me, I take about 10-20 shots each time. If it’s a very interesting subject, I’ll take more. With this, I walk the middle line – not too many photos to overwhelm me with hours of sorting out the clear from the blur, and not too few that I have to discard the whole lot because none turns out ok. And remember that there’s still some post-processing (aka touching up) to do after you’ve picked out the acceptable ones. This is the subject of the next post.
Get up close to the subject
I find that the nature of the mobile macro lens is such that one needs to get very close to the subject (esp the small insects) in order to get the focus right and to have enough details covered in the shot. But it’s so much easier said than done. I have to move very very slowly and deliberately when I spot my subject. Worse if I have to bend down or squat down. And then hope and pray it won’t scuttle off or fly away. Takes a lot of sweat and patience but if you keep at it, eventually you’ll be able to get in a few shots. I used to wonder how macro photographers shoot dragonflies and spiders. When I finally found the courage to try, I did manage to get a few decent shots. But you’ll have to put up with some strange stares at times … lol!
Improvise or buy a proper grip for your phone
Please remember that you need to remove the phone cover before you clip on your lens as the lens is made to work with only your phone camera and nothing in-between. But after removing the phone cover, I find that my S8 becomes too small and slim to hold comfortably, especially when taking many shots. I’m also afraid of dropping it – no protective covers means “habis” ie “finished” if the phone drops. What I did was to make it easier to hold my phone. I used a damaged car phone holder, and I double-secured my phone to it with a rubber hair band. It really made a difference.
Make an improvised grip
Buy a proper grip
I remembered there was a gadget on AliExpress that can hold a phone properly when you want to use it as a camera. After some search, I found a few in fact. I did a post just on commercial mobile phone camera grips. Please refer to this post for more information.
Shaky hands
Try to rest your hand on something solid
Because our hands are shaking all the time, try, where possible, to rest your hands or your phone on something solid like a tree trunk or a branch or even the ground. Use both hands to hold your phone (with the CapGrip, one-hand holding is still ok when necessary). I use the first 3 fingers of both hands to hold my phone and the last 2 to rest on anything stable whenever possible.
Use a phone monopod or tripod
Some have proposed using a monopod/tripod to take clearer photos with the mobile phone. That’s another way to lessen the shaky hands/blurry photo problem. For me, I find it to be impractical as my insects are found high and low and in-between. And insects never stay still. By the time I set my tripod, they would be long gone. But it might be good for stationery subjects like flowers.
Shoot at different angles and positions
I am long-sighted. So I can’t see the photos on my phone very clearly. There’s also the problem of reflection of the glass that interferes with what I am seeing. So I usually take a few shots at a certain angle/position – hoping that one would turn out clear and assuming focus is right. Then I shift slightly and take another few shots. And again. Why? Because of the phone’s auto-focus. At the wrong angle, the phone’s auto-focus will focus on the wrong thing … and the subject will be out of focus. Result – blurry photo. All too often, it looks like I got it right on the phone only to discover I did not when I view on my monitor. Practice never makes perfect … it only reduces the number of blurry photos! Lol!!
Some have recommended using the manual focus of the phone’s camera and not the auto-focus. I have not reached that stage of complexity yet. Perhaps one day I just might. Then I can share with you more about manual focus.
Lighting and light conditions
Cannot use phone flash for mobile macro-photography
For my S8, I can’t use the flash because the macro lens blocks the flash. So what I do in times of desperation is to use my torch. But using the torch, especially a strong one, will light up the subject very harshly. That doesn’t make a very nice photo. But better that than all blurry photos, right? It’s also not easy to hold a torch and take a photo at the same time.
Lighting plays a big part in eliminating blurry photos. So I try to go out to the parks in the mornings and afternoons when there is more sunlight. No choice – that’s the limitation of using a phone for macro-photography. Unlike using a pro-camera, where you can have all kinds of lighting options. But the good thing is that everything is natural – the natural setting, the natural light and the insect in the wild. I prefer it that way.
Testing a selfie light
I did try a lighting option that ended up badly. After looking around AliExpress for all possible options, I settled for this as a possible lighting source. Not cheap. The price includes a 20x macro lens and a wide-angle lens. Unfortunately, the battery didn’t work and I couldn’t charge the light. Still sorting this problem out and will update when it’s done.
That’s about all that I do to try and reduce the number of blurry photos. I hope I’ve given you some ideas on how to deal with this problem.