During my trip last weekend to Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens, I used a Nikon D7000 with a Tamron 180mm macro lens to take some shots while my fellow photographer, Cindy Dyer, relaxed in the shade on a hot, steamy day.
I use a Canon, so it was not immediately obvious to me where the controls were for various functions on the Nikon. I didn’t really have much time to poke around in the menus, so I just shot. I knew that the camera was set for aperture priority, but I didn’t realize until later that it was set at f/20. What that meant was that the two shots that I am posting here were shot at 1/100 and 1/80 of a second respectively. I am a little surprised that they came out relatively sharp, because the Tamron lens is pretty heavy and is not a VR lens.
The subject matter is pretty familiar for folks who follow my blog—a Cabbage White butterfly (Pieris rapae) and a Blue Dasher dragonfly (Pachydiplax longipennis). I like the way that both images turned out, with beautiful backgrounds.
Did the Nikon set-up make a difference? It was nice shooting with a camera with a bigger and brighter viewfinder than my Canon Rebel XT, but that is more a function of shooting with a much newer camera. What was especially nice, though, was shooting with a 180mm macro lens. The lens felt comfortable and gave sharp results, even if focusing was a bit slow when it had to move through the full range in autofocus mode.
I probably am not ready to go over to the dark side and embrace a Nikon—in my experience it seemed that the Nikon was different from my Canon, but not necessarily better. I may consider, however, the Tamron 180mm macro lens. I love my Canon 100mm macro lens, but sometimes it would be nice to have that little extra reach and still be able to get true macro results.
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Mike Powell 