Field notes on photographing water, first light, and very small things.
Grass, 05:40, 100mmSpider silk after rainBacklit, wide open
Getting close without a macro lens
An extension tube costs almost nothing and buys most of the way there. The catch is light: every millimetre of extension eats it. I shoot these at f/4 and accept that the plane of focus is a few grains wide — the drop is sharp, everything behind it dissolves. That dissolution is usually the photograph.
Why first light and not sunrise
Dew is gone within twenty minutes of direct sun. The window that matters starts before the sun clears the horizon, when the light is flat and cold and the drops still hold their shape. I have learned to be set up in the dark and to accept that half the frames will be too dim to keep.