Hi Hans:
<< I would think the rule of focal length and lowest shutter speed for
hand holding does not apply for macro lenses when their magnification is
equal. Iow when both lenses are set at 1:2 the shorter focal length of
the 50mm lens no longer gives you any advantage in shutter speed
tolerance. >>
Perhaps you are right here - I never thought of it. But, the background
bokeh is much futher away, thus a different subject magnification, ah?
Camera movement will kill nice bokeh if it is combined with streaking
from camera movement. How odd to be speaking of "blurry bokeh" - but
it's real and something I was always aware of in nature photography.
Even before I knew what to name it.
With either lens, the X-sync speed of 1/60th makes it more difficult
than it should be in eliminating ghost images in flash pictures. Outdoor
flash shots, for example of flowers, are barely stronger than the
ambient light. In open habitats, I always had to use a slowish film, an
ND filter or diffuser on the T32 and an aperture between f/11 and f/22
to do my synchro sunlight technique of having the flash 1 to 2 stops
stronger than the ambient light. Shoot something in open shade and it
required 1/30th sync speed to keep the background from going black. I
always felt more comfortable with a 50mm macro lens in these situations.
Why use flash, some might ask? You can control modeling, get some degree
of arresting subject movement, increase subject contrast and apparent
sharpness and highlight subjects against their background. The trick
isn't to overpower the subject with flash illumination. Let the ambient
light fill in the shadows.
As an aside, when I upgraded from a 50mm f/3.5 to a 50mm f/2, I found a
lot more keepers among my plant pictures. I think it was because I
didn't have f/22 on the f/2 macro and that macro had better bokeh. f/22
on the f/3.5 macro is a rather cruddy aperture for high defination macro
photography and I was using it too much.
Gary Reese
Las Vegas, NV
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