Anyone else into macro/abstract photography ?

This poor little fella appeared on my patio one day...

Taken with the 40 quid Mustek microscope, but it's kinda O.K. Natural light always helps.

This poor little fella appeared on my patio one day...

Taken with the 40 quid Mustek microscope, but it's kinda O.K. Natural light always helps.

I've never gone down the microscope route, interesting.  I like the shot, composition/framing, I think more lighting would bring out the detail a bit more, the focal plane is in there judging by the foreground & background, perhaps the microscope can't quite grab enough detail, not sure as never used one.

I started by doing hand held single shots with a magnifying glass taped to the end of the hood of a normal lens, then got hold of a macro lens.  without a doubt, the best results come from multiple shots, stacked together.  This means moving the camera setup through a horizontal plane, might only be a millimetre in total, but a hundred increments & a shot each time, then stack the hundred shots together.

I first platform for moving the camera was a ceramic tile cutter.  I bolted the camera to the assembly that slides on the 2 rails, which gave me a fairly steady horizontal movement, still had to move manually by slightly nudging it with my finger, but it worked, I then made my own sliding platform with a micrometre attached for better control.

I you fancy having a go with stacking, sliding platform etc I'll assist if I can, I'm far from an expert but I experiment & persevere, keeps me out of mischief.