Phone macro

[Old Crank]

In a previous post I had a couple of orchid pictures.

The macro is quite impressive. I remember a kodak book
that you would carry around to help with all sorts of photo questions.
Small enough to fit in a camera bag. It used to show various things
like depth of field flash exposures, estimates of exposure with lighting.

Anyway here are a couple of pictures with my phone's macro setting. First is indoors and the second in sunlight.

Scale is centimeters. Galaxy A21s,
Scale is right against the phone for 0.
You can see that is room light you have to get to about 3 cm of your target
and a little after 5 cm is the outside range. So 2 cm depth of field.
Second, 2.8 cm might be acceptable to 5+. So about 2.5 cm in full sun.
The lens or software seems to have some stopping down function.
The two flower pictures are with full sun and shade from the camera. Problem
with camera shade is keeping it out of the picture. And the reflection off the screen
makes it hard to see the scene and focus.

[GoneOffShore]

1. Impressive with a phone.

I have a Sigma 105mm Macro 2.8 that frustrates me beyond measure. Fine for telephoto, but using it as a macro, I have to set up a tripod. My friend gave it to me when we were doing a project together and I've used it about 5 times in 8 years.
It's a lovely lens, but useless to me.

[Old Crank]

2. I haven't

Really never tried macro with a 35mm.
Is the Sigma fixed focus at x inches?
Most of my experience was with 4X5. I could get better than 1-1
on the ground glass. But tripod and NO moving air at all. 2-4 sec0nd exposures
after that you needed to add filters for color shift correction and even longer exposure.
The good old days.
A bit of motion doesn't seem to bother the phone.

[GoneOffShore]

5. I will have to get back to you on the fixed focus thing.

The lens has been so frustrating to use that I've basically given up on it, even using my Canon 70D. Tried selling it, but haven't had any takers. I may try to trade it at my local camera shop, but I doubt that I'll get too much.

[George McGovern]

3. Very nice photos Old Crank. Your cell phone does great! They have amazing capabilities.

[usonian]

4. I found some info on phone cameras.

Almost all have fixed apertures.

And most perform very well as wide-angle mini-cameras.
A whole lot is done via software in the phone.
To much?
Have iPhone Cameras Become Too Smart?
Apple’s newest smartphone models use machine learning to make every image look professionally taken. That doesn’t mean the photos are good.
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/infinite-scroll/have-iphone-cameras-become-too-smart

Anyway, this article says that the Galaxy A21s has a 2MP macro camera with a fixed focus at 4cm distance.
https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_a21s-review-2142p5.php
The effect of aperture:
https://thesmartphonephotographer.com/smartphone-aperture/

A couple more reviews:
https://m.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_a21s-review-2142p5.php
https://www.gadgetbytenepal.com/samsung-galaxy-a21s-review/

The 2MP is disappointing.
And as an old-timer who did a lot of aperture/depth-of-field twiddling, I find it frustrating to have a single fixed "wide open" aperture (f-number)

Hope that helps.
Now for the history lesson!
My first 35mm. camera was a Nikkormat with a 55mm. Micro Nikkor lens, a great performer at all object distances.
I still use one on the new Nikon Z5 camera with the F-mount adapter.

As for the Sigma, a long(er) focal length is preferred, because short focus lenses mean you are on top of your object.
Technology has advanced. The 24-200mm. zoom doesn't even have a "macro" setting (typically, a "flower" icon if you have autofocus controls). It just delivers, which is very cool.

Since focusing is so very critical on macro photos, it is often better to shut off the autofocus and use manual focus mode.

With the extremely short focal lengths of phone cameras, you are bumping against subjects, and light gets blocked.

Using the LCD rear display on phones and point-and-shoot cameras is painful, and I am nearsighted, so I have to take off my glasses to even see the screen (this goes way beyond what bifocals can do)
The old Nikon F2 had/has a bright viewfinder, as does the new Z5.


No "regular" camera is fixed-focus that I know of.
Awesome that you have used a view camera. I need to take some 4x5's, but the gear is a bear to haul around.

Helps to have a great Woody Wagon, like Ansel Adams had.

He also used some hand-held cameras later on.
Shown here with Imogen Cunningham in the background.
?w=1000&ssl=1

For quite a while, I discarded the meter prisms on cameras --- or they broke --- and used the same light meters with all of them. For consistency.

And you can shoot cameras in manual mode without a light meter if you have a Master Photoguide, with the "daylight exposure dial"



No meter? Just shoot f/16 (EV15) at 1/film-speed seconds in full sun.

All that said, I carry the phone with me everywhere, but I also carry a Panasonic Lumix in my pocket for the 8X zoom and macro mode. Newer point and shoot cameras have wi-fi, so you don't even have to take out the SD card to share photos on computer or iphone/ipad via the lightning cable adapter.

Optics just says that a long lens won't fit in a phone (unless you fold the optics, which I think they are starting to do) and zoom just requires more parts than phone makers can fit in there.

TECH ASIDE (I was an optical engineer), JUST HAVE FUN.
MOTHER NATURE'S A MAD SCIENTIST (AND MAGNIFICENT ARTIST!)