Back in the 60's & 70's when I was a small boy we led a different lifestyle to most kids these days, when I was four we moved from our maisonette above The Broadway a busy high street in Loughton Essex to Stevenage a new town in Hertfordshire.
We were surrounded by wildlife, the road I lived in backed onto farmland there was a sizable area of woodland a few hundred feet from my door & even bigger areas a short bike ride away.
In those days we were free to roam the woods, park & countryside at will because the fear of letting your kids out of sight had not crept into every facet of parents lives so my friends & I would spend most of our free time doing just that.
because the school I attended also backed onto the same farm & woodland it wasn't unusual to see foxes & deer in the school fields, squirrels & hedgehogs made their homes in our gardens, bats would flit around over our gardens, at night owls could be heard when I went to bed & I would be woken at the crack of dawn by birdsong & the distant sound of cockerels in the farm.
It sounds idyllic I know & could easily be put down to my viewing my childhood through rose tinted glasses but I still know many of the people who I grew up with that road & their memories are the same as mine.
My favourite TV programmes were presented by people like David Attenborough, David Bellamy & Jacques Cousteau, the stars were the animals & I always wished I could take pictures like the guys who got to travel the world shooting footage for these wildlife shows, my dad presented me with a Kodak Instamatic camera when I was 8 or 9 & I saved for months to buy an Olympus Trip at the age of about 13 but they really were not able to do what I wanted; you see I wanted to get right up close........
I wanted to get the pictures of what proportionally are the most dangerous animals going, insects’ spiders, & all manner of creepy crawlies & bugs.
Even later in life when I could afford the equipment I was far too busy to get out into the country & get the shots I wanted so it kind of got left behind.
Until that is about nine years ago; I was in a charity shop near my home & found an interesting little bit of kit in a small leather case, the asking price was the princely sum of £1.50 so I just had to buy it.
It was a Peak scale loupe & as soon as I saw it I knew I could do something very interesting with it.
What you will need:-
A digital camera with a retractable lens.
A scale loupe, I got mine in a charity shop but they are readily available on ebay for a few pounds.
A plastic tube, I used the middle from a roll of sticky tape.
A 35mm film canister cap or somethng similar.
Insulating tape.
A glue suitable for use on plastic.
Duct tape.
The list above will almost certainly be different for other cameras but the basic concept remains the same, get the loupe on the front of the camera lens.
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We had some fun taking pictures in the garden of the spiders & bugs during that summer & then the loupe in its little leather case sat on my desk. I used it occasionally but never for pictures when the camera was replaced with a different model it that didn't fit so well.
Until this summer that is....
We gave up our pub last year & moved back to my better half Joanie’s home not far from where I grew up, the garden isn't large but it faces east to west so it gets sun from early morning until well into the evening we have a large area of allotments at the end of the property so we are slowly encouraging the wildlife back into the garden.
I also bought a second-hand Kodak CX7530 a few months ago & it occurred to me that I still had my loupe in its little leather case.
I had surgery on my shoulder in March so anything more than light gardening duties have been out of the question so I have spent a good amount of time camera in hand trying to get some good shots of the smallest wildlife that made its home in our garden.
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I had hoped to do some digital video last spring using a similar setup but the camera I acquired for the project developed a terminal fault so I put it on hold until I find something suitable, I may see what I can find over the next couple of months ready for the coming spring.
Certainly shows that there's a lot of potential in everyday digital cameras and you don't need the latest and greatest and all the expensive add-ons to get interesting shots.
I have no complaints; I got a section feature, my first front page feature, got onto the popular page & into a newsletter so I did get a year & three months of pro membership & a patch on my profile which is more than I expected when I entered :-)
Also we all picked up some great ideas for future projects from the other entries & that's what it's all about after all.
Congrats again.
You made the Final list... good for you :)
Wishing you all the best :)
Just a few weeks ago, I was telling my husband... I wish I could take pictures through my digi-cam with a loupe (magnifier) to get things even close, and there you have it. you made it :)))
Thanks for sharing, and I will certainly give it a try.
I must say, I'm not crazy about spiders, and I have one on my deck just like yours in Step 1, middle picture. Arggggg, they give me shivers!!!!!
I must admit when I looked at some of your pictures I thought maybe a loupe like mine would interest you, with your eye for framing a shot you should get some great results.
I must say I have really enjoyed viewing the entries to this contest, I have collected so many good ideas I should be out of Nostalgic Girls hair well into next spring ;-)
I for one enjoy reading about the development of an idea & the things that brought it about as much as I do the actual making process.
I am sorry if you don't like that particular style but I make no apology for using it as it is my personal preference.
Hope you enjoyed the pictures though :-)
There is a description of how I made the connector in step 2; it would be entirely pointless to do an in-depth instruction set as different cameras with different lenses would need different methods & materials.
As for how it works I described how I pre focus the loupe on the camera & then allow the autofocus to do its work in step 3.
I for one like to read the "full story" and marvel at how ingenious some people are, how they use small means to do what then want/need as a contrast to the ones who just go out and buy a lot of expensive stuff and then re-combines them into something else.
Some of the 'ibles I have read by contributers from Africa and South America are just amazing. With almost no tools or machinery and very limited access to materials they manage to create functional and often much needed thing-a-ma-jigs (did I spell that right ;-).
Keep up taking your pictures and write the way you like, you can never satisfy all in a place like this.
Best regards,
Jim
I too am constantly amazed by the ingenuity of people; it often seems that those with the least to use but the greatest need can achieve the most impressive results.
Some are really nice.
Excellent tutorial btw.
Glad you enjoyed my 'ible.
I read your instructable and I was lost in my childhood memory lane.
Certainly, life had a different pace back then and it was sweet and chasing bugs was fun.
kudos to you for bringing those memories back to life and good luck with photography.
I have tried my stint with cellphone camera and CD player lens and did get some very close shots.
I remember a few years ago when I was working in technical support I was able to work from home a great deal, my two middle sons had what I will always call their Just William summer, they built camps in the woods caught fish & newts in the local streams & ponds got very dirty & generally had a great time doing the things kids did all the time before games consoles & technology took over their lives.
They both remember that summer as one of the best they ever had.
Nostalgic Girl & I have been chatting about other lenses I can experiment with over the last few days.
She works for our local women’s resource centre which has a charity shop attached to it so she is going to keep an eye out for binoculars & telescopes for me as well as a more powerful loupe.
I had hoped a few days ago they had a microscope so I could try some of Arpruss's techniques, unfortunately it was faulty but I am in no hurry, I am sure that an interesting lens of some sort will turn up soon enough & I will be back tinkering in the workshop & out of her hair for a few days ;-
Thanks for your tips!
I like your sticks, they remind me of a summer I spent about 35 years ago when I was a scout , a friend & I made hiking sticks which a friend of his dad then sold for us on his market stall to raise money for our summer camp.... Happy days :-)
All I need now is a decent quality printer so I can frame a few around the house so please don't forget my little friends when the voting starts :-)
Who wouldn't like a nice BIG spider print for their bathroom? ;-)
Nice Ible thnks 4 share.
I have had a few comments from family & friends about the number of spider shots.
In the spring I'm hoping to attract a bit more variety into the garden so a bit more colour in future :-)
Remember my creepy siders when you vote ;-)
At the end of the day with an autofocus camera the loupe will simply do the same job as it does when you put it up to your eye, the difficult part is getting the shot you are after.
My camera has 8x optical & 3x digital zoom & has a handy indicator on the backscreen, I have found that if I preset the camera to full optical zoom it eliminates any vignetting that may otherwise be caused by the loupe I did use one in this 'ible which shows the vignetting clearly, it is the second picture on step 3 where the bottom right hand corner is shadowed, in fact if you look carefully you can see the black rim at the bottom of the loupe.
I wouldn't usually have used this shot but it was the first one I ever got of a spider drawing silk from its spinneret so I just had to :-)
As I said in the 'ible it is all about practice & accepting the fact that not every shot will be a masterpiece, I think I used 25 or 30 pictures in this 'ible to get those I probably took a hundred or more.
As long as you have a decent quality loupe with clean lenses & a bit of patience you should be able to get the same results if not better.
One little warning for ebay buying of loupes. I bought a 15X one, and I got one with a plastic lens. It's usable for looking at things, but acquires scratches easily and has a lot of edge distortion. Make sure you ask the seller whether the loupe has a glass lens. (If it doesn't, you can always return it, if you took care to ask.)
You raise a good point about buying loupes on eBay, I bought a pocket jewellers loupe a few years back & got a cheap plastic one sent to me when I had expected a decent quality glass lens, I contacted the seller & they admitted they had made a mistake & sent a replacement the following day.
It's worth taking the time reading through the adverts & making sure you know what you are getting & never be afraid to ask the seller questions, I sell a lot of collectable items on eBay & would prefer to answer a dozen questions & not make a sale than have someone buy something & be disappointed with it.