I sure hope Nelya doesn’t read this
Sometimes, when I am not working or photographing or playing with the kids, I think about where I would eventually like to get to in terms of photography in general. In general I like macro photography and would like to stay within the macro realm. I will of course continue to shoot other things, but certainly as I grow I intend to improve this area first. However, eventually I would like to spin off a bit, so here is my plan in general. Note that this is more of a “what other things I would like to do” kind of plan rather than a general photography plan. If I want to become better, I need to spend my efforts on improving my technique rather than purchasing additional things (my wife will like that part). However, there are of course other – rather expensive – things I hope to get into in the future.
Step 1 – Strengthen my skills in macro and general photography. This is what I am working on right now and what I intend to work on for the foreseeable future. Budget-wise, there are still quite a few things I would like to purchase here so it will be awhile before I can do much at all for the following steps. However, macro photography considered, I am relatively happy with my equipment right now. The only things I would like to purchase for macro are the TS-E 90 and a 1Ds Mark III camera. However, my hope is to make some progress on step 2 next year.
Step 2 – Keep in mind that the steps overlap a bit. While I work on this step I intend of course to still work heavily to improve my skills in regular photography, but I would like to start building contraptions for other types of macro photography. I have seen others use lasers to take pictures of flying insects and water drops and those are the types of things I would like to start working on. Of course, when I do start I am likely to try things much simpler at first.
Step 3 – At some point I would like to take macro to the next level – or in other words be able to go way past the 5x barrier. To do this, you need a microscope. Therefore I hope to one day purchase one or more microscopes. Most likely I would purchase a stereo microscope and a polarizing compound microscope. This is a completely different field of photography and requires a lot of research. I have read a bit about this – brightfield and darkfield illumination, etc – but I will ramp up the research sharply before making a move. For instance, I am still not sure which is better – adapting a 35mm camera to the microscope or buying a camera especially made for microscopes. How much it costs to get into this I am still not entirely sure about, but the minimum seems to be about $3k-$5k for a single microscope.
Step 4 – Further in the future, I would like to bring video into the picture. I hope this isn’t too far in the future, and I may decide to switch steps 3 and 4, but I would like to get into macro videography. Of course, one of the biggest barriers here is that insects need to be doing something interesting in order to make an interesting video. Currently I can photograph an insect in an interesting pose and this would make an interesting photography, but not an interesting video. I have already e-mailed people at work who are into video about how to go about this and have found that video cameras that accept interchangeable lenses are very expensive. Lighting is also a huge issue here and I have yet to see an ideal solution. My current estimate is about $15k to get started here.
Therefore I’m sure Nelya wouldn’t be too happy to see these numbers, given the fact that she still almost faints every time I put a camera equipment order in. I keep telling her that the expenses will stop at some point, but that is just for step 1. 
At least it is fun to dream….
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Tags: photography, plan
Somehow related with your post, I’m puzzled by one simple question these days: should I buy some new equipment (as I have some problems with the response of my camera in low light) or should I change the area of photography. In other words, where should we draw the line between art, creative intent, mastercraft and technology?
LOL, did she say anything to you about this?
Reality check: No matter what the chosen field of endeavor, the expenses never stop.