Showing off my conventional and unconventional equipment

All photos: CC BY-SA 4.0 Insaneworks

The usual stuff

Canon EOS 550D / EFS 18-55mm	Super wide angle lens with macro / Speedlite YN560-II flash
Tamron 18-270mm	Samyang 8mm fisheye lens

Filters & stuff

Extension tubes: 13mm, 21mm, 31mm, bandpass filter, step-up rings are step-down rings, UV filter, self made heart shaped bokeh filter	Three filters for camera built-in flash, two types of magnifying glasses, a self made mini led light in a mini stand and transformer

Lights and reflectors

I love photos that have flaws in them. Reflections, bokeh, flare, distortions... You name it, I love it! I could buy an expensive, proper macro lens and get absolutely accurate and perfect shots of the reality that I can see with my eyes, but then the thing I like to call accidental magic wouldn't be there. Then I should know what I want when I'm photographing. I might learn something, which is always a good thing, but experimenting and combining things is fun also. And the beautiful flaws.

My most used options are 18-55mm lens with wide angle and macro lenses. I almost never take those off and use the 18-55mm lens on it's own. If I want to get really close, I add the extension tubes. One or more between the lens and the camera.

My second favorite lens is the Tamron lens. I usually use that when I want to stalk people and animals out there in the city. Adding an extension tube or the wide angle + macro lens to Tamron is possible, but the result is really weird and mostly blurry. Works sometimes. It all depends on what I want.

The fisheye lens and the flash is something that I rarely use. I definitely should use the flash more often and learn to take good photos with it. Taking portrait photographs would definitely be one reason to use the flash. Now I just have to get willing models.

Usually I prefer natural light when photographing anything else than small objects. I almost never use the built-in flash on the camera, but if I do something softening the light is always a good thing. Two of the three filters in front of the flash are useless. White is okay, but the blue and the orange ones are terrible. But as I almost never use the built-in flash, I never use the flash filters also.

The hand held magnifying glasses are really weird and fun. Usually pretty hard to use because I only have two hands, but after several hours, may result in one great photograph.

Self made heart shaped filter is fun too. When this one breaks, I'll try some other shape.

When I take macro photographs, I usually use any light that is in hand. Sunlight, flash lights, table lamps and this self made led light. Some have a soft yellowish color, some hard blue light. Sometimes the different colors look horrible, sometimes they give a nice twist to the photo. And of course I use any kind of reflectors that I can find. White paper, foil, mirrors, metal cans. Anything that I can think of.

Here's few photos with different combinations. Check out also the 1 to 12 photography idea parts at the bottom of this post. There you find photos and how I did those. And of course some CD melting too.

Now it's your turn to show off your #cameragear. The fancy, expensive, old, new, weird and the stuff you may have stolen from your child because it's so cool. ;)

---

How to make ordinary things look interesting, enhanced, weird, crazy, pretty or just different than usual. Previous parts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 & 12

CC BY-SA gallery.insaneworks.fi