Macro photography - Trying out some new extension tubes to get a little closer!

A couple of days ago, I was hanging out in the front yard of our house and my wife commented on the huge amount of bees that we pollinating on a couple of our plants. I walked over and saw hundreds of bees and some moths sharing the plants. And of course, what was my first thought? "I gotta shoot these guys!"

I popped on 3 extension tubes onto my Sigma 150mm macro lens and went to work. The hardest part of using a macro lens, especially when combining extension tubes (which let you focus in even closer), is getting the subject in focus. The depth of field is extremely narrow!

I manually pre-focus the lens and then move in and out (by a matter of a 1/16 inch or less) to get these little guys in focus. Did I get a lot of shots where the bugs were out of focus? Yep. But I also got some cool ones to share with you all.

The kids really liked this shot because the eye was in perfect focus. Check out the image below to see a close-up of this moth's eye.

These guys are so darned busy collecting pollen that they do not react to a big ole' lens coming right at them.