Testing macro lens and lights

I've always wanted to learn macro shooting but I'm awful with those so it makes me use the macro lens less often. I've had the RF 100mm for a while now but basically used it few times only. I also bought Yongnuo ring light some time ago and finally today I took them out from the box

However, some reason in ETTL mode it kinda didn't want to flash, anyone else have those lights and might know what was happening? It seemed usually if I changed any settings, it would stop flashing. Then I press the manual button to strobe a flash and quite often after that it started working.

ETTL was way off though, I couldn't get any decent light from it even when using the FEC-adjustment. Finally switched to manual mode and just dialed the correct power level. Is there some trick to ETTL when shooting macro? Or is it the Yongnuo being bad? I remember my Godox AD200 with R2-Pro doesn't do correct ETTL with R5, so maybe same with the Yongnuo ring light? Not huge thing since macro is usually well controlled.

Test subject today rose from the garden. Full frame and 1:1 crop:

Very nice! I was wondering why you didn't take a 1:1 or 1.45:1 using the lens, instead of cropping it to 1:1 in post?

Regarding the ETTL for the Yongnuo flash, I suspect the problem with having the flashes too close to the subject. It tends to overexpose. I suppose you can use the flash compensation feature.

I also have the Yongnuo ring flash (which is basically a copy of the Canon version) and I dislike using it. Instead, I use an off-camera flash. That way I can easily control the direction as well as diffusion. It works much better for me.

Tongho58 said:

Very nice! I was wondering why you didn't take a 1:1 or 1.45:1 using the lens, instead of cropping it to 1:1 in post?

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The 1:1 means export from LR at native pixels instead of resizing, not the magnification of the picture.

Tongho58 said:

Regarding the ETTL for the Yongnuo flash, I suspect the problem with having the flashes too close to the subject. It tends to overexpose. I suppose you can use the flash compensation feature.

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For me it was totally underexposuring, I think it was shooting at minimum power. Using FEC didn't change anything, higher or lower. I think it was shooting at fixed output power no matter what the ETTL and FEC was saying.

tpatana said:

The 1:1 means export from LR at native pixels instead of resizing, not the magnification of the picture.




For me it was totally underexposuring, I think it was shooting at minimum power. Using FEC didn't change anything, higher or lower. I think it was shooting at fixed output power no matter what the ETTL and FEC was saying.

Click to expand...

Interesting. It's been a long time since I last used it but as I recalled, it functioned pretty much normally when in ETTL mode.

I have two third party flashes that work fully with my 5DmkII but not in ETTL with the RP. My ten year old Canon 580 EX II works equally well with both. Canon wants us to buy only their accessories.

dougsmit said:

I have two third party flashes that work fully with my 5DmkII but not in ETTL with the RP. My ten year old Canon 580 EX II works equally well with both. Canon wants us to buy only their accessories.

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For Yongnuo and Godox, they will work after you perform a firmware update.

On the flash or on the camera?

dougsmit said:

On the flash or on the camera?

Click to expand...

On the flashes.

tpatana said:

I've always wanted to learn macro shooting but I'm awful with those so it makes me use the macro lens less often. I've had the RF 100mm for a while now but basically used it few times only. I also bought Yongnuo ring light some time ago and finally today I took them out from the box

However, some reason in ETTL mode it kinda didn't want to flash, anyone else have those lights and might know what was happening? It seemed usually if I changed any settings, it would stop flashing. Then I press the manual button to strobe a flash and quite often after that it started working.

ETTL was way off though, I couldn't get any decent light from it even when using the FEC-adjustment. Finally switched to manual mode and just dialed the correct power level. Is there some trick to ETTL when shooting macro? Or is it the Yongnuo being bad? I remember my Godox AD200 with R2-Pro doesn't do correct ETTL with R5, so maybe same with the Yongnuo ring light? Not huge thing since macro is usually well controlled.

Test subject today rose from the garden. Full frame and 1:1 crop:

View attachment 9211

View attachment 9212

Click to expand...

Hi-
I can't comment on your flash issues, but the exposure on these two photos look spot-on to me.

Nice images.

When I shoot macro, I set my flash (Godox TT685II) to manual and at 1/16 power. Shutter speed is to 1/200 and f-stop is f11. These settings usually work much more reliably than E-TTL for me.