close up lens on ebay good or stay away

[formula400]

as above really, any good or a waste of £15

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Close-Up-Lens-...QQcmdZViewItem

[denno75uk]

I'm afraid I can't comment from experience, but I have heard of people using these macro filters with decent results. There's alot of macro going on at the moment on the forum but no-one seems to be using these, so I'm guessing they don't really compare to a dedicated lens.
For £15, might be worth a punt. You could still be learning some of the macro techniques with these to see if you could be bothered enough to fork out for a lens.

[Mark Haywood]

Hi there. I bought some of these a couple of years ago for use with an Olympus E-500 + 40-150mm lens. For the money I don't think you can grumble really and they certainly magnify. For less than £15.00 though I don't think anyone would expect them to give perfect results and, at least in my experience, they don't. I found them to make things a little soft whilst chromatic abberations are quite pronounced, and immediately noticeable.

For a few more quid you could get a Raynox lens and adaptor - I think the MSN-250 is the most popular? The adaptor works like a standard lens cover to clip onto whatever lens you are using and the close up lens screws into it. I haven't used the set that I bought in earnest yet, but initial results look very good - sharp with very little/no CA. I bought the RAYNOX CM-3500 MACRO EXPLORER KIT from digitaltoyshop @ £80.00. The RAYNOX DCR-250 is £40.00 - I think there is a 10% off code floating around for digitaltoyshop. You may be able to find it cheaper on ebay.

[loz]

for £15 it is hardly breaking the bank.

But don't expect the quality to be high.
Very likely to yield soft images, distortion and lots of CA.
Though it may not be too bad in the centre of the image.

There are high quality close up lenses though - such as from Canon 250D and 500D. The quality from these is quite good. These are actually composed of 2 glass elements, and multi coated, just like proper Canon lenses. They are not cheap though.

All these images were taken with a similar high quality, 2 element Nikon 6T close up lens - sadly no longer in production.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lozwilk...7603266363366/
Similarly any of the flower macros in here were with that lens
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lozwilk...7603270815461/

[shaolin101]

I have some of these - not sure if they are the same brand but i use them with the nikon 50mm 1.8 and they seem to be ok. I think for the money they are worth a go. It will at least let you see if you enjoy that style before buying another lens

Although not great specimens here are a couple taken with them. At least i think they were - they were taken at christmas so the memory is a bit hazy now!

[loz]

Originally Posted by shaolin101

Although not great specimens here are a couple taken with them. At least i think they were - they were taken at christmas so the memory is a bit hazy now!

They don't look particularly close up... I think a 50mm lens would focus that close without any add ons.

This is what I would mean by close up of a lens cap.
(this isn't a crop, just resized)

or a coin

[shaolin101]

thanks - they may well not have been taken with them - it was far too long ago to remember! Although the original sizes are quite a bit larger

I will dig them out though and see if i can post a couple using them so it can be seen what they are like

[Mike.P®]

If you dont want to invest in a Macro lens (which is the best way imo) then either the Raynox or a 2X Macro teleconverter (make sure its the macro and not just a normal) along with a 50mm will give decent results.