I have State Farm. In Texas (with some notable exceptions, insurance coverage tends to vary from state to state due to state regulation) the homeowners policy has a very low cap on "property used in business" (photographic equipment), if you are a pro. Essentially it is not covered. So if you are a pro in Texas, your homeowners will not cover your equipment. Expect your adjuster to google you, look for your website and any other indication that you are selling your photography to determine whether it's a hobby or business.

I had a bad experience shooting macro with a 180mm macro on a Manfrotto pistol grip. It was very difficult to get precise framing. The weight of the 180 plus camera was to much for head to handle. I have used numerous ballheads and 3-way heads with the same combination without having a problem.

If you are in the semi-pro transition phase, be careful. Before I completed my transition from trial lawyer to professional photographer, I was in that nebulous zone where I sold a fair amount of prints, had a website, had several images published in magazines, but had yet not quit my day job. Since I ran my own full-time non-photography business and did not want to trigger an IRS audit, I did not claim my photography expenses as business expenses, on the advice of my accountant. Needless to say, I had a home break in and my photography gear was among the items stolen. Before my phone interview with the State Farm claims agent, the agent had viewed my website and publications and was leaning toward excluding majority of the photography claim. (There is a limitation in my policy concerning losses of equipment used in business). The only thing that saved me was that I was brutally honest and disclosed without prompting that I sold images, but that my accountant advised me that I should not claim that I was running a photography business because it was a relatively small number of sales, the expenses exceeded income, and the IRS sometimes flags claims of new photography businesses for audit and denies the deduction under the "hobby loss rule." We both acknowledged that I was very close to the business exclusion line and that mine was a tough case. The claims agent allowed my case for this one time with a note to the file, but said that I should get other insurance for my gear for future protection. Be aware that if you are considered a professional, your equipment my not be fully covered under your homeowner's policy (the contents of which are often vary and are determined by the individual state's insurance regulators). So if you are a pro or semi-pro you may want to discuss with you agent whether your homeowner's insurance will completely cover your loss.

I shoot in the macro/closeup range on a daily basis and have approximately 10 or so macro lenses ranging in focal lengths from 50mm to 180mm and varying from classic Kiron manual focus to the current image stabilized macro lenses from Sigma and Canon (not counting various Luminars, APO Rodagons, or other specialty lenses.) Nearly all of the macros I have used ranged from very good to excellent. They are usually exceptionally well corrected prime lenses. It is hard to go wrong with current macros from any of the big named lens manufacturers. As you have budget constraints, I think you get the best bang for the dollar in the used market. If you buy a used lens in fine optical condition from reputable seller and obtain the right to return the equipment if it does not meet the description, you will do very well. Many people buy macros and then find that they don't use them. I have picked up pristine used macro lenses at very favorable prices. Though I have not used it, the Tokina is a well rated lens that should serve you well.

The real questions are whether you are pushing your d750 to the limits with your photography and whether the capability of the d500 would in improve your images or allow you to obtain images that you would not otherwise obtain. For example, if you regularly shoot birds in flight, the better autofocus system of the d500 may mean you get more tack sharp keepers and the increased pixel density may mean that the cropped images of the birds are substantially sharper with the d500 because you have more pixels on the bird. In other words, do you "need" capability of the d500 or do you want a new toy.

Whether it is the beautiful lake reflection of trees sporting autumn colors or the unwanted glare causing a sheen on flower petals, polarized light is an optical occurrence that is seen by both our eyes and the most advanced coated lenses. The advanced coatings of our lenses do not filter out polarized light nor would you want them to. The ability of our lenses to capture the polarized light of beautiful lake reflections is a mainstay of landscape photography. Sometimes polarized light, such as lake reflections, can make our image special. Often however, polarized light is detrimental to our images by masking color and detail with unwanted reflections known as glare. Eliminating unwanted surface glare can unmask the surface detail and true color that the reflections hide. Polarizing filters help control these unwanted reflections. I am including two images to show one of the functions of a polarizer. The first image is without the polarizer, while the second image uses one. Both images were shot with high quality advanced coated optics, the Canon 100mm "L" macro lens, from a tripod mounted camera. The surface glare on the plant leaves has nothing to do with the coatings on the camera lens. The elimination of glare by using a polarizing filter is not something that can be duplicated in post processing

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The high quality coatings on todays lenses improve clarity, minimize internal reflections and help the accuracy of our lenses in many respects, but they in no way effect the need for a polarizing filter. For the most part, the light that we photograph is unpolarized. It randomly vibrates in all directions. There are certain situations in nature that causes a significant percentage of the light to vibrate in a similar direction (polarized light), such as reflections caused by water or the scattering of blue light in our atmosphere. Regular lens coatings do not significantly filter out polarized light. Polarizers have numerous slot or "palings' that filter out polarized light when it vibrates perpendicular to the palings. As eyes and our normal photographic lenses do not distinguish between polarized and non polarized light, polarizers are one of the few instances where an external filter provides a benefit in a digital world. It is my understanding that once polarized light is in the mix of light read by the sensor, there is no way to effectively remove it in post.

In my experience, there are several factors that effect the look and quality of various polarizing filters: the quality of the glass, the quality of the coatings, color cast of the filter, the extinction rate (the efficiency of the filter in removing polarized light.). Accordingly, the quality of the polarizer may vary among the various products in a single manufactures product lines.

When I shoot botanicals, I often use a polarizer to decrease glare which give the colors greater saturation.

For size of the steps using Stackshot, I use the chart published on the Zerene website. I have found that their numbers work. I have not had trouble with banding or soft spots in the image. The one thing I would suggest is that you open up your aperture a bit from the f/11 or f/13 indicated in your post. Most of the macro lenses are at their sharpest (depth of field considerations aside) at f/5.6 or thereabouts. The additional depth of field is not needed because the chart will give you the step size appropriate for that fstop.

I use Zerene on a daily basis. It stacks in both Tiff and jpg formats. It also has a very neat Lightroom preset, where you highlight the group of raw files you wish to stack. The preset will create temporary tiff files and then export those tiffs into Zerene for stacking. Contrary to a prior post, there is no limitation of 100 images. I've stacked 200-300 images without any problems in Zerene. All you need is computer memory and patience. The stacking capability of Photoshop is limited and works best where the stack is limited to just a few images.

Since I started photography as a young boy, I have had a chance to make a number of major blunders. The key thing is that I made so many bad mistakes that I was home free if I avoid making the same one twice. Among my disasters (now comic, then not so much): improperly loading the film so that it wasn't taken up by the advance sprocket, thinking I had rewound the film back into the canister then opening the camera back, advancing the film on shot too far and ripping the end of the film out of the canister, creasing the film when loading it into the development spool, forgetting to reset my ISO (it was ASA back then) when I changed film and probably a few other that I have mercifully forgotten. Luckily these disasters occured before I graduated high school in the early '70's.

Bill, I use my 5DS r in live view while mounted on a tripod triggered by a Camranger. Since the live view locks the mirror and has electronic first curtain shutter release, aren't they both essentially equal, at least as regards to shake?

For me, great photography starts with emotional connection. Great photography reaches into and taps emotions, which may range from wonder to horror. In short, it tells a story that is meaningful. Most often, the emotional impact is heightened because of reinforced synergies. The lighting, the composition, and the subject matter complement each other and serve advance the story, so as to maximize the emotional impact. That said, the emotional impact is subjective to each of us; and what I find great, may not touch you.

I have been using a Benro GH3 with my heavy Canon 500mm f4 and love it. That said, it is the only one I have used.

Collections is a very powerful tool in that it allows you to create a virtual file of virtual copies. This is important if you want to keep track of your master edits and don't want multiple copies of "final' images that you have to sort through to see which is truly the final image. With virtual copies, any change made to the master image automatically makes the same changes in the virtual file...and vice versa. If you want to have two independent sets of final images different, one in Nikon and the other in Sony, then export the images to that file, and then edit.

Two of my passions, shooting birds in flight and focus stacked macros, burn through cards quickly. Nightly, I download my cards to two SSD drives. They are small, rugged. I also believe that they are faster than current hard drives, at least that's what they told me at the Mac store. For reasons of speed and the convenience of switching the Lightroom catalog between my laptop and home computer, I store my catalog on one of the SSDs (a 1TB Samsung). This allows me to begin editing in LR, for those occasion I actually have time to edit on my trips.