chapjohn Loc: Tigard, Oregon

CH Canon has given great advice on using extention tubes ( and I am a Sony user).

Using f16 is a good aperture with extention tubes. ET's decrease dof and focal distance. These are not problems, but why you use ET's.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

I always carry some extension tubes... They come in handy any time I want a lens to focus closer than it's capable of doing on it's own.

Over the years I've used them on lenses from 20mm to 500mm and just about everything in between.

Extension tubes are most effective on short telephoto lenses. The longer the focal length, the more extension needed to make any significant difference. And with short (wide) focal lengths, even a little extension can make for a huge amount of change.... maybe even too much.

While I have several macro lenses, I don't always carry them with me... or even if I have one have one, maybe it's not the focal length I need for a particular photo opportunity. Extension tubes are a light weight, simple to use solution.

20mm lens with 12mm extension...



A macro lens or a longer focal length w/extension would have blurred down the flowers in the background of the above shot. So I decided to try a wide angle (20mm on film/full frame). The only problem was that was my shortest extension tube and the flower was touching the front element of the lens when it was in focus! Any longer focal length, I guess the flower would have needed to be inside the lens!

50mm lens with 25mm extension...



For the above, I deliberately used the 50mm lens that I knew would "go soft" and vignette strongly when set to a large aperture and used with an extension tube. The background was very busy and I wanted to heavily blur that down, too... both the large aperture and the long extension which put me very close to the subject helped with that. (Crop sensor DSLR used.)

85mm lens with 20mm extension...



A lens which isn't very close focusing and that I usually use for portraiture, was able to serve as a macro lens when I didn't have one with me to take the above shot.

90mm lens with 20 or 25mm extension...



The bee on an orange poppy was shot with a vintage macro lens that's only able to do 1:2 magnification on it's own (half life size), so I added a plain extension tube to make it able to render higher magnification. (Lens was adapted for use on modern camera, crop sensor DSLR used here.)

70-200mm lens with 25mm extension...



The spider above was one of those times when an opportunity arose, but I didn't have a macro lens with me. I was photographing water birds along a stream, lying hidden in tall grass with a 500mm lens on a film (full frame) camera, when the sun reflected off this spider's web right in front of me. I quickly switched to a shorter zoom and added the extension tube to get higher magnification than the lens can do on it's own.

300mm lens with 1.4X teleconverter and 36mm extension...



I had a macro lens with me when I spotted the tiny fence lizard above... but those critters are very shy and it's hard to get close to them. So instead I added a teleconverter and a large extension to a more powerful telephoto, to be able to get the shot from a distance and not scare off the lizard.

500mm lens with 36mm extension...



Two more situations where a longer telephoto simply couldn't focus close enough to tightly frame the subject... a small bush tit at it's nest on the left, an Anna's hummingbird on her nest on the right.

I learned to use extension tubes many years ago and have made a point of having some for every camera system I've used since. I always have some with me. They add very little weight and don't take up much room. I currently shoot with Canon DSLRs (full frame and APS-C) and have several Canon extension tubes (12mm and 25mm, sold separately) as well as the Kenko tube set (12mm, 20mm & 36mm). These are all high quality, but I take some extra care when using them with heavy lenses like the 300mm (6 lb.) and 500mm (8 lb.) mentioned above. Some "cheap" tubes I used in the past with other systems had flimsier locking mechanisms which failed once... nearly disastrously. These modern ones are much better built and have all the electronic connectivity, to allow auto focus, image stabilization and - most importantly - aperture control to work. Even so, it can be a lot of weight on them with some big lenses.

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Thomas902 is quite correct. Obviously someone who actually does Macro. For most brands / camera models there are several (higher priced) Camera manufacturer made sets of extension tubes offering different features at a cost. From totally manual ones, to A AE, to full A&S AE, to AF & AE. All can be used with various lenses with slightly different shooting techniques. Mine (4 different sets) are all old school Manual or Auto Diaphragm Sets, both K and M-42 Mounts for my various Pentax cameras.

"In fact I have crazy colleagues who purchase old 2X manual Nikkor tel-extenders; remove the optics and use for tubes... haven't gotten that desperate (yet)... lol"

Say, that's an idea. I actually did that with some strange accessory someone gave me. I had no use for it so I removed the optics (glass) and made an additional single screw mount Extension Tube. I do have "extra" 2X and 3X Tele-Extenders in both K and Screw Mounts. Perhaps I could make me or a friend a Tube on the cheap.

Mark Sturtevant Loc: Grand Blanc, MI

Just some comments. I have used extension tubes quite a lot. You don't need to stop down to f/16 - f/22 like someone had said. Well, you can but that kind of depth of field is not everything. Pleasing, out of focus areas from shallower depths of field are part of what makes a good picture. I regularly photograph well over 1:1 and I prefer f/11 to f/14, paying attention to critical focus on the points of interest and letting the rest not be in focus. Lenses are not that sharp at those smaller apertures.
Second, if you have a dedicated macro you can still use those extension tubes with the macro to go over 1:1. The image quality could be better, I think, but if you want to have an extra boost of getting in real close, it is a good option that beats the price of springing for a super-macro lens.

Mark Sturtevant Loc: Grand Blanc, MI

I did that as well, using one that could rapidly extend and shorten with a twist. Taking most of the glass out was easy, but there was a lens or two in there that was a real challenge. Getting it adapted to my camera was also a significant challenge, but it was also fun. In the end I never used it but that is entirely my fault. .

newtoyou Loc: Eastport

That is best advice. Do investigate, but hands on after will teach much more.
Bill