Don’t think that macro photography is any small feat just because the insects, creatures, and flowers in front of your viewfinder are tiny. “Macro photography is really one of the more complicated forms of photography,” says Florida photographer David Maynard. “You really have to hone your skills to get it right and get the results you’re looking for.”

To achieve his own macro goals, Maynard uses the Tamron 60mm, 90mm, and 180mm macro lenses. “All three lenses have that 1:1 aspect ratio, a very cool feature that allows me to fill more of the frame,” Maynard says. “With the three different lenses, I can choose how far from the subject I am to still fill the frame with that subject.”

The 180mm lens, for instance, boasts a longer focal length that lets Maynard back up more than he would with the other two lenses. “If I’m taking a macro shot of a subject that’s poisonous or that bites or stings, I might use the 180mm first so that I can get back a little bit further,” he explains. “The 90mm is between the 180mm and the 60mm, a comfort zone where I can be up nice and close at a short minimum focusing distance.”

For times when he wants to get right up close, however, for a head-and-shoulders, portrait-looking image, Maynard relies on his 60mm lens. “The minimum focusing distance on that lens is so bloody close,” he says. “I was shooting a large southern grasshopper with the 60mm in front of a bunch of people, and they said I was so close that they could see the grasshopper’s antenna actually resting on the lens hood.”

Using the 60mm lens on a full-frame sensor (Maynard uses a Canon 5D) also provides a natural, dark vignetting effect that he likes to implement on occasion. “The 60mm is made for the smaller sensor,” he explains. “You might think you don’t want that vignetting, but sometimes you do: It gets a little dark and fades in around the edges and gives your eye a very dramatic pull to the subject that you’ve arranged in the center. You can do a similar thing in Photoshop, but with the 60mm on a full-frame sensor, you can do it in-camera to create that pretty vignette. For dramatic macros with no vignetting, I’ll put the 60mm on my 30D, which is a 1.6 sensor. That eliminates the vignette but gives me a minimum focusing distance that’s tight.”

Focusing in this type of photography is critical—Maynard switches up his focusing M.O. depending on which lens he’s using. “With the 90mm and the 180mm, I almost always use manual focus to get close and then use the rocking technique, where you’re moving yourself to and from the subject to fine-tune the focus,” he explains. “I don’t do that as often with the 60mm because the focusing on that lens is so quick and accurate. In one of my first experiences with the 60mm, I started freaking out (in a good way!) because I found myself in AI focus mode actually tracking a bumblebee flying through the air and getting a decent shot.”

What time of day Maynard heads out into his creature corners depends on what he’s planning on shooting. “For certain bugs and critters, I’ll get up early in the morning to go out and shoot because they’re more prevalent at that time of day,” he says. “Down here in Florida, the dragonflies are most active from early morning to mid-afternoon. The geckos, on the other hand, are more active just after sunset, when the lights are beginning to come on: You’ll often find them near a porch light or under a streetlight, because bugs are attracted to the light, which makes it a natural hunting ground for the geckos. Then you have frogs, who mainly are nocturnal, so you’ll find these after dark.”

Maynard almost never shoots macro in ambient light, unless he’s going for a special-effect style shot. “When you’re shooting a subject very close with a longer focal length, your depth-of-field becomes very narrow,” he explains. “So if you’re shooting an insect at f/3.5 at 180mm just 12 inches from a bug, the eyeball (which is where you should focus) will be in focus and likely nothing else. You have to go to a closed-down aperture to get a decent depth-of-field with a tiny insect or creature, but if you’re shooting with just ambient light, your aperture is more wide open. You need to get enough light to push it out to a high aperture (e.g., f/19, f/22, or even higher if it’s a tiny, tiny object), so some type of strobe is important.”

Maynard uses the PocketWizard Mini and Flex to sync the flash with the camera at much higher shutter speeds off camera. “If you can sync your flash up to full power to your camera, you can literally shoot in broad sunlight at f/2.8, knock the ambient light down, and still get that beautiful saturation in the subject you’re shooting with no harsh shadows and a soft, well-lit, well-balanced background,” he says.

While your first instinct may be to grab a portable speedlight, Maynard issues a caveat about using this type of lighting for macro. “These lights are tall and well above your lens plane when you’re operating at or near the minimum focusing distance of the macro lenses,” he explains. “The speedlights are going to shoot 90 percent of the light over the subject’s head in this configuration.”

Maynard recommends redistributing the light instead. “I use a ringflash adapter on the speedlite, because it takes the light, circles it around the lens, and surrounds my subject with light,” he says. “The other thing I do is go off-camera with my lighting. You can use a mini softbox attached to the speedlite and literally handhold it or set it on a little stand just off camera as your primary light, and then use a reflector for side and backlighting. This can give you not only a deeper depth-of-field at a higher f-stop, but it can also give you a shadow-to-highlight ratio that makes the shot very dramatic, almost like it was shot in a studio.”

Maynard uses 4-in-1 or 5-in-1 reflectors to enhance his macro images. “There are several advantages to using reflectors,” he says. “For instance, let’s say I have a gorgeous bloom I want to take a picture of, but the background is very noisy (maybe I’ve got a wall or a railing that I don’t want that in the shot). I’ll pull out that reflector, flip it to the gobo side (the blackout side), and just drop it down behind the bloom and take a beautiful, isolated shot. Sometimes I’ll light from the front—I want to set up a second light source to define the edges. If I want those warmer tones on the bloom I use the gold side of the reflector to kick some of the primary light back at the other side of the flower and warm it at the same time.”

No matter how you’re lighting and composing your macro shots, however, don’t lose sight of the type of photography you’re doing. “Be real careful where you’re stepping; leave a very small footprint,” Maynard explains. “Several species I’ve photographed with great success are either endangered or close to being put on the endangered list. There’s a large responsibility that comes with shooting macro or nature in general. The stress you create by trampling into your subjects’ environment can actually be harmful to them if you’re not careful, so think about what you’re doing and how you’re affecting your subjects.

For more on David Guy Maynard’s work, go to www.dmaynardphotography.com.