AGFA 4-Piece Close-Up Macro Multi Coated Filter Kit 52mm (+1+2+4+10) APCUF452

BBB

I bought these in the 77mm diameter, to use on My Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 EX OS. With My Canon t4i, these filters a simply amazing, especially when You consider the price. I have only used the +4 so far. The result is the lens's 3.5 foot minimum focus distance is reduced to 8-10 inches. So I can get right up on something and get incredibly close-up shots at 200mm. If You are a serious macro photographer, or You intend to shoot indoors, these won't help You so much, just buy an actual macro lens... If You are like Me and occasionally want to shoot insects, flowers and such close up, this is a steal! They are not multi, or single coated, so don't let anything that is not soft and forgiving come in contact with the glass!NOTE: Some reviewers seem to think that macro means multiplier. These filters do not let You zoom further, they let You get closer...The Upsides:-You can turn any lens into a macro lens!-They are of good quality, the glass has no distortions and are crystal clear. The rings are made of metal.-The price is almost unbelievable, considering the extra ability they provide.The Downsides:-They reduce Your depth of field to an incredible degree. Which requires You to use an aperture of at least f/8+, My best results have been at f/16-22. Even then, at a distance of 10 inches from a flower, You can't get the entire thing in focus unless You are directly above it. Go in at an angle from the side and a range of about one inch is in focus at f/16. Which is fine for shooting bees and such.-Due to the extreme curvature of the lenses, the amount of light Your lens can capture is also greatly reduced. Full sunlight is a must! I used a very bright LED on an overcast day and had to get it within a foot to get a reasonably bright shot of a japanese beetle.Over all, I can't tell You not to buy this kit. If You accept the fact that You can only use them in direct sun light and You have to use a very narrow aperture, these can be of great benefit. I am quite happy that I spent less than fifteen bucks on these instead of buying an 1100 dollar lens. Now I have a 200mm macro set up, with some limitations, but I am more than pleased! Wow, I mean really, wow!In full sun, I was using the following settings, on the camera and lens mentioned above, with the +4 filter, zoomed to 200mm. ISO 200, Shutter speed 1/125 and an aperture of f/16. I got some GREAT shots of bumble bees, they took up about 50% of the width of the image and You could see all the hairs and even the pollen caught on each hair. Even once You get use to using the filters, You'll have a fair amount of throw-away shots, I'm getting a 1:5 good:bad ratio. But the keepers have been well worth the investestment.

Summary:I would buy them again, and I did as Christmas gifts. I had difficulty using the +10 on the 70-200, but it works fine for the 17-55. For the 70-200 I recommend using the +4 instead and cropping where necessary. The +2 and +1 are easier to walk-around and take hand-held shots with... and by easier I mean not-impossible. Don't expect autofocus to work. A worth-while purchase for anyone who doesn't take enough macro photos to justify a separate lens, or doesn't want to carry an extra lens.The photos I posted were shot in raw and converted by Picasa, but I didn't do any editing at all.Test ConditionsCamera: T2i with wireless remoteLenses: 50mm 1.4, 17-55mm 2.8 IS, 70-200mm 2.8L IS IINo Flash, and did not attempt to stack filters.Hand-held and Tripod were both attempted.Indoors with and without halogen desk lamp.Focusing:Focusing rarely worked with the +4 and never worked with the +10. +1 and +2 worked some of the time, but not as fast or as well as the bare lens. I was using center point AF, but quickly decided that manual focus would be better and faster.Haze:Even with the large hoods on the 70-200 and 17-55 haze was a major problem at large aperatures. the macro filter just collects light from every direction. A large aperature may be more useable with a flash, but I didn't test it. The haze made me quickly give up on the 50mm 1.4. The +4 and especially +10 have very small depths of field on my 70-200, it was better on the 17-55 but the focal distance was so close for the +10 I had to remove the lens hood.Flash:A significant amount of light is needed to use these filters while hand-held because the shutter speed needs to be as high as possible with the smallest possible aperature to take the best photo. For example the +4 at 100 ISO onthe 70-200 needed 1/25" exposure for f/2.8. Without the filter required the same shutter speed though, so not a huge hit in brightness.Hand-held / IS:The biggest problem I had was image stabilization. Anyone who has used the 17-55 or 70-200 knows they have excellent stabilization, but it just wasn't enough for the macro photos. Out of 5 Shots hand-held one came out good, where the tripod made them great. Perhaps a flash could solve this.Conclusion:In controlled lighting these filters are capable of taking shots you could not get without a macro lens. For $20 and the minimal weight they add to my pack this is a better solution for me. The carrying case is very nice, and has six slots in it, so I will be able to use it to hold additional filters. I probably will re-purpose the +10 as something else. The best photo I took was with the 70-200 @200 with f/32 and focus at 1.2m. This shot took 1.6 seconds to expose.I also took some video, but maintaining focus on anything which moves significantly is very difficult.I would like to try a macro tube to see how that compares to these.If these had some anti-reflective coating they would work better.Advice for taking better photos:Tripod and remoteLens hoodStop the aperature down to prevent haze (f/32 worked best)Lots of light, flash?Zoom all the way inFocus with your feet (set focus on camera to nearest and move camera/subject instead)

sometimes it is can be very difficult to focus when i use it on my lense

In order to get much better than these, you'd have to spend a lot more money! I think the only thing that could improve these lenses would be some optical coatings but I've gotten around that by using some CPL filters.These are fun and in my case I'm using them with a much smaller millimeter lens with an adapter. That way I get virtually no distortion since I'm only using the center of these lenses. I did try it on a larger zoom lens that I have and yes there is quite a bit of distortion if you're going to try to use the entire close-up lens. I recommend buying a larger size for whatever you're going to use them for and then also buying an adapter so you're only using the center area of the close-up filter.They do also work stacked, the depth of field is incredibly shallow so this may or may not be something you want to do.

I'm using it with an underwater camera, so image quality is pretty forgiving. Otherwise I'd send them back for claiming they are coated. These are not, not even an AR coating. Hint, the cloth case is black but has a green tint like the glass in the picture. I took off 1 star for faking the picture of coated filters. Are they worth $10, sure it's a good value for the price. The frames are metal.