I've blown my budget getting the Fuji S2 Pro, so little accessories like ringlights will have to wait until I can get some money coming back from photography. In the meantime, I'm trying to make the most of what I do have. What I have is a Micro-Nikkor 105mm f/2.8 AIS manual focus lens, some Vivitar flashes, and various bits and pieces.
Quite some time ago, I put together a rig that allowed me to use my two Vivitar 3700 flashes at full manual power to expose Kodachrome 25 film for macro work. At 1/2 life size, I was just at f/32 for good exposure.
With the Fuji S2, though, the minimum ISO is 100, so that would be overkill. However, the 3700s have a "motor drive" setting that delivers a fixed fraction of the total power, so with that I can seek out an find an appropriate ISO/f-stop/magnification combination.
Here's the rig, shown with a Nikon FM camera standing in for the similarly-sized Fuji S2:
The critical component is really the diffuser. I picked up a piece of white opaque 1/8" plastic from Ridout Plastic in San Diego, cut a suitably sized piece, and cut a hole just large enough so that the plastic fits tightly around a 52mm skylight filter. The main structural piece is a 1" x 1/4" piece of aluminum bar bent into a "U" shape. There are several holes drilled into the aluminum bar to permit using 1/4-20 screws for attaching various other things, like the camera, L-backets, and such. Between the flexibility at the bracket joints and the rotations that the flash heads can accomplish, I can direct the light onto various parts of the diffuser to place - or eliminate - any shadows. There's also a cable release lashed via cable tie to the right-hand upright. One flash triggers from the camera PC sync, while the other has a Vivitar SL-2 slave.
I've done some work with this, and it is a flexible system. It's heavy, though. So I got to thinking about the built-in flash on the Fuji S2. What results can be gotten in macro just using the built-in flash?
In that case, I'm just using the diffuser on the lens. I can set my aperture and the flash TTL takes care of the exposure, even though my lens is a manual AIS type. That's convenient, too. But what about the results?
Here are a set of three pictures taken in short succession at ISO 200, 400, and 800 using the Fuji S2, 105mm, built-in flash, and diffuser. Magnification is about 1:2.5.
ISO 200, f/16
ISO 400, f/22
ISO 800, f/32
For those who are interested, you can download the raw files here: ISO 200, ISO 400, ISO 800
For myself, I think ISO 400 is about the upper limit for usability. ISO 800 starts to interfere with resolution of fine detail.
The exposures were all very good using the TTL.