Z740 Closeup/Macro?

I am looking for suggestions for an adapter for taking closeup pix of wildflowers or details of various things with my Z740.

Thanks in advance!

Richard,

The lens adapter that comes with your Z740 is threaded for 55mm accessories so you can add 55mm threaded close up lenses if the Close-up mode of the camera doesn't get you in close enough as it is.

You really get what you pay for with close up lenses so I would advise not to go for those super deals that seem too good to be true or are way, way cheaper than the more pricey brands. A good close up lens will give you as sharp a shot as possible all across the image. Cheap close ups will only look good right in the center.

They're rated in terms of "diopter power" in numbers like +3, +7, +10, etc. so the higher the number, the closer you can get. Unfortunately there's no hard and fast rule for knowing how close a particular diopter will get you on each camera, it's more of a rule of thumb. Diopter power is given in terms of the metric system, where a +3 diopter lens has a focal length of 1 meter divided by the 3 diopter = 1/3 meter (33.3cm) focal length and a +10 diopter gives a 1/10 meter (10cm) focal length. Said another way, the +10 will get you a little over 3X closer than a +3. Also, it's important to not stack the lenses on top of each other to get more power to get closer. When you do that you add lens surfaces and increase the chances for flare, decreased sharpness and distortion.
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Mike O'Brien
Eastman Kodak Company

Thanks Mike,

I need to play around with it some to get a better idea of just how close the Z740 will focus on flowers and such as the Bluebonnet season is nearly upon us.

I have not yet installed the firmware update. Does it change the close focusing or just the accuracy of assisted focus?

Richard

Richard Briscoe said:

I have not yet installed the firmware update. Does it change the
close focusing or just the accuracy of assisted focus?

Click to expand...

Richard,

The f/w update improves the low light focusing of the camera across the board, close and far.
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Mike O'Brien
Eastman Kodak Company

Thanks Mike!

Cheers

F/w update? How do you get those? Is it scarey?
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Don Schaeffer-Kodak Z740

Don Schaeffer said:

F/w update? How do you get those? Is it scarey?
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Don Schaeffer-Kodak Z740

Click to expand...

I'd be interested to know this too...just how does this work? I'm not 100% happy with how my Z740 performs in low light so if this can be improved I'd be interested to know

For Don and Drifting.

Firmware updates are on the Kodak website off this page - you pick your camera from the dropdown menus and follow the instructions for installing. It's pretty straightforward, just follow the instructions. The most important thing to remember is to use a brand new, or newly recharged battery or if you have the Kodak AC adapter for the camera, use that too because you must maintain power in the camera during the update (which only takes about 60 seconds.)

http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=7895&pq-locale=en_US
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Mike O'Brien
Eastman Kodak Company

Mike,

Updated the camera to FW 1.01 just fine. Trying to use the Z740 on a telescope. Have the Opteka 10:1 macro zoom that can focus the camera at 1" okay, but the auto-focus kills me when I use the optical zoom to get focus inside the telescope eyepiece (so to speak). Is there a way to lock the focus of the camera to a different focal length instead of the "auto" selection when you zoom in (with macro mode)? How about letting the auto-focus run when in macro mode and let the camera find the correct focal length?

Thanks

Andy,

That's a tough one. Using a built-in lens cam on a telescope is always a challenge. Have you tried using Landscape mode and then changing zoom? Landscape mode sets the lens for acceptable sharpness from about 20 meters on out and the AF is shut off. I don't know what that would do to using it with the Opteka unit you've got, but it's the only way to deactivate the AF on the camera.
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Mike O'Brien
Eastman Kodak Company