Hammered said here http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Kind-Photos-...er-t338745.html that his wife is a macro nut.

I'm not a macro nut but I was when I was far younger, in my teens actually.

I would have given a fortune, that I sure did not have, to be able to take photos of the little insects that were fascinating me.

Getting older, part of the fascination is gone but I'm still pretty interested to take macro pictures.

Of flowers, or well, insects...

What lens should I use? For Canon in my case, but I'm also interested by Nikon recommendations.

You could possibly try the Canon EF 50 f1.8 II you mentioned you owned earlier with some cheap extension tubes (ca $10).

More expensive is the Canon EF 60 F 2.8 USM.

Canon 100 F2.8 macro

Personally I'm newbie, I use a Canon 100 mm Macro (no Image Stabilizer) with a commercial ring flash. Need time, a strong, firm hand, never loose the hope, and a lot of patience and experience.

And a tripod

Personally I'm newbie, I use a Canon 100 mm Macro

And a tripod

The same as Vulcan?

Looks good to me.

But Vulcan uses it on a full frame camera, what about you?

nikon 60mm f2.8 micro, brilliant lens !

can't find anything wrong with it

nikon 60mm f2.8 micro, brilliant lens !

can't find anything wrong with it

Show us at least one photo taken with it

And for Canon, both are about the same price.

Baht 17,500 for the 60mm compared to baht 19,800 for the 100mm on fotofile.com

You could possibly try the Canon EF 50 f1.8 II you mentioned you owned earlier with some cheap extension tubes (ca $10).

Not something I have tried for many a long year.

Katana's suggestion is a cheap way to start, without investing in expensive lenses.

I seem to remember suggestions about reversing the lens.

Lenses are designed with the distance to film/sensor to be less than to the subject.

With macro we need the opposite?

Show us at least one photo taken with it

especially for you nice boring product shot

I find very convenient way to shoot macro (not sure if this technically is a macro but I actually don't care to have the subject projected at the original size in the sensor) when I am on the road, in a non studio setup, to use long tele 200 to 300 mm with image stabilizer and extension tube 25mm. The convenience is that you don't need to go very close to the subject (if its alive will not run away) and you can shoot handheld.