CLOSEUP VS MACRO

Macro photography is close-up photography, but close-up photography is not necessarily a macro.

When we think closeup, we refer to a zoomed-in subject which fills the frame, such as a portion of a face, a stream of water or the entire flower.
In practice this usually means that we were able to focus on a subject close enough so that when a regular 6×4 inch (15×10 cm) print is made, the image is life-size or larger.
This requires a magnification ratio of only approximately 1:4, so close-up photos are easily achieved by many non-macro lenses and a “Macro” setting on point and shoot cameras.

However, a macro demands a higher lens quality, or another technique (please see this blog entry for examples) which will achieve a true magnification ratio of 1:1.

A close-up qualifies as a true macro only if the image projected on the “film plane” (i.e., film or a full frame digital sensor measuring 24 x 35 mm) is close to the same size as the subject, which in itself is a definition of a photographic 1 : 1 (or lifesize) ratio.

Of course, magnifications larger than 1 :1 (like 2 :1, 4 :1 etc) are also considered to be macros, and often you will see these in extreme closeups of insects where the entire frame is filled out by an insect’s face or an eye.

However, at the minimum magnification in order to be a true 1:1 macro, the photograph from edge to edge must represent the area which is, in reality, no bigger than 35 mm across..

For example:

CLOSE-UP

(even though this looks very close and detailed, the camomile flowers are about 12 mm each, there are 4 all together and some spaces in between, giving a edge to edge area of about 55 mm which gives a magnification ratio of less than 1:1. Even though this was taken with a 1:1 macro lens, it doesn’t matter, what matters is the size of the area photographed.)

MACRO

(taken with exactly the same lens as the picture above, the droplet here is approximately 4 mm, the heart – about 14mm. So from edge to edge, the area photographed is about 30 mm, which puts it comfortably within 1:1 magnification range)