So we now have the equipment needed for macro photography. What settings work best? We already mentioned that we will use manual focus (which we will discuss during next week's blog). Let's start with the fixed settings and then work our way to the variable settings. As a rule of thumb the following settings work well:

1. Set the ISO to a value of around 400 - 640 and just leave it there. There is no need to change this.

2. Set the shutter speed to about 200th of a second. Just make sure that your camera can sync with your flash at this speed. If your camera cannot sync with your flash at this speed then set your shutter speed at the fastest shutter speed that your camera can sync with your flash. You do not need to use any High Sync Speed functions of the flash. We don't really care too much about which shutter speed we use because the short flash duration will freeze the subject. We just want a shutter speed that is fast enough to have the image vastly underexposed if it were not for the flash.

3. Set the aperture to F8 or F11. We want to maximize our depth of field without allowing diffraction to steal our sharpness. Between F8 and F11 seem to be a good balance between depth of field and diffraction. Besides, many lenses seem to perform at their peak at F8.

4. Once the ISO, shutter speed and aperture have been set we leave them alone. We do not tamper with them again as the exposure will be controlled by the flash going forward.

5. Set the flash on manual. Use 1/16th or 1/32nd power. Shoot a test image and review the exposure. Just adjust the flash's strength to get the exposure as you want it. This is the only variable you need to change. Typically, once you find the strength of the flash that works for you, it is almost a set and forget scenario. This makes shooting very easy, in terms of exposure.

6. Lastly, make sure that your camera's white balance is set on flash. You want a fixed value rather than a variable value as you will be stitching images together using focus stacking software. Having different images all shot at different white balance settings just creates extra work in post processing.

You are now ready to go. However, there are a few other things you may want to set as well.

• I shoot at 10 frames per second, which I will discuss when I talk about technique.

• If your subject is static or you are shooting using an indoor setup AND you are using an auto focus lens you may want to consider ignoring what I will tell you next week regarding technique and use the focus shift feature (some systems call it focus stacking) of your camera (if your camera has this feature). This is a feature where you set your focus to the closest point that you want in focus and then your camera will take an image set at that distance, change the focus distance a little and take another shot, and repeat the process multiple times. This will give you a number of images each focused at a different place which can then be stitched together with focus stacking software. If you use this feature, set the interval between the images at 0.1 to give your flash a chance to power up between images.

We are all set to start macro photography. Next week we will talk about technique.