This article features some Alice in Bloomland HHHR (Handheld Hi Res) test images captured at the Royal Botanical Gardens. This exhibit ran from February 1 through to the end of March 2025.

NOTE: Click on images to enlarge. To view this article in a range of other languages click on the Canadian flag in the upper right corner. 

During my last visit to Alice in Bloomland I spent some of my time doing some HHHR images in order to get in some practice before the spring blossom season.

All of the images featured in this article were captured handheld using an E-M1X fitted with an M.Zuiko 90 mm f/3.5 Macro IS PRO.

As regular readers know I’m not a pixel peeper… but I do appreciate that other folks do like to examine 100% crops of images.

All of the Alice in Bloomland HHHR photographs in this article are displayed as full frame captures, followed by a 100% crop done at 1200 pixels on the long end.  As is my standard practice, all jpegs used in this article were created with a quality setting of 8.

All of the Alice in Bloomland HHHR images are displayed in the order in which they were captured during my visit to the Royal Botanical Gardens… i.e. in less than 80 minutes from start to finish.

The photographs above and below were captured from a distance of 6.5 metres (~ 21.3 feet). There was some harsh light directly above the dragon’s head which appeared to blow-out all of the highlights between its eyes on its forehead.  Using HHHR increases dynamic range by about 2 stops so I was able to recover many of the highlights in this image.

I was pleased with the amount of detail that was captured from a distance of 6.5 metres using HHHR.

I shot in Manual mode, using Auto-ISO, and a single small auto-focus point. As you review the EXIF data you’ll see that my ISO values varied from ISO-160 all the way up to ISO-6400.

I kept my shutter speeds at fairly safe levels from 1/125 to 1/200. When using HHHR my E-M1X captures 16 images, then combines them in camera to create a high resolution RAW file.

I haven’t been doing any handheld macro photography since the fall of last year, so I knew I needed some practice.

As a result, I didn’t push things by using either of my teleconverters with my M.Zuiko 90 mm f/3.5 Macro IS PRO. Depending on the subject matter, I used apertures from f/5.6 to f/8.

The exhibit area was very crowded during our visit so I only took one HHHR attempt for each image opportunity. Some of the sample images in this article could have used a bit of cropping to better position the subjects. I kept my images as full frame captures so the 100% crops would be more relevant for readers.

Even though I didn’t have too much time during my visit to Alice in Bloomland, capturing some HHHR images significantly increased my anticipation for spring flower and insect macro photography.

Towards the end of my short visit I started to feel more and more in tune with my macro set-up.

Like any genre of photography it takes some practice to reconnect with camera gear we may not have used for a while.

I’m very much looking forward to putting my M.Zuiko 90 mm f/3.5 Macro IS PRO through its paces this spring and summer. One of the things that I love about handheld macro photography is being able to experience common subjects in new… and more detailed ways… without the hassles of using a tripod.

Technical Note

Photographs were captured handheld using camera equipment  noted in the EXIF data. All images were created from RAW files using my standard process in post. This is the 1,449 article published on this website since its original inception in 2015.

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