Strobe, Macro Extension Rings and Eye Balls

A few weeks ago my brother-in-law checked out one of my up close and personal self portraits. He noticed how cool my contact looked but wanted to see more... in so many words. Today I read my friend and fellow photographer, Jeremy Koons' blog post and was completely inspired. (Hitting the link to his post is highly recommended) I've been using my macro extension rings like crazy lately so I decided to put these recent inspirations together. Remember to click on the photographs to enlarge them!

Experimenting with and without a small softbox... creating catchlights.

Experimenting with distance and angle of strobe...

 and distance and angle of eyeball to camera lens...

Focus was a crapshoot but oh so worth the challenge!

Small softbox combined with daylight and tungsten lights...

This is where Jeremy's link comes into play!

Notice the size of my pupil... pretty small.

Nearly landed the focus on Iris but happy with the reflection of eyelashes.

Only using the small softbox...

Eye had adjusted to the dark and POW, hello pupil!

Focus is on the outer edge of contact.

Strobe without softbox.

Focus on ridge or rim of eyeball and contact.

(Love the black reflection of the rim against light background)

The light flecks above and to the right of catchlight is the reflection from the strobe off my camera.

Focus on the bubbles and blemishes on the outside of contact!

I'm not sure where I'll be going with this experimental photo day but these just may show up again somewhere!