G3 - No macro lens

I did not buy a macro lens with the G3 because the Panasonic-Leica 45mm macro, although lauded as a very good lens, was rather expensive and had a rather short working distance towards 1:1 compared to the working distances I got using my close-up lenses on the 45-200. The Olympus 60mm macro would have had a slightly larger working distance than the 45mm macro, but the 60mm macro was not announced until the following year, by which time I had become fairly comfortable using my close-up lenses on the 45-200.  

Another issue with using a macro lens was how to get beyond the maximum 1:1 that the macro lens would give, covering a scene width of around 18mm wide. I was used to being able to get to a scene width of around 15mm using the Raynox 150 on the SX10 and a scene width of around 9mm  using the Raynox 250 on the SX10. This was with a working distance of just over 200mm with the Raynox 150 and around 115mm with the Raynox 250. I could get near that with the Raynoxes on the 45-200 on the G3. With the Raynox 150 I could get down to around 19mm scene width and around 11mm with the Raynox 250, both with the same working distances as with the SX10.

I could not do measurements with a macro lens at the time, but I got a general idea of what was likely by reading around and asking questions on line. Doing measurements now I find that the Olympus 60mm macro has a working distance of around 80mm at 1:1. With a Raynox 150 on it the 60mm macro gets to a scene width of around 13mm with a working distance of around 40mm, and with the Raynox 250 a scene width of around 11mm with a 30mm working distance. With 26mm (a typical full micro four thirds set) of extension tubes the 60mm macro gets to a scene width of around 10.5mm with a working distance of around 60mm.

Here is a summary of these measurements. 

The working distances associated with the macro lens are too short for me to be comfortable with photographing invertebrates out in the field. 

You might think that it might be worthwhile putting up with these shorter working distances for the better image quality from a very sharp, specialised macro lens. However, equivalance came into play here too. Because I was using minimum aperture to get maximum depth of field there would be no improvement in image quality using the better quality lens. This is because when using such small apertures the dominant factor in terms of the resolving power of the lens is diffraction, which is pretty much the same at f/22 with micro four thirds as with f/8 with small sensor bridge cameras. This seems counter-intuitive, and I didn't really understand it at the time, but several  years later I did demonstrate that my real world experience matched up with the theoretical predictions.

It would have been a different matter for botanical subjects where magnifications, for what I like to photograph, are generally less than 1:1 with micro four thirds, and smaller working distances are not a problem.  Also, I use a wide variety of apertures for botanical subjects and so, hardly ever being at minimum aperture, the better optical qualities of a macro lens can come into play.

I now realise that I probably could have benefited from using a macro lens, as I do now, for botanical subjects. But I either did not realise it during this period or did not want to spend that much money on it given that things were going fine using the 45-200 by itself and with the Canon 500D close-up lens for smaller subjects than the 45-200 could handle by itself, and very occasionally the Raynox 150 for even smaller subjects.