What Does f/40 Look Like From Nikon's 105mm Macro

 Assortment @ f/25

I've had this lens for awhile now and don't think I've used it beyond f/16, and then only rarely because I strive for critical sharpness most of the time and anything beyond f/11 on this sensor will start to rob it of acuity.  We had some flowers in the house for Mindy's birthday (thank you Jenn) and they were begging to be shot so I grabbed the D600 with the 105mm attached and started firing away at f/25.  Why f/25?  Simply because I hadn't done it before and was wanting as much in focus as possible close up.    

Roses @ f/40

But as I was shooting I also realized that most of what gets shown from what I shoot is shown on the WEB.  In other words, I don't do large prints (I really need to remedy that) where the difference would surely reveal itself so why not try to attain my goal of "everything in focus close up" and see what it looks like on the computer screen?  So, at that, I cranked the aperture to f/40.

Button Mum @ f/40

The images shown here are not crops.  I actually got this close and fired at this tiny, tiny aperture.  What I've done in the past is set an aperture of, say, f/8 and back away from the subject and crop later.  My goal was to get a sharp image with everything in focus just like I wanted this time.  Only this time I've done no cropping.  Are the images as critically sharp?  No.  They are definitely softer.  Does it matter much here on the computer screen?  Not to me.  In fact, it may not matter much in a large print depending on viewing distance.  Is everything in focus?  Mostly.  

@f/40

One advantage is, if I should decide to make a large print of such an image all the pixels remain in tact.  None have been thrown away by cropping them out.  So I changed things up a little and like the results.  Let's keep experimenting to see what we may come up with next and let me know what you think.

Lily @ f/40