At my age, birthdays are perhaps best disregarded, but this year, I decided instead to pamper myself with a present, a rather special jewel of a lens I’ve been hankering after for some time. And so, I’m now the proud owner of the Leowa 60 mm macro lens, a tiny but not exactly lightweight bundle of delight for those like me who like nothing better than getting close. Then even closer. Yesterday, we went out for our first photographic “hunt” together. Early February at an altitude of about 800m in the innermost hills of Abruzzo is not the best of hunting grounds, but the sun (already on its way back to our latitude) tempered the worst of the bitter north winds and made short work of the ice crystals wherever it could. First impressions? Well, it’s certainly not an easy lens and getting the best from it is going to be quite a challenge, but all in all, I’m more than happy with the first results. It’s remarkably flexible, reaching from infinity to 2:1 macro in the twist of a lens barrel, and I’m already savouring its potential to get me even further into the “macro world” that always makes my heart beat that little bit faster, whatever the outcome. It’ll take a bit of practice, but in the meantime, here are the first images to emerge from this new exploration of my favourite dimension.