Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

garyvoth.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 167 posts

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#81

Post by trap_goes_hot »

_ph_ wrote: post #74
muro wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here, have a bunch of lenses, but this one is almost always on the camera. I'm tempted by the 50mm 1.2, but its price gives me pause and I'm worried about its weight.

One shouldn't get too crazy about aperture. On a modern 35mm camera you rarely need the f/1.4. Certainly not for gathering enough light and usually the DOF is small enough at f/2 already. So you can get a much lighter and cheaper lens by not going for the fastest aperture. A nice alternative are the Voigtländer lenses, which are available or adaptable to modern mirrorless cameras. They tend to be less pricy and quite…

In general I agree, but as you probably know, the answer almost always is - it depends :)

So it depends on the focal length. I use both 24 and 35mm at 1.4 pretty much every-time I use them. At those focal lengths, and normal subject distances, they don't have crazy shallow depth-of-field where only one eye-lash is in focus. I can get great environmental portraits where the subject pops a bit more than 1.8/2.0 etc.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#83

Post by hellisothers »

combatentropy wrote: post #56

This article was actually published more than 20 years ago, https://web.archive.org/web/20020603153119/http://vothphoto.... Some of its advice is timeless, but its context is back when your phone did not take great pictures. Instead, most people carried around no camera at all, and events went undocumented. Then, among people who decided they wanted to take pictures of wherever they were going, they bought point-and-…

Arguably your phone still doesn’t take great pictures in the situation the author is describing: indoors, medium to low light. In this situation the advice is still timeless, a camera with a 50mm ~f1.4 can create a truly great photo (skills outstanding), while the best phone will still produce a “good” photo.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#85

Post by oldstrangers »

_ph_ wrote: post #71
oldstrangers wrote: post #24

I love a good prime lens. Took this with a Sony FE 24mm f/1.4 ( https://roambyland.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/ss-1-of-1-... ). 50mm is probably too 'in the middle' for my uses, as a 24 + 70-200 has really replaced my need for a 50, and the ability add in a little compression of the foreground with the zoom is really nice. If I had infinite space in my bags I'd have a 50 for sure. If I was just using one camera I'…

On the other side, the neutral way, the 50 renders szenes is the appeal and the challenge for the photographer. A wide-angle or strong tele lens add a lot to the picture themselves, by their extreme angles of view. The 50 does nothing like that, puts all the burdon on to the photographer. Yet, a lot of the most iconic pictures have been taken by a 50.

I'm not sure I'd call using a 50 a burden on the photographer, I think they're probably a lot more intuitive for most photographers. A 50 was the first lens I bought during school, and it was widely regarded as the preferred lens for photography classes from beginner to advanced. I love the 50, I just personally don't have much use for one currently.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#86

Post by _aavaa_ »

uniqueuid wrote: post #17
solardev wrote: post #4

These aren't dead! You can still find a variety of fast 50mm lenses, from a cheap f/1.8 for like $150 (which is still way better than most kit lenses) to a very nice f/1.4 upgrade at like $400 all the way to absurdly expensive ones. https://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/comparisons/premium-50mm-le... Their primary advantages: * Amazing "bokeh" -- the quality and look of the background blur that modern phones mostly try to…

Absolutely agree, but have to add a small nitpick: 50mm primes used to be lightweight. The trend is towards Sigma Art / Zeiss Milvus/Otus dimensions, and that means much better edge sharpness but ~1kg in weight.

This isn't true. Lens which optimize for performance at the cost of size are becoming more mainstream. But that isn't to say that this is the trend for the market as a whole. We're simply seeing more options.

Take Sony for example. They have their large 50 1.2 and 1.4, but they also have several small lenses: the insane 55 1.8, the 1.8, the 2.5G, and the 2.8 macro.

And you can go smaller still if you go the manual focus only route, e.g. the even more impressive CV 50 f2 APO.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#87

Post by ISL »

If pointing someone to a single "normal" lens as a prime, I'd point them to a 40mm, not a 50.

When I work with a 50 (which I very much enjoy; used one yesterday), I find that it is tighter in composition than my normal field of view. The 40 much-better matches my own perception and experience. The 50 is a more-careful tool.

35 is a little wide for me (but perfect for human/photojournalism work). If you want to try out a 40, there are great pancake lenses out there at relatively low cost. The Canon 40mm STM (recently discontinued) and Fuji 27mm are the smallest lenses made by their manufacturers -- cheap, sharp, fast, flexible.

Edit to add: For the specific case of environmental portraiture of kids, I'd probably trend toward a 35 and perhaps even a 28 (the focal length-equivalent on the Google Pixel 3a and 4a and the Q/Q2). The perspective with which we perceive the experience of being a kid is a close and intimate one.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#88

Post by copperx »

q-base wrote: post #77
petargyurov wrote: post #53

This is good timing -- I am literally in the middle of researching lenses and film SLR cameras for a beginner -- I'm looking to get into film photography. Anyone here have recommendations? I am currently reading about the Olympus OM-1 and it all sounds great apart from the lack of exposure compensation (but that might just teach me the hard way).

Get a Nikon FE! There are tons of cheap Nikon glass. It has exposure compensation as you mention. It has a brilliant way of turning of the light meter so it won't drain your battery, when not in use and is just an overall pleasure to use. Some of my best photographs has been captured on my Nikon FE. https://www.35mmc.com/10/02/2022/appreciating-what-you-alrea...

I have a Nikon FE with a 50mm prime, it's great. Would you mind sharing how do you process and scan you photos?

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#89

Post by cat_plus_plus »

> As your spouse proudly holds the baby up you raise the camera to your eye.

How did you just happen to have the camera with the right lense right at the moment? For truly spur of the moment, have to use whatever you have at hand and not worry about tech, usually a cell phone.

> The viewfinder seems a little dim in the room light

On the other hand if you have a little more time, just click live button and tap viewscreen to focus (or get a camera with electronic viewfinder that brightens things up for you, though good ones are expensive). In time sensitive situations, larger F stop is your friend because your main subject is likely to be reasonably focused. Might get noise from high ISO, but these days noise removal / shadow brightening is pretty powerful in post-processing providing you shoot RAW.

> There is a difference of approximately 3.5 stops between f/1.8, the typical maximum aperture for an entry-level 50mm lens, and f/5.6, the typical maximum aperture at the portrait end of a “consumer” zoom. This is a huge difference in practice.

I love a couple of old manual lenses I have, but these require careful scene planning to ensure focus is on the correct thing and background is far away to be properly blurred, the opposite of "kid is smiling" situation in the article. For those, I keep 18-135 lens on by default so I can shoot a large group of friends from short distance or a bird on the tree at short notice.

Re: Classic 50mm “Normal” Lens

#90

Post by ISL »

dieortin wrote: post #38
aaronbrethorst wrote: post #28

If you have an SLR or mirrorless camera, don't yet own any prime lenses (a lens that doesn't zoom), and you want your photographs to get a lot better very quickly, go buy the 50mm f/1.8 lens your camera manufacturer makes and only use that for a couple months.

I’m curious, why is this?

Aside from the clarity that a prime brings to your composition, the optics in a 50mm f/1.8 are frequently much better than what you'll find from a kit-lens zoom.

A Canon 50mm f/1.8 at f/8 as as sharp as anything you'll ever use -- outperforming many professional lenses.

In the long run, though, a prime helps you to understand what goes into composing a great image. It takes time to learn a focal length and learn which focal lengths resonate with you.

I have recently dabbled with a standard zoom for the first time in ages -- to me, it is now a collection of f/4 prime lenses that are accessible with the turn of a dial, each of whom have their own perspective, character, habits, and temperament. As I work to compose an image with it, I now decide, before I bring the camera to my eye, which focal length I want and select it. If the composition is off, then I move to bring the image together. Without extensive experience with primes, I'd never have understood the power of the changes in perspective that even small changes in focal-length can bring. (See a sibling comment of mine on this post waxing poetic about the differences between 50mm, 40mm, and 35mm.)

(you can, of course, get the same experience at lower cost with discipline and duct-tape holding a zoom at fixed focal lengths for days at a time, but most people don't succeed with that approach)

Post reply on HN