Portraiture Lenses

psycho_frodo

I am considering purchasing a few new lenses for the purpose of studio based portrait photography. I use a Canon 30D and have been looking for a good lens guide to help my purchasing. Anyone have any advice based on their experiences in this area?

Fajitas!

What is your budget?

City-Exile

Sinéadw ordered the Canon 50mm f/1.8 for around €84, from Kea Photo, on eBay. I think that would be a good lens for portraits.

psycho_frodo

I'll look into that lens thanks! I have a budget of 1.5k euro.

melekalikimaka

1.5 K !!!!! my god, thats alot

psycho_frodo

I won't necessarily buy one lens for 1.5k :-) If I can find 2(3) decent mid range lenses that would be great too.

City-Exile

psycho_frodo wrote:

I have a budget of 1.5k euro.

In that case, I'd go for the Canon EF 50mm f/1.2 L USM.

psycho_frodo

City-Exile wrote:

In that case, I'd go for the Canon EF 50mm f/1.2 L USM.

That's a gorgeous lens... *drools*

Fajitas!

Right, if you want prime lenses I'd go for the Canon 50 1.4, 85 1.8, 100 2.8 Macro and the Sigma 30 1.4

You'll have a pretty good range of lenses, keeping in mind that with the 1.6 crop, you'll have from 50mm to 160mm covered, all sharp lenses. All the above can be bought for about the 350 mark, leaving you about 100 quid to have a night on the tear with...or buy a reflector. Oh...or p&p for the above.

If it's zooms you're after, the 24-70 2.8L coming in at 900 quid (ish) and the 70-200 f4 L at about 500 quid. Again, a night out, reflector or P&p with the other hundred.

I haven't mentioned any 'real' wide angles, but if you're concentrating on studio work, you won't be needing it too often!

psycho_frodo

Fajitas! wrote:

Right, if you want prime lenses I'd go for the Canon 50 1.4, 85 1.8, 100 2.8 Macro and the Sigma 30 1.4

You'll have a pretty good range of lenses, keeping in mind that with the 1.6 crop, you'll have from 50mm to 160mm covered, all sharp lenses. All the above can be bought for about the 350 mark, leaving you about 100 quid to have a night on the tear with...or buy a reflector. Oh...or p&p for the above.

If it's zooms you're after, the 24-70 2.8L coming in at 900 quid (ish) and the 70-200 f4 L at about 500 quid. Again, a night out, reflector or P&p with the other hundred.

I haven't mentioned any 'real' wide angles, but if you're concentrating on studio work, you won't be needing it too often!

Thank you very much for that advice. I am just pricing those lenses through b&h at the minute. Looks like I can get a few nice ones in to my budget. :-)

Fajitas!

You sure can

leinsterman

Fajitas! wrote:

Right, if you want prime lenses I'd go for the Canon 50 1.4, 85 1.8, 100 2.8 Macro and the Sigma 30 1.4

You'll have a pretty good range of lenses, keeping in mind that with the 1.6 crop, you'll have from 50mm to 160mm covered, all sharp lenses. All the above can be bought for about the 350 mark, leaving you about 100 quid to have a night on the tear with...or buy a reflector. Oh...or p&p for the above.

If it's zooms you're after, the 24-70 2.8L coming in at 900 quid (ish) and the 70-200 f4 L at about 500 quid. Again, a night out, reflector or P&p with the other hundred.

I haven't mentioned any 'real' wide angles, but if you're concentrating on studio work, you won't be needing it too often!

What Fajitas! just said and then some!!

Actually that is good advice ... I have the 24-70 2.8 Sigma and it is nice for less money giving you more optionms for other kit ... but to be honest in my case I may upgrade it to the Canon L version later ... but for now the Sigma is my main walkaround despite being big and noisy ... it is pin sharp having sent it to Hahnel in Bandon to get it calibrated ...

I am also considering the Canon 85mm 1.8 ... for use on a 5D or 1Ds MkIII (1.3 crop) ...

Having just broken my 50mm 1.8 ... I'll probably go for the 1.4 version to replace it ... though for €90 this little 1.8 lens is not to be underestimated ... it is probably one of Canon's best lenses all things considered ...

Is there any opinion of the Canon 24-105 F4L IS for use in a studio? ... it is a nice lens outdoors ... and a good walk around option.

A (hopefully relevent on this topic) question for the forum: Do really need speed for studio since you may be using flash a lot ... or is it nice to have a few fast primes around for those low dept of field and low light studio shots ? I've not done much studio work myself and most that I have involved flash guns ... so it strikes me that sharpness is paramount over lens speed ...

Fenster

I hope to get the 85 f/1.8 later this week. Whee.

Fajitas!

Simon, generally a lens with a lower aperture is better quality. Plus studio dosn't always mean lighting rigs, could be working with availible/low light, or want to utilise minimal DOF!

From what I've heard, but haven't put it to any tests, the 24-105 suffers a lot more distortion.

I prefer the extra stop between that and the 24-70 any day!

AllMyOwnTeeth

The 24-70 is a very versatile portrature lens, great in the studio and out and about (a little heavy perhaps). I'm hoping to get a 85mm f/1.2 shortly though. I've heard really great things about it.

Morlar

OutOfFocus wrote:

I'm hoping to get a 85mm f/1.2 shortly though. I've heard really great things about it.

Not sure if you have seen this comparative review of the 1.2 mk I v the 1.2 mk II also against the 1.8.

http://www.wlcastleman.com/equip/reviews/85mm/index.htm

apparently the mk II version has been significantly improved (which helps explain the price as conns have it for the guts of 2.5k!).