OMD: Can I take the same pictures with the 12mm f2.0 and the 17mm f1.8 ?

Guy Parsons wrote:

dustpuppy wrote:

I like taking a lot of portraits and shots of people, and lots of candid shots. Would those two lenses basically be equivalent for me, with the 12mm being a wider angle ? So I could crop my shots and end up with the same thing ? Or is the 17mm more adequate for taking shots of people / portraits ?

In the M4/3 world it works like this.....

12mm for scenery, street scenes, inside rooms to capture family gatherings, but too many distortion problems for any attempt at portraiture.

17mm same sort of use but less distortion for groups.

25mm for full figure shots and environmental portraits.

45mm for better head and shoulders and some face only.

60mm or 75mm for tight face shots and to to aim for shallower depth of field.

Most people look more normal when photographed from a distance of about 5 to 7 feet, with wide angle lenses you need to get too close and the nose gets too big. So the focal length is chosen to get the framing you want from that 5 to 7 foot distance.

You can use longer focal lengths like 100mm or 150mm to better separate subject from background, but then you are getting too far away from the subject. OK for a single subject under your control, but if in a group or other people are interacting with the subject then you lose control of the subject by just being too far away past that 5 to 7 feet "social contact" distance.

Best to get a kit zoom of 14-42mm or 12-50mm and experiment then check what works best at which focal length and then maybe buy individual prime lenses.

If you had to buy only one prime lens then the 17mm is the most useful choice for general use, but not necessarily for people shots.

Regards........ Guy

Great Post, Thanks for Sharing!:)

Tedolph

(Seriously)

P.S. Too bad the OP had left the room and isn't paying any attention to this stuff.