Portrait lens advice

Keith Z Leonard wrote:

treasuringhearts wrote:

Hi! I see that you own a 100-200mm as well as the 50mm...which lens would you use for indoor social event photography in a home environment where lighting may be a factor? Thanks so much! I currently use my macro 100mm f2.8L and my original zoom 70-300mm (which I am about to replace)...and I am deciding between the 50mm and the 100-200mm f4 L (non-IS)...with my 5DMkii...which would you go for? Mainly kids' photography/newborns etc. Thanks so much!

Hello. Looking at my lightroom catalog, I use my 24-105 the most, my 50mm second most, and my 135mm is a close third.

The trick here is that for about 1/2 of my 24-105 shots I used a bounce flash, then discount the amount outside and you'll find that much more often than not when shooting with the zoom lens I use a bounce flash.

My 70-200 f4 is next on the lens list, used a bit less than the 135 f2 L prime, but still significantly. And I use it at the extremes most of the time, either 70mm or 200mm. Again, more often than not the bounce flash is used for indoor photography. This is true even though I'm shooting a 5Dmk3 which has pretty excellent ISO performance.

You might note though that I have quite a few flashes/modifiers/triggers, and I like to do lighting setups etc....but for general event shooting I use a 430ex II on the camera and bounce from the ceiling or walls and use a "bounce card" on the flash to avoid dark eye sockets. This is an excellent investment for any camera and you can easily balance the ambient light vs flash and use gels to match your lighting when necessary.

The 100mm macro should be a pretty useful focal length for portraits. The 50 I use for full length and small groups, though 35mm is pretty popular these days for that sort of work as well. Canon has a weakness at 50mm honestly, with the 50 f1.8 II having terrible build, the 50 f1.4 being pretty soft at f1.4 and really has a somewhat fragile AF system, and the 50 f1.2L has focus shifts and is just very expensive (lovely images though). With the recent announcement of a 7 blade 50 f1.8 STM, I would wait to see how that is reviewed, sounds like a real winner for an inexpensive 50mm!

The 70-200 f4 is an excellent lens, but f4 isn't very fast and if you are going to rely on ISO performance indoors you'll have a lot of noisy images. Of course if you are taking photos of a few people you may will require f4 (or smaller) anyway, then you really HAVE to add light.

So if you don't have a good bounce flash, I'd invest there first! Newborns are not generally bothered so much by the flash, but they also don't move, so you can park them near window light and have excellent light for your photograhs, primes are great for this task and there are several good ones that are affordable like the 85 f1.8, and hopefully the new 50 f1.8 STM. Your 100 f2.8 IS L should be great for this use though, so I'd use it since you already have it. The 135L f2, 200 f2 L, and the 85 f1.2 L are the portrait lens monsters in the Canon line up.

Hope this helps.

Helps? That is the most incredibly thorough, clear, professional answer ever...thank you I have been using my flash and bouncing it, which works beautifully, and have been using my diffuser and Gary Fong a lot with kiddies because it is soft and more even if I don't have a good 'bounce target' Your advice is invaluable...thank you. I will hang five for the new 50mm, I see it was released this week I am not 100% sure of the 100-200 f4 yet, but it will be next on my hotlist Thanks for your honesty about the 50mm...I had picked up on some of the chatter but need SOMETHING in that range...but the new 50mm may the answer. Thank you thank you. have a fantastic weekend xxxxxx