Recommend a lens for a GX7 for indoor photos of parrots

alcelc wrote:

20 f/1.7 has only issue on CAF. If you shoot with AFS and shoot when the bird will not move fast (move the head, open the mouth etc small altitude motion might not be a major problem here), 20 is a highly usable lens.

Might be a 14 f/2.5 could also be considered which is the cheapest but not as fast as others.

If budget allowed 15 f/1.7 could be an ideal lens (I bought mine US$352 in gray market) especially of its DoF advantage over longer lenses in tight shootin space.

e.g. f/1.7 at a shooting distance of 5ft:

• 14mm has a DoF of 1.13ft (in front of) / 2.05ft (behind the plane of focus) @f/2.5,
• 15mm is 0.72ft / 1.02ft,
• 17mm is 0.61ft / 0.81ft @f/1.8,
• 20mm is 0.43ft / 0.52ft,
• 25mm is 0.29ft / 0.32ft,
• 42.5mm is 0.1ft / 0.1ft (take the reading of a 43mm lens).

The deeper the DoF, the closer the shooting distance, the darker the environment need to wide open a lens, or need the faster shutter speed to capture the movement of your bird, the 15mm would have a better position among the others. 14mm could be the most economy choice.

15/1.7 out of my price range and don't want to go with grey market.  You paid a great price for that lens.

I probably need to adjust the distance I am from the birds from what I posted in the original post.  Probably more like  6" to about 12-15".  Sometimes I get closer, sometimes a bit further but generally it seems to be about that range.   I do have a 43/1.9 Pentax that I've used with the birds but can't get overly close.  Minimum focusing distance is about 1 1/2 feet.  I do use AFS.   What do you think about AFF?  I've never tried that.

I also checked out some info about the Sigma 30/1.4 Art so throwing that into the mix although it looks a bit on the large size to me.  I do like the size of the 20/1.7.  Some seem to have no issue with the AF and some have just given up on it and gone to another lens.