Portrait lens for Grandchildren and picky parents

AndreM365 wrote:

From what I've heard, you already have a "bag of primes" in the 16-55. For outdoor portraits the 90mm is amazing IF you have enough space. Need about 10m to fit a 6ft human and works well for 1m high mini-persons at 4-5m distance so you don't interfere in their play space.

This makes the most sense to me for outdoors. I haven't used either lens but adored a M43 equivalent of the 80mm outside. The fast focusing and shallow DOF will be extremely fun and yield photos that pop far more. It's so easy to point and shoot and get something which really stands out. At the same time getting such spectacular shots was inspiration to be better.

Then stick with your zoom for indoors. Even 23mm can be too tight indoor e.g. at the dinner table for a birthday. But being stuck with a 16mm, 18mm or 23mm cuts down on bokeh opportunity, so having the versatility of the zoom sounds ideal.  You will never miss a shot being able to go to 16mm and always have the option of zooming in to capture those sought after arty/bokeh shots. I would probably leave both lenses on f2.8, so would also consider the 80mm.

Win win situation as long as the weight is acceptable. If not the little 50mm f2 is a great compromise and the one I would get due to focus speed. Sounds like the 56mm f1.2 still (i.e. on an XT3) isn't fast enough for kids. But if weight isn't an issue the 50mm f2 doesn't sound too exciting for an alternative to your 55mm f2.8 and my family have become annoyed with the 50 because I am so close they notice me taking photos more. Get the 80 or 90 for the fun and to blow everyone away with "pro bokehlicious" shots.

Weight:

80mm f2.8 750g

90mm f2 540g

16-55mm f2.8 655g

50mm f2 200g

If I was shooting the kids mostly in the garden the 80mm would win (being a macro gives you something to shoot when they run off and the weight is similar to your current lens), but if mostly on days out the 50mm would be tempting. Perhaps you should get both the 80 (or 90) and the 50. Apparently all 3 are spectacular