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atolk
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Regular Member
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Posts: 120
Re: My next prime portrait lens should be ... ?
antonio-salieri wrote:
The Canon 85mm f/1.2 is the most flawless lens I've used and worthy of your consideration for any application where 85mm is appropriate. It is a great portrait prime, although expensive. It may be the best 85mm ever made.
The Sigma 135mm f/1.8 is one of my favorite lenses. It's slightly different from that Canon 85mm f/1.2, but both have similar qualities. If 135mm fits your use case, as it certainly does for portraits (if your space isn't too tight), this lens gives you near-perfection too.
These two are the ones I personally own and they are among my most-used lenses. Aberration of any kind on both these lenses is virtually impossible to find with the R5 (which is very high res). The 135mm wins on the wow:price ratio, but both these lenses really wow. It all depends on whether you need 85 or 135. The thinness of DOF achievable is very similar between the two as well.
Thinness of DoF is a gift and a curse as Mr. Monk would say. I am not into thinness of DoF, believe it or not. But contrast, background separation and pleasing bokeh/background blur are good. Plus I was told (in this very thread) not to covet sharpness. You may want to find this branch, but you probably know intuitively what that's about.
I cringed a little bit every time one this one (female) reviewer used the word "dreamy" when describing her test of one of these lenses, I forgot which one -- I looked at a lot of video reviews. I believe she decided the lens was "the most dreamy" she has ever tested. And it was not the RF 85 f/1.2. But at the end of the day, cringeworthy or not, "dreamy" is what sells on IG as well as senior packages and other beauty shoots.
Hmmm... This made me think that when I think "senior packages", I implicitly think female seniors. I found out boys do senior photos, too. Will I need another, less dreamy lens? Only partly kidding.