Bargain Olympus 75mm f/1.8

Group means you need deeper DOF, not shallower. And to control background, you move camera and/or group and you use longer focal length if you want to blur background.

If you want to include background as usually for group shots, you use short focal length, move group and camera and try to get deeper DOF.

The key is in everything else than ultra shallow DOF.

Tommi K1 wrote:

Group means you need deeper DOF, not shallower.

No it doesn't, unless you think that 5 guys set in row are for some reason a lot thicker than each of them individually. besides, to take whole scene with 5 guys you need to keep distance and this is already propviding sufficient dof.

And to control background, you move camera and/or group and you use longer focal length if you want to blur background.

Unless you can;t control background and you don't shot groups from across footbal field.

If you want to include background as usually for group shots, you use short focal length, move group and camera and try to get deeper DOF.

No I don;t.

The key is in everything else than ultra shallow DOF.

No it isn;t.

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

I fail to see why or how would anyone need a thinner DoF than what this lens offers. Sure, I understand the case for a 24mm f/1.4 lens to achieve similar defocus with a wider angle of view, but something like the Nikon 105mm f/1.4 appears simply unusable (wide open) to me.

Unusable? Only for dog headshots. Try to take picture of a group on busy background and then express your expert opinion.

It is so simple to find samples in the internet, why dont you try?

First of all, if you're going to quote the whole thing, at least remove the photos. It takes all of thirty seconds and saves bandwidth for other users.

Says guy who posted pictures of dog heads and flowers. Save bandwith, don't post.

Regarding your post: Riiight. Because lenses over 70mm in FL are always the best choice for group portraits,

always, always, always - who said that? you.

same as you said that nikon 105 f1.4 is unusable on 1.4.

you have tendency to painfully mistaken statements.

especially since all humans are, well, flat, and all telephoto lenses have flat focus fields too! How could I forget that I mean, humans are notoriously hard to move around, right? It's not like you could ask the group to move over to a location with a nicer background.

how can you tell, you're expert in dog portraits and flowers.

If there's a group of people, with a tele lens you'll need to move further back, thus increasing the DoF, thus negating the whole point of a 105mm f/1.4.

you have no understanding at all. Exactly because it is 1.4 at 105mm i can move back and still get shallow dof.

I thought it'd be self-evident for anyone knowledgeable

but you.

enough that I was talking about headshots, which is the primary use of any fast medium telephoto

shocking statement from someone that posted so many flower pictures.

(because their AF typically sucks for sports, see my original post).

Let's be honest here - lenses like the Canon 85mm f/1.2 and Nikon 105mm f/1.4 are for getting a single eyelash in focus.

Honest with whom? get out of cave, check flickr.

That's their whole selling point, otherwise any 85mm f/1.8 is more than good enough for the task.

Obviously you don;t know that, you have neither lens.

And I find portraits with nothing but blur in them stupid and pointless.

Its difficult to read. First you're saying about eyelashes then you're saying that this is boring.

Seriously, stop living in your strange world, check pictures people are taking with these lenses.

Be my guest if you want to do it with your own money, of course, but in my view, there's really no need to aim for a telephoto lens with an even thinner DoF, as there's nothing to be gained by doing so.

For you.

PS: If you really think that the best way to isolate a group from a background is a medium telephoto, then you definitely want a macro

LOL.

or half-macro lens. Most of those have flat focus fields. Otherwise you have to get the group curved just right or they'll be blurry. The Olympus 75mm f/1.8 is remarkably well-behaved in that sense, but of course it could never satisfy a DoF-maniac like you

what's this smiley for? your post is all but friendly, save pretense for others.

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"Chase the light around the world
I want to look at life
In the available light" - Rush, 'Available Light'

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

I fail to see why or how would anyone need a thinner DoF than what this lens offers. Sure, I understand the case for a 24mm f/1.4 lens to achieve similar defocus with a wider angle of view, but something like the Nikon 105mm f/1.4 appears simply unusable (wide open) to me.

Unusable? Only for dog headshots. Try to take picture of a group on busy background and then express your expert opinion.

It is so simple to find samples in the internet, why dont you try?

First of all, if you're going to quote the whole thing, at least remove the photos. It takes all of thirty seconds and saves bandwidth for other users.

Says guy who posted pictures of dog heads and flowers. Save bandwith, don't post.

Thanks for being so honest. If you don’t care about flower or dog photos, move along to the next topic. You haven’t offered constructive criticism or anything of value, only insulting comments in broken English.

Broken English - i see strenght of your arguments is matched only by quality of your pictures.

Off to the ignore list with you.

RobbieBear wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

I fail to see why or how would anyone need a thinner DoF than what this lens offers. Sure, I understand the case for a 24mm f/1.4 lens to achieve similar defocus with a wider angle of view, but something like the Nikon 105mm f/1.4 appears simply unusable (wide open) to me.

Unusable? Only for dog headshots. Try to take picture of a group on busy background and then express your expert opinion.

It is so simple to find samples in the internet, why dont you try?

First of all, if you're going to quote the whole thing, at least remove the photos. It takes all of thirty seconds and saves bandwidth for other users.

Says guy who posted pictures of dog heads and flowers. Save bandwith, don't post.

Thanks for being so honest. If you don’t care about flower or dog photos, move along to the next topic. You haven’t offered constructive criticism or anything of value, only insulting comments in broken English.

Broken English - i see strenght of your arguments is matched only by quality of your pictures.

You can’t make a statement like that without proving your own argument by showing us all what incredible pictures you can take.

I can because I don't make any reference to quality of my own pictures.

All I'm saying is that a guy, that took a snapshot of flower or dog head and is saying that 105 1.4 of ff is useless, knows or represents no opinion worth bandwitch to open his post.

I have 105 1.4 and also recently purchased 200 f2 (first version), both doing very well on old d600 and vast majority of people that actually used such lenses  know, that these lenses are not for dog headshots from 70cm distance. OP ignorance combined with poor quality of his examples was in striking contrast with his authoritative dismissing statements.

Being quite serious here, as I personally value seeing the work of great photographers so that I can improve my own snapping.

Off to the ignore list with you.

Kharan wrote:

Anyway, I just wanted to gloat about my find And also ask other owners of the lens how they deal with the frustrating tendency of CDAF to choose the more distant target. On my E-PL5, the AF point is quite large, and if there are two eyes in the box, for instance, it'll invariably focus on the more distant one. Getting shots of flowers is quite hard too, as again, the camera prefers to shift the focal plane further away from itself. Is there any simple workaround for this?

I think the tendency to focus on the more distant target is a function of the camera, not the lens.

I have an E-M10 II which does the same, whatever lens I use.

However, if I put the same lens on my Panasonic cameras, then they are more likely to focus on the nearer target (which is usually what I want).

I've no idea why Olympus chooses to use such a focussing algorithm. I find it is usually not what I want and it sometimes requires using manual focus to get the desired focus point.

By the way, the 75/1.8 is a great lens!

RobbieBear wrote:

arbux wrote:

RobbieBear wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

arbux wrote:

Kharan wrote:

I fail to see why or how would anyone need a thinner DoF than what this lens offers. Sure, I understand the case for a 24mm f/1.4 lens to achieve similar defocus with a wider angle of view, but something like the Nikon 105mm f/1.4 appears simply unusable (wide open) to me.

Unusable? Only for dog headshots. Try to take picture of a group on busy background and then express your expert opinion.

It is so simple to find samples in the internet, why dont you try?

First of all, if you're going to quote the whole thing, at least remove the photos. It takes all of thirty seconds and saves bandwidth for other users.

Says guy who posted pictures of dog heads and flowers. Save bandwith, don't post.

Thanks for being so honest. If you don’t care about flower or dog photos, move along to the next topic. You haven’t offered constructive criticism or anything of value, only insulting comments in broken English.

Broken English - i see strenght of your arguments is matched only by quality of your pictures.

You can’t make a statement like that without proving your own argument by showing us all what incredible pictures you can take.

I can because I don't make any reference to quality of my own pictures.

All I'm saying is that a guy, that took a snapshot of flower or dog head and is saying that 105 1.4 of ff is useless, knows or represents no opinion worth bandwitch to open his post.

Are you critical of all flower / dog head shots or just the ones from this poster.

I'm critical about poor examples (not even photographic quality, but poorly chosen).

I have 105 1.4 and also recently purchased 200 f2 (first version), both doing very well on old d600 and vast majority of people that actually used such lenses know, that these lenses are not for dog headshots from 70cm distance. OP ignorance combined with poor quality of his examples was in striking contrast with his authoritative dismissing statements.

His statement that the 105 is unusable is qualified by the phrase ‘to me’.

I don’t see how any of us can argue with the poster’s statements on how HE finds the lens in use. For what he does, he finds the shallow depth of field afforded by the 105 wide open too shallow for him to manage.

1. He can't know it since he never used one.

2. it's a discussion forum, any claim can be disputed. He can have his opinion, I can ctiricize it and his poor argumentation.

I have not used the lens, but I can say that, in my film days, I found that, when using ultra fast portrait lenses, I often had to stop them down to achieve a deeper DOF.

3. I can imagine that it was only a problem with headshots. And I mentioned it several times in my original reply, that fast lenses are not unusable, they're used differently.

We can argue that there are other scenarios where shooting wide open with the 105 is highly desirable, but those situations are probably not flower shots etc.

Exactly, and that was I said as well.

Surely, it’s horses for courses, and for his course, the OP requires a different horse?

Maybe, but his response on how to take pictures of whole body or groups suggested he "knows better" what is useful and what is no useful - agin not ever shooting with fast lens and ownig his lens for very short period of time.

Being quite serious here, as I personally value seeing the work of great photographers so that I can improve my own snapping.

Off to the ignore list with you.