Question:
Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
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I recently started using Sigma’s EX 105mm Macro lens. It worked very well using good film. I’d suggest a fixed-focus lens in the 80 to 105mm range, preferably macro.
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50mm Ron Walton Visit the BPC http://www.bpc.photographer.org
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Response:
85 – 135 mm. On Hasseblad or Mamiya. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Response:
<<I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. I would go with the following 35mm format primes for weddings: 85 or 105 for portraits 50mm for waist up shots or full figure 35mm for group shots You will have sharper photos and the wide apertures will enable maximum flexibility with depth of field choices. The 135mm soft focus sounds intriguing but 135mm is SOMETIMES (NOT ALWAYS) too strong for portraits. Another option would be to just experiment with diffusing filters such as Tiffen Pro Mist or Hoya Soft FX or a Zeiss Softer and not bother with the 135. The 28-80 is a good focal length range for reception candids but some consumer level 28-80’s are not that sharp. I have never used the Canon so I cannot comment on it’s quality Good Luck Art Codron
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135 mm on the canon there’s two, the f2 L USM and the f2.8 softfocus the f2 performance is unbeatable, cheack the MTF it beats leica, Zeiss and any other 135 mm on the market, as with the softfocus, it might be well suite if you like the dreamy kinda things, cheaper too, since the 135 F2 L is quite expensive 135 mm to 200 is the ideal portrait lens, as that it offers the prespective and low depth of field for blurry backgrounds, but If you are looking for some for parties, not studio then zoom might be better of for your needs, like the 28-70 F2.8 L but on the Elan it will block out focusing assist beam and the on camera flash, but if you have the money, the 135 F2 is worth it, or then again you might want softfocus, try before you buy the soft focus, for me, it seems to work sometime and not other, beside, you can always get the filters for soft later, and the focusing on that is not USM, Canon 28-105 is well deserved too, It has quite a good quality for the price, don’t know about the new 28-135 IS What do you think about the portra, I liket the 400 VC, very good for weddings, outstanding prints color wise. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – 50mm Ron Walton Visit the BPC http://www.bpc.photographer.org Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Response:
I would go with the following 35mm format primes for weddings: 85 or 105 for portraits 50mm for waist up shots or full figure 35mm for group shots You will have sharper photos and the wide apertures will enable maximum flexibility with depth of field choices. The 135mm soft focus sounds intriguing but 135mm is SOMETIMES (NOT ALWAYS) too strong for portraits.
It’s a matter of taste, but I personally don’t like the soft focus effect (I do, however, own the 135 soft focus lens, which I use simply for the focal length and speed). One thing that bothers me about some wedding photographers I’ve seen — they concentrate on the posed shots, and the candids are an afterthought. I suppose the motivation (conscious or otherwise) is that people are more likely to buy enlargements of posed shots than of candids, but I think it’s doing the couple a disservice. Having an album documenting everything that happened — all the facial expressions, people dancing, other couples snuggling up (discreetly) — makes for much better memories. Good candids are NOT an afterthought — it takes just as much skill, I think, to spot, compose, light, and time candids as it does to pose formals. I know that the one wedding I shot on a really professional basis (flat fee plus enlargements), the couple did order enlargements mostly of posed shots, but they also got a copy of every shot I took (9 rolls worth). Watching them go through these, they were lingering over a lot of the candids. And while I’m at it, might I also suggest not simply blowing everything out with tiny apertures and the accompanying massive blasts of flash? Sure, it yields sharper shots, and slow film also yields less grain, but aside from being obnoxious it misses the opportunity to use ambient light and capture the atmosphere. It doesn’t work for everything, but it’s remarkable what can be done with ambient light if you’re willing to use faster film and large apertures. I read somewhere that Denis Reggie uses a 200 f/1.8 for this purpose (low ambient light candids). I don’t wonder why. I like the original poster’s idea of a 75-300. I like having a long telephoto for candids. I was at a wedding (not the official photographer) recently, and I used the 300 to pick people out of crowds. It was a Jewish wedding, and at one point the bride and groom were being entertained by their friends. I caught some really good shots of the bride — tight head shots — without interfering with anything. The photojournalist workhorse 70-200 f/2.8 would be a great lens; bring a teleconverter for real long distance shots. The pro plunked down a ladder at one spot and shot from there all evening, with what didn’t look like a terribly long lens. I’d also suggest an even wider angle lens for other candid situations, such as close-in shots of dancing. It does distort people, but it captures an entirely different view of things when used correctly. — Tall Clubs International – http://www.tall.org/ or 1-888-IM-TALL-2 Project lead for The Gimp Print — http://gimp-print.sourceforge.net "Linux doesn’t dictate how I work, I dictate how Linux works." –Eric Crampton
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I like the original poster’s idea of a 75-300. I like having a long telephoto for candids.
That is very true. I have used mine at weddings many times over. It’s nice to "reach" across a room and catch an unsuspecting scene. Since the original post sounded more specifically steered toward portraints, I only suggested one fixed-length lens. However, the 75-300 is an excellent post-ceremony choice.
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Hi Again I Apreciate the advices of all you. My main interest is in ad some photojournalism to my wedding photography, thats why I thouth about the IS it should give me some stability if I popup my camera and try to get something in a rush.But as someone adviced I like the idea of a 100mm macro because I like to take pictures of litle creatures and of the desert flowers (I live in Arizona) when I go out with my wife. – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Before you buy.
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<<One thing that bothers me about some wedding photographers I’ve seen — they concentrate on the posed shots, and the candids are an afterthought. I couldn’t agree with you more….my best wedding shots are candids. I have at all the weddings I attend. Quite often the wedding couple is blown away by my candids and they like my stuff better than the stuff the pro shot. The posed shots are obligatory but unfortunately necessary. I prefer to use available light when possible. I agree with you that often times the ambient light will add a lot of atmosphere. This is another reason for a fast lens. If it is too dark, then I’ll use flash. Regards Art Codron Art
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YEAH….That’s what I’m talking about… AWESOME EQUIPMENT… I like the Mamiya stuff…
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – 85 – 135 mm. On Hasseblad or Mamiya. Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Response:
– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Hi everyone! First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
– I have the Tamron 28-105 f2.8 lens, and cannot recommend it for any application where sharpness is an issue. Also, low light AF performance on my Minolta 800si sucked. It’s also really heavy. Even with the $100 rebate I got from Tamron, it wasn’t worth it. Carey L. Jones
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In my experience, if you are in a tight situation where you must react very very fast on what is happening around you, there is no substitution for a fast zoom lens. So if you want to start billing people for your work, think about getting something like 28-70f2.8. Quite often you won’t have time to change lenses. I would say that whatever you get try to get as fast an aperture as possible becuase you almost always will be shooting at fairly large apertures just enough to get you the required depth of field. If you use smaller apertures your background will be dark and your photos will look like they came from the point and shoot of one of the guests. Nicely exposed heads on a pure black background. Therefore you would want to balance the ambient light with the flash and that would effetively mean staying at about f5.6. With a consumer zoom you would then be shooting at max aperture which is often quite soft:) An f2.8 zoom will be pretty sharp at f5.6. For the same reasons I am very dubious about the merits of using very long lenses at wedding receptions. You can only use those effectively for headshots and those are not very exciting. Again low depth of field will kill you in most situations so you would have to stop down and that will kill the ambient light. (Of course every rule has an exception and I have taken decent shots of people with my long lens). So I wouldn’t sweat much about the long lens for the candids. You want to show people interacting with one another and this is typically a job for a wide angle. Leave the long lens for shooting the ceremony from a distance. The wide angle leses are probably the most important ones. I would get a 24 prime and a 28-70f2.8 for the candids. And I don’t remember if a question of a second body ever came up in this thread. If you are going to charge people you definitely need a second body just because the most important thing at the wedding always happens when you are rewinding your film. Always. And yeah, the batteries in your flash always die at the worst possible moment too. Good luck, Alex P.S. The pro who photographed our wedding used a 24mm for B&W and a 37-70f2.8 for the color pictures. Came out to be some of the best candids I’ve ever seen and he did capture everything that was interesting and important to us. * Sent from RemarQ http://www.remarq.com The Internet’s Discussion Network * The fastest and easiest way to search and participate in Usenet – Free!
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The Tamron is soft, but that is sometimes a plus for portraits. I use a Sigma 28-105 f2.8-4 for most of my portraits because it isn’t tack sharp and doesn’t make zits and hairs pop out on film. All truth be told, I do wish it was a little sharper on occasion, bute for less than $200, it works great for me. I have other lenses that I use when I need sharpness. I really like the idea of a Canon 28-135 USM IS for candid work. The extra 30mm would come in handy sometimes. A lot of the wedding photographers I know shoot the posed shots with a medium format and then a 35mm with a 70-200 f2.8. If you get the 28-135 and a Kenko Pro 300 1.4x (you’ll retain AF), you should be set, in my opinion. -Brett – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – First please excuse my english it isn’t my main language. I been photographing family and friends weddings for about a year, now I’m thinking about doing it more seriously (read billing) so I want to get better equipment. Right now my setup is the following: Canon EOS Elan IIe Canon EF 28-80 USM Canon 380EX Speedlight Canon Off Camera Shoe Cord 2 Canon EF 75-300 USM Stroboframe Camera Flip Bracket Omnibounce C Kodak Portra 400 I would like to change the 28-80 for something in the class of Canon 28- 135 USM IS and a Canon 135 F2.8 soft focus (for portraits) or Tamron 28- 105 f2.8 so I have biger apertures to throw the background out of focus and more in the tele range. Thanks in advance for your advices. Before you buy.
Before you buy.
Response:
I have the Tamron 28-105 f2.8 lens, and cannot recommend it for any application where sharpness is an issue. Also, low light AF performance on my Minolta 800si sucked. It’s also really heavy. Even with the $100 rebate I got from Tamron, it wasn’t worth it. Carey L. Jones
The bokeh stinks, too. A year or so ago, I was considering buying one. I took some pix in the store, and a very nice guy on this ng mailed me some wedding pix that he took with it, and it instantly convinced me not go get it because of the sharpness and bokeh issues. Instead, I got the Nikkor 28-70 / 2.8 AFS (as an upgrade to my Nikkor 35-70 / 2.8), and have been totally pleased. Tom Washington, DC
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The bokeh stinks, too. A year or so ago, I was considering buying one. I took some pix in the store, and a very nice guy on this ng mailed me some wedding pix that he took with it, and it instantly convinced me not go get it because of the sharpness and bokeh issues.
PMFJI, what’s a bokeh? Bernard Hill Selkirk, Scotland
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<<PMFJI, what’s a bokeh? The diaphragm/aperature of the lens. If it’s not bokeh, don’t fix it. Kent in SD
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The bokeh stinks, too. A year or so ago, I was considering buying one. I took some pix in the store, and a very nice guy on this ng mailed me some wedding pix that he took with it, and it instantly convinced me not go get it because of the sharpness and bokeh issues. PMFJI, what’s a bokeh?
"Bokeh" is a Japanese word which describes the beauty or softness of the out-of-focus areas of a photograph. For a decent illustration, see http://www.photozone.de/lenstec.htm There are many other web pages with examples of "bokeh". You might do a search on the word using "googol" as your search engine. — http://www.members.home.net/ckross Digital and film-based photography
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It’s what Leica owners claim makes their equipment superior to everything else. -Brett The bokeh stinks, too. A year or so ago, I was considering buying one. I took some pix in the store, and a very nice guy on this ng mailed me some wedding pix that he took with it, and it instantly convinced me not go get it because of the sharpness and bokeh issues. PMFJI, what’s a bokeh? Bernard Hill Selkirk, Scotland
Before you buy.
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<<PMFJI, what’s a bokeh? The diaphragm/aperature of the lens. If it’s not bokeh, don’t fix it. Kent in SD
1) You tell me "what’s a PMFJI", and I’ll tell you "what’s a bokeh". 2) The shape of the diaphragm / limiting aperture of a lens contributes to the rendition of out-of-focus points, but is clearly not the whole issue. This has been discussed many times before on this NG, but the quick and total rebuttal to any comment that this is the major effect can be had by noting that Nikon sells two "DC" lenses called allow the user to adjust the bokeh without touching the diaphragm setting (including wide open – ie, no diaphragm, just various limiting apertures as the light transits the lens due to the size of the various glass elements and stops). The adjustability of bokeh in these lenses means that you can (to a modest degree) make either foreground or background objects softer. Do a search like someone else suggested and you should find hundreds of postings on bokeh. Cheers, Tom PS – to the guy in Scotland – Great country!!! (biased perhaps because some of my ancestors were from there)… My family and I will likely be visiting (again) in July. I plan on showing them Skye (among other places).
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1) You tell me "what’s a PMFJI", and I’ll tell you "what’s a bokeh".
PMFJI but PMFJI means "Pardon me for jumping in". Sorry, ISTR it is standard NG speak <g. Bernard Hill Braeburn Software Author of Music Publisher system Music Software written by musicians for musicians http://www.braeburn.co.uk Selkirk, Scotland 01750 21854 +44 1750 21854
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The bokeh stinks, too. A year or so ago, I was considering buying one. I took some pix in the store, and a very nice guy on this ng mailed me some wedding pix that he took with it, and it instantly convinced me not go get it because of the sharpness and bokeh issues. PMFJI, what’s a bokeh?
I believe it’s a turf accountant with a mouth full of crackers
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