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I am looking to pick up a lens with good quality bokeh for portraits (indoor and out) on my Rebel XT, without spending an arm and a leg. I'm not terribly concerned with low light, as I have two speedlites. My main concerns are image quality and bokeh.
Any suggestions between theses two?
I loved my 70-200 f/4 (so much so that I later bought a 70-200 f/2.8 IS and then the mark ii). But if you only care about IQ and bokeh, I would suggest the the 85 f/1.8, unless you think you'll be stopping down for DOF (head & shoulder shots of children may well require stopping down from f/1.8). If you need to stop down to f/4 anyway (or even close), the longer focal length will give you more blur.
I highly recommend the EF 85mm f/1.8. Excellent IQ, wide aperture for good OOF blur, and the bokeh (quality) is very nice.
How sharp is the 85mm at f/1.8 when in the field? According to the lens comparison of TDP (and judging my from 50mm f/1.8, assuming they'd be similiar), the 85mm is rather soft until f/4, whereas the 70-200 starts off sharp at f/4. If I'm going to be stopping down the the 85mm to f/4 to get sharp shots, why not get more versitility from the 70-200 at f/4?
also, does the 70-200 give good OOF blur at f/4?
I am looking for both sharp shots, and pleasing bokeh, not just one or the other. Would either of these lenses give me both?
I purchased the 85mm 1.8 a few years back and loved that lens. At the time I had a Rebel XTI and pretty much left the 85 on it for a lot of my shots. I loved the amount of bokeh, had to get used to the razer sharp DOF at 1.8, but loved that lens. The only reason I do not currently use it is because I bought a 40d a few years back and threw on a 24-70
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Originally Posted by realityinabox
I think it does, I could give you a few example photos if I have some at f4.
To be honest your choice would be easier if you had a more versatile use for your lens. The fact that you want to do portraiture as a maingoal I instantly thought 85mm 1.8, but I also like the 70-200 f4 for it's versatility and it's immediate sharpness at f4.
You should ask yourself a few questions.
Would you use the versatility of the zoom or could you live with a prime?
Remember that you need a faster shutterspeed when shooting handheld with the 70-200. Especially when using the longer end of the lens. This also applies inside [:P]
And you're limited to f4, which could be meaning that you'd have to bump up the iso to higher values and thus losing the sharp at f4 advantage.
It's a white lens and some people find that distracting. (Important point if you have to photograph shy people occasionally?? Family-portraits etc)
I have never used the 85mm 1.8 so I can't really tell you more on that part than you could read around here, but the 70-200 CAN be used as a portrait lens, that's for sure. If it's a good tool, that's up to you. What lenses do you have anyways?
Good luck,
Jan
I have a Sigma 28-70 f/2.8 (which is pretty soft most of the time) and a 50mm f/1.8.
I've also been thinking about upgrading the Sigma. It is a question of more range versus solidifying my general purpose range.
solidifying my general purpose range will be more expensive. I've thought about the 17-55, the 24-70 and the 24-105, all of which are over a grand.
- 17-55, I hear good things about this lens, but my Rebel XT is getting rather old and the possibility of going full frame on my next body upgrade is quite likely.
- 24-70, more expensive (the wife is already tense about me thinking about spending a grand, so $1400 wouldn't help my case)
- 24-105, the f/4 might be too slow to get good OOF isolation, and I hear (and see) that the bokeh isn't all that pleasing.
So really, ideally, I'd have about an extra $1,000 to spend, I'd get a 5D1 and a 24-70L and be a happy camper. Problem is, I'm over $1,000 short.
Which is why I'm considering sticking with my sub-par Sigma and solidifying the long end with the 85mm f/1.8 or the 70-200 f/4L.
Thoughts?
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Originally Posted by realityinabox
Hihi....I know how that feels [A]
Well yeah now I remember your other post. I suggested to get a great basic gear and was voting for the 17-55. But if you're so serious about going full-frame, this wouldn't be the best option. By the way that lens has increased in price enormously the last 6 months...wow... It is even higher priced than the 24-105 in BULK[:O] and you wouldn't even get a lens-hood with it [:@]
Quote:
Originally Posted by realityinabox
I personally like it a lot and I've seen great shots made by it (by other people). I still remain with my advice by getting your basic gear right. If your sigma isn't performing you'll probably use it even less when buying any of the lenses you mention. I would just sell it.
If it still wouldn't fit your budget, the 70-200 starts to look better. I assumed you'd mainly use it for portraiture, but since your sigma isn't such a high-performer, you could also find yourself using a 70-200 for more general purposes. With great image quality. And you'd keep the Sigma for the times you need a wider field of view.
Anaother thought: With the 85mm you would find yourself wanting the same quality out of your general-purpose lens, but you can't get that and the 85mm would be to static to use as a proper general-purpose-lens. In that case you'd be better off with a zoom lens.
I hope I puzzeled you a bit [:P]
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Originally Posted by realityinabox
Depends on the situation and what you mean by "good OOF blur"
Keep in mind that subject distance and background distance matter a *lot*
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Originally Posted by Jon Ruyle
I mean both quantity and quality. Good isolation of the subject, as well as smooth blurring of the background.
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Originally Posted by realityinabox
Here are a few I could find in a quick search, both shot at f4:
50D with 70-200 f4L @ 100mm - f4 - 1/250 - iso-100 - subject-distance 1.4m(according to exif)
http://www.fruityview.nl/tdp/70200blur.jpg
50D with 70-200 f4L @ 70mm - f4 - 1/1600 - iso-400 - subject-distance 7m(according to exif)
http://www.fruityview.nl/tdp/70200blur2.jpg
Both images are uncropped, so original dimensions.
Also take a look at Pixel-Peeper and use their advance search option.
Good luck, Jan
Quote:
Originally Posted by realityinabox
Both have good quality bokeh (though neither is corrected for bokeh over sharpness).
Quantity depends on what you're shooting. If you cut subject size in half, aperture to get the same DOF doubles. I think f/4 is fine for head/shoulder portraits (esp children), though on a crop body, faster might be better. (On full frame, I sometimes stop down to f/5.6 when taking a picture of a child's head). If you're taking a picture of something really big, even f/1.2 may not be as fast as you want.
It also depends on how far back the background is. With a close background, f/1.8 will show more blur, and f/1.8 will isolate the subject better. But if the background is far enough back, 200 f/4 will actually about the same blur than 85 f/1.8 (aperture dominates as you approach infinity). Longer lenses also give anappearanceof more blur by magnifying background details.
Not simple. In short: to isolate subject, I would choose the 85. To get a creamy looking distant background while keeping the entire subject in focus, I would choose 70-200 f/4.
Look at Jan two pictures taken at f/4. Notice how different the owl (small subject) looks from the two people (big subject). In the first picture, f/1.8 would have given too shallow a DOF for the tastes of many, and the blur at f/4 is already great. For the second, I think even f/1.8 would not have eliminated the background (though it would have done a better job relegating it to background status).
The second looks like it was taken with a rather short focal length... less than 200mm anyway. At 200mm there would have less background visible.
Quote:
Originally Posted by realityinabox
This is critically dependent on Jon's other point, "Keep in mind that subject distance and background distance matter a *lot*."
In other words, the 70-200mm f/4Lcan give a lot of OOF blur with decent bokeh - but it's up to you as a photographer to make that happen. The70-200mm f/4L and the 85mm f/1.8 both have 8-bladed apertures, so the quality(bokeh)of OOF blur will be good. But, f/4 is generally not ideal for quantity of OOF blur. That means if you want to isolate your subject, you need some degree of physical isolation, too. Here's an example:
[img]/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer.Components.UserFiles/00.00.00.35.15/Sparrow_2700_s-Landing.jpg[/img]
EOS 7D,EF 70-200mm f/2.8<span style="color: red;"]LIS II USM + EF 1.4x II Extender @ 280mm, 1/2000 s, f/6.3, ISO 3200
Please excuse/ignore the apparent lack of sharpness - yesterday morning was my only chance this week to get out and shoot, it was dim and there was a heavy and misty drizzle falling when I took the shot (actually, it rained the whole day [:(] ). Thank goodness for weather-sealed lenses and body!
My point here is that the subject is very well-isolated and the forest in the background is blurred completely out, even at the relatively narrow aperture of f/6.3. That's because the focal length is long (280mm), the sparrow was somewhat close for a bird (~25 feet, I guess), and the forest was ~60 feet behind the sparrow.
Back to the lenses in question. With the 85mm f/1.8 @ f/1.8, you can take a portrait shot a few feet from your subject with the background a couple of feet behind the subject, and get decent OOF blur. You don't have to work very hard to blur out the background. With the 70-200mm f/4, you'll need more distance between subject and background, and you'd want to be using the longest focal length you can (in the space available), and be as close to your subject as possible, all to minimize the DoF.
Here are a couple more examples I just ran across. The field of view is the same, the subject is the same (although she's in different stages of readiness for the evening out), the background is the same, and she's standing in the same place relative to the couch behind her - so, these shots are identical in terms of framing and subject-to-background distance.
[img]/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer.Components.UserFiles/00.00.00.35.15/IMG_5F00_2569.jpg[/img] [img]/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer.Components.UserFiles/00.00.00.35.15/IMG_5F00_2585.jpg[/img]
T1i,EF 85mm f/1.8 USM,1/100 s, f/2.2, ISO 1600 T1i,EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM @ 33mm, 1/60 s, f/4, ISO 200
As you can see, the OOF blur is much stronger at 85mm f/2.2 (which is not even wide open for that lens). Of course, this isn't a completely fair comparison because of the different focal lengths (DoF is thinner with longer focal length for the same subject framing), however since the framing is the same, I was much closer to her with the 33mm shot on the right (DoF thinner with closer subject).
A lot of it will come down to how much room you have - if you'll be able to use the zoom at the long end for your shots and have even more room to place your subject further from the background, the 70-200 f/4L should work.
On the whole, I think that if your primary goal is portraits and you plan to shoot some of them indoors, your best bet is theEF 85mm f/1.8. One point to note, though is that to get the same benefits of that wide aperture outside you might need to use an ND filter on the prime lens (likely a 3-stop/0.9/8x).
Alright I updated my photos with exif inclusive subject-distances(never saw that one in exif before).
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Originally Posted by Jon Ruyle
The Owl's head is about as big as John's daughters head [;)]
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Originally Posted by Jon Ruyle
You're right about that.
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Originally Posted by Jon Ruyle
Both are. The owl is shot at 100mm and the guys are shot at 70mm. In these examples the greatest variable is probable distance to subject. 1.4m vs 7m. And also the 30mm focal difference and subject-size, which made the composition different.
I bet that a head-portrait at 70mm f4 could look pretty good and with a nicely blurred background. Keeping in mind of course that the subject-background-distance also needs some space.
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Originally Posted by neuroanatomist
Roger that!
I only showed my photos to show that the 70-200 CAN produce very nicely blurred backgrounds and isolation of the subject if taken by a person who knows his/her lens.
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Originally Posted by neuroanatomist
Not even close to a completely fair comparison if you ask me [A]
I'll look for a few more examples if I have some more at f4
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Originally Posted by Sheiky
You're right. DoF at 85mm, f/2.2, and 10 feet is half the depth of 33mm, f/4 and 4 feet.
Ok, I was a little biased. [6] I just really like the 85mm f/1.8 lens. So much so that I'm planning on getting the 85mm f/1.2L II!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sheiky
I think this is the main point - bokeh (quality) of OOF blur will be similar between the 85mm f/1.8 and the 70-200mm f/4L. But, getting a good quantity of OOF blur is generally going to be easier with the 85mm f/1.8. That's probably one reason I liked the 85mm f/1.8 so much in the first place - open it up to f/1.8-2, take one step closer to your subject, and BAM - you've got good OOF blur without paying much attention to the background.
As you say, if you know your lens, you can certainly get there with the 70-200mm f/4L. Most of the time, for 'around the house' random opportunities for portrait-like shots, there's just not enough space for sufficient subject-to-background separation for f/4 to do the job. But for 'real' portraits, i.e. setting up a background, picking the right spot in a park, etc., the f/4 zoom would do nicely, I think.
just curious what you decided...lot of good info in this thread - from the DOF calculations to good ol' "I just like x better than y"
I'd recommend the 1.8 for one reason - budget. An "arm and a leg" is different for everyone of course but I'm guessing < $600? Even with a $1000 budget I'd get the 1.8 because I would rule out the non-IS versions of the 70-200s.
The convenience of a zoom is great and all the Canon 70-200 Ls are excellent. But they're expensive. I would pass on a non-IS zoom in that range because I believe the benefits of IS are well worth the wait. Even the older 2- and 3-stop versions make a big difference.
So if budget, IQ and bokeh were my main considerations I would rule out zoom lenses.
I'd go for the ~3 more stops of light-gathering and buy the 1.8. Then when your budget allows buy one of the IS L zooms.
Bokeh quality is largely Dependant on composure, distance to subject vs. distance to backgroundand focal length.
[url="http://www.flickr.com/photos/jakeandmelissawright/4007150322/in/set-72157622463216523/]http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2520/...989b2950ae.jpg[/url]
[b]06/24/2008[/b] XSi w/ EF 75-300mm f/4-5.6 USM II,1/500, f/8.0, 300 mm, Iso 200
If you are close enough to the subject and frame it with a distant bland background even a POS lens can get a fairly nice blur with a slow aperture.This is one of my earliest DSLR shots.
<span style="font-family: 'Arial', 'sans-serif'; color: #000000; font-size: 8pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-themecolor: text1; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman';"]http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3315/...54e17f8a3b.jpg
04/04/2010 XSi w/EF 70-200mm f/2.8 L USM (NON-IS), 1/3200, f2.8, 120mm, Iso 200
Reguardless between the 70-200mm f/4 L USM andthe EF 85mm f/1.8 I'd go forthe EF 85mm f/1.8 it's next on my list. (I thinkI'd get an ND filter for it in the same order to make it more usable wide open, or near it, inbright conditions.)
So, call me crazy for pulling this one (kind of) out of left field, but I saw a good deal on the 24-70L on BH and I pulled the trigger. $1049 used in good condition, 9+ on their scale, $150 less than any other used 24-70L I've seen.
I'm still not 100% sure it was a good decision, but I figured with a deal like that, I couldn't pass it up. Plus, I have 15 days to return it if it that deal was really too good to be true. We'll see.
To be honest with you I think you've made a good choice. When I was using a 40D, I found even my 50mm f/1.8 a bit long for portraits and had to stand at least10m away with the 70-200mm f/4L IS to get a full body portrait.
So the 85mm f/1.8, although it's a fantastic lens, would be too long for me on a crop sensor. The 24-70mm will give you a good amount of background blur (at great quality) with some flexibility in that it's a zoom. On FF it's a dream but I haven't tried it out on the 40D since moving to FF.
The 17-55mm f/2.8 IS would have been a similarly good choice but I understand you eventually want to go FF. In that case you've made a great choice because the 24-70 is built like a tank and will last you for years.
Have fun, Ben.
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Originally Posted by realityinabox
Great deal!
Now you've managed to do 2 things...and get a good lens for portraiture and get a great general-purpose lens to replace your sigma and a small benefit: it's usable on FF as well [;)]
Great one! Enjoy it as much as you can!
Excellent move! If you've never bought used from B&H before you're in for a nice surprise. When they rate something 8+ or above it is very hard to tell it's a used item. Close inspection, sure. But at a glance and to any casual observer it'll look new. And as you noted, 2 weeks to return, no questions asked, full refund. God I love that store!
This was a 9+? Fuggedaboutit - it'll look brandy new. [:)]
The 24-70 has one of the best reputations of any lens out there short of the Leica glass, which of course is (at least) 4x as expensive!
With the IQ of that lens, even wide open, and a new-ish body you'll be able to shoot 1600 in low light no problem; not have to worry about under-exposing and getting overly noisy images. I know you said low-light wasn't a consideration as you work with strobes but you'll be happy to have the option anyway.
Congratulations!
24-70 is my most used lens. You can also catch Annie Leibovitz shooting with it quite often (when she is shooting her 1Ds).
Well dang guys... I was a little iffy as I hit place order last night (big purchase), but these comments are making me feel a lot better about it.
Can't wait for Wednesday now. Should have picked faster shipping, haha.