Lens Baby

[Flaming]

Even though I am not about to spend $300 on a lens (I am a college student and my car just cost a lot to get back to running order), I would love to hear from the people who already have the Lens Baby. Any comments are welcome, especially if you might have suggestions on how it can be used for better effects and the like. I would also really like to see PICTURES! lots and lots of them. The more the better as far as I am concerned.


Happy shooting and sharing, []


Samuel

[nickds7]

I've used the lensbaby composer a bit, hardest thing is focusing



Some stuff:





Ilove it, but I may be selling it in a month or two.

[Sheiky]

Hey Samuel,


I tried the composer as well in store, so I don't have any pictures left. It was just a lensbaby stand. I liked the composer a lot and the effect you get at even a centered composer is pretty cool and it was even sharper than I've expected!


Really cool lens to play around with. I tried it on my 5DII and when I pushed the lensbaby to maximum tilt/shift whatever you call it, vignetting was pretty hard. On a crop I don't think it would be much of a problem. When you shoot at certain angles, the focussing gets really hard and sharpness in center is OK, but at the edges it's hard to get good results.


Still...for what money can buy it is an awesome lens which can give you amazing creative detail, but it's not easy. Perhaps you like a little challenge? [H]


Oh and please don't buy the matching tele and wideangle converters unless you've tried it, they were rubbish on my camera. Vignetting almost half the frame with the teleconverter...pfff moneywaste in my eyes. At least on a fullframe camera, don't know about crop.


Jan

[Flaming]

Thanks for the replies. Those shots are really cool.


I would enjoy the challenge of a lens like this. The only thing would be figuring out what subjects to shoot. I am often wandering around and finding subjects that are not all that interesting. A couple of reasons the lens seems interesting to me are its fairly fast and it is a prime. I only have one lens right now and it is a zoom. I borrowed a 85mm f/1.8 from a friend for a week or two last semester and really enjoyed how I was restricted by the lens which made me concentrate on the shots I was taking. I had a fairly good set of shots that week. A much higher keeper rate than I usually do with my zoom. So those are some things that I have had in mind as I have looked around to try and find a second lens.


Samuel

[Shea Design]

Neat exposures,.. and nice to see I'm not the only one tilting glass around here!


-Shea

[gbc]

I got the Lensbaby Muse as a christmas gift. It's cheaper than the composer, at $100. It's fun, but it's tough to focus. It produces a really dreamy effect. These are the first shots I took.


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Not great, but I haven't had a lot of time to practice with this. It is nice, though, to practice focusing and composing without all the whiz bang gadgetry of the modern dslr. You even have to change the aperture manually, by inserting small disks into the lens.

[Sheiky]

I would enjoy the challenge of a lens like this. The only thing would be figuring out what subjects to shoot.

In that case I think the lensbaby will challenge you enough and I think you would like it. Look at what a tilt-shift lens can do with just ordinary objects and scenes. There might be more subjects to shoot than you've ever imagined []


I don't have the experience, but I think still scenes and objects should be great to shoot, but I'm not entirely sure about moving subjects and spontaneous portraits. But hey I might be wrong!





...challenge accepted? [A]


Oh and speaking about primes...the 50mm f1.8 could also be a nice lens to try? I would recommend to try the lensbaby somewhere and see what you like.


Good luck and enjoy!


Jan

[Flaming]

Again, great shots all around. Love the look of them.


Shea, it is great to have you on the blog, by the way, and I love those compositions you have posted. Cool work.


Jan, I do accept the challenge the only thing now is to pony up the cash for the composer. I have thought about the 50mm f/1.8 often. I really like the idea of a small cheap lens, but sometimes I wonder if the IQ will disappoint me when I shoot wide open. I also have a USM right now and it seems like the 50's AF might be a little irritating. Maybe I should just go for it and worry about the IQ later when I really do have money and a good reason to worry about it.


Thanks again,


Samuel

[Sheiky]

Jan, I do accept the challenge the only thing now is to pony up the cash for the composer. I have thought about the 50mm f/1.8 often. I really like the idea of a small cheap lens, but sometimes I wonder if the IQ will disappoint me when I shoot wide open. I also have a USM right now and it seems like the 50's AF might be a little irritating. Maybe I should just go for it and worry about the IQ later when I really do have money and a good reason to worry about it.

Well I've had one and I never was satisfied with it. Hated the AF, but I know a lot of people who really love this lens. Speaking about IQ, the 50 f1.8 will definitely beat the lensbaby wide open and even totally stopped down. You shouldn't buy a lensbaby for it's amazing imagequality, but for it's capabilities. You can compare both lenses iso charts on Bryans reviews.


About the AF of the 50mm, I think it's pretty ok, but manual focus isn't really usable due the small and cheap construction and the sound it makes and turning it does while auto-focussing might give you the idea it's very slow.


If image-quality is a major concern, the 50 1.8 will win hands down, but for creativity I would personally buy a lensbaby before buying a 50mm 1.8.


Good luck saving and hopefully we'll see some nice pictures from you later on, or perhaps now? [A]


Jan

[nickds7]

I think there is some confusion here (or im reading it wrong)... lensbaby has no AF. MF only.Creativelyspeaking, the lensbaby is excellent. It is easy to get some boring dull shots with it though.