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An example of an image made with a Nikon Zf; 40mm f/2 lens (click to enlarge) |
When I first started in photography in 1971, there were almost no zoom lenses that were available. Well, that may technically not be true but I'll qualify that by saying there were no zoom lenses worth buying even from the major camera manufacturers (but possibly only for cinema cameras?). Around the mid-1970s, Vivitar came out with a 70-210mm f/3.5 Series 1 zoom lens—a push/pull style zoom lens. Later they came out with a 35-85mm vari-focal lens—not a true zoom as you had to refocus every time you changed focal lengths. Nikon had a 43-86mm zoom, but it was not very good. Both of the Vivitar lenses were introduced to 'rave' reviews by the major camera magazine reviewers at the time. I saved as much as my meager salary as I could over a long period of time and eventually bought both. I just saw a lot of potential in using zoom lenses rather than continually changing lenses when a different focal length was needed. Zooms were (and are) fast and convenient.
Those two lenses fundamentally changed the way I photographed. Later, Vivitar introduced a 90-180mm Flat Field f/4.5 Macro lens. It was even sharper than the other two. Since then, I've always favored zooms even though for most of my decades shooting film, I continued to use prime lenses for my paid work. It was only when zoom lenses were universally good and prolific did I switch to primarily using zooms. Using zoom lenses made life much easier. Much.
Since going digital, my habit has been to continue to use zoom lenses but also own one prime lens for each of my systems. That lens is typically a fast, semi-wide angle to use indoors, whether in a museum, birthday parties for grandchildren, outdoors in very low light or even on a rare occasion to reduce the size and weight of my camera kit by carrying only a prime. That said, I almost never use them regularly.
Keeping up with the photo industry, I've seen the proliferation of third party prime lenses mostly from Asian countries. Some aren't so good, it seems, but some are reviewed as rivaling the OEM lenses that come from the manufacturer of your DSLR or Mirrorless camera. I've been tempted to buy several but, in the back of my head, logic told me I'm a 'zoom guy' and won't get the use out of primes. Buying several OEM primes can be very expensive and not using them often doesn't make much financial sense. Well, that has now changed.
Several weeks ago, I wrote a post about why fixed lens, single focal length cameras wouldn’t work for me and the types of subjects I photograph. But it got me wondering if I could make a single focal length work. You can read that post here. Intrigue turned into a challenge to myself. I've decided to go (partially) old school and try a few primes to begin with and then maybe only one if I find myself getting by mainly with just one. Over the holiday shopping period I bought a few primes to use when going out and photographing. I didn't want to spend a lot of money as this is mostly an experiment so I did my research and put together a relatively inexpensive kit that I fully intend to use on a regular basis. Not exclusively, but regularly. (We'll see how this actually goes...?)
So, I'm going 'old school' for lenses but I'm not (and never will) go fully 'old school' and go back to film. Thirty plus years of shooting film was enough. Too much hassle and not nearly as versatile as compared to the convenience of digital photography.
Going one step farther, I am going to try to use primarily two lenses—the 40mm f/2 and 28mm f/2.8 Nikkors. Why two? Twenty-eight millimeters, 35mm and 40mm are the typical focal lengths attached to single focal length, fixed lens cameras. I’m not sure which will work best for me in the most situations so I am, in essence, hedging my bet, so to speak. If I can, with time, narrow these two down to one and if I choose to buy a fixed focal length camera in the future, I’ll know which focal length is the best choice. That is IF I could be happy with a fixed lens, single focal length camera even though I could readily make arguments against using only one focal length. I'll write more about that in the future.
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(click to enlarge) |
Here is my current experimental kit for photographing in the near future. My goal was better than just good quality but not too costly.
-Nikon Zf full frame 24mp camera (produces probably the overall best image quality in every type of situation of any digital camera I've owned)
-Viltrox 20mm f/2.8 AF lens (a surprisingly good lens; plastic build, but that's okay)
-Nikon 28mm f/2.8 SE AF lens (not the very best 28mm lens but more than 'good enough')
-Nikon 40mm f/2 SE AF lens (punches way above its weight in image quality; my copy is stellar)
-Yongnuo 85mm f/1.8 AF lens (amazingly good lens; all metal; pin sharp!)
I'm sure there are other variations of this combination. Some of you may want a wider angle than 20mm and others more telephoto than 85mm. Some may want faster lenses. But for my photography, this should suffice for most of my work (obviously it won't work for birds and wildlife). I would be interested in your prime kit, if you shoot primes, and why you chose the camera and lenses that you did.
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Amtrak train #94. Three-quarters backlit test shot with the Nikkor 28mm f/2.8 lens. Better lens than many will admit. 1/1600th sec. @ f/8; ISO 800 (click to enlarge) |
With all of the Black Friday and Christmas sales, I thought it was a perfect time to pick up a couple of inexpensive primes. In December this kit could be put together for relatively little money as compared to what one would normally spend. Nikon recently had the Zf + the 40mm f/2 lens refurbished for $1800 (they will put them on sale again, be patient). The Viltrox 20mm f/2.8 lens was $150. The Nikon 28mm f/2.8 lens was about $300 and the Yongnuo 85mm f/1.8 lens was also $300. So, you could pretty much duplicate this whole full frame kit for about $2500 US. That sum won't buy you only a camera body from most of the manufacturers today.
So, I'll see how this little experiment works. My goal is to create an environment to re-invigorate my photography—i.e., try something different. I've been in a creative slump for the past few months and I'm looking to change the way I do things in order to light a spark of new creativity. Will it work? I hope so but if it doesn't, I still have some inexpensive but great gear to use.
If you are in a creative slump, change things up and see if that helps bring back some of your photographic enthusiasm. Come back for periodic updates on how I fare with this kit.
ADDITIONALLY: I was asked what prime lenses I primarily used back in the film days when I was shooting events, weddings, stock, corporate and commercial assignments. At different times I used both Nikon and Canon and my kit primarily was a 24mm f/2.8, 35mm f/2, 50mm f/1.4, 85mm f/? or 105mm f/2.5 and a 180mm or 200mm f/2.8. I used both a Nikon F2A and a Canon F1 as main cameras. Later I also added a 20mm f/2.8 before switching to zoom lenses.
Thanks for looking. Enjoy!
Dennis A. Mook
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Very interesting experiment. Will be interested in the results and your assessment.
ReplyDeleteI photographed for many years using only prime lenses, usually on cameras that had a bellows. Most used focal lengths were the slightly wider than normal, the very wide, and then the slightly longer. That would be an equivalent of 20, 35, 65, or 105 in 35mm. As I am in the process of digitizing many old film images, I can see I should have prioritized the longer focal lengths.
Often, I would recognize a potential scene for an image, then when I moved closer to better fill the frame, I would find the spatial organization or particular look of the scene had changed. In other words, the scene that attracted my attention was the one back where I originally stood. That situation is easily remedied these days by bracketing with various focal lengths of a zoom lens. In the prime days, I did not own enough lenses to give myself a second choice when later reviewing the images.
I note that on the DXO lens site, the Yongnuo 85 is one of the highest rated for sharpness of any lens regardless of price.
Thank you for your comment. After falling in love with photography in 1971 using a 35mm camera I wanted to learn the Zone System so I bought a 4X5 camera, a 120mm f/8 Schneider Super Angulon lens and a 210mm F5.6 Nikkor (I think?) lens. I learned the Zone System using those two lenses but then moved back to 35mm and mostly medium format as I found that the 4X5 was just too cumbersome for the kinds of photography I was doing. I still have my 4X5 black & white negatives in individual glassines. Yes, the Yongnuo is an exquisite lens. I look forward to getting some use out of it. ~Dennis
DeleteWhy did you decide to do the experiment with FF instead of MFT?
ReplyDelete