Lens question

[Upatdawn]

I have a Nikon d5300 with the 18-140mm lens

as its a "cropped sensor" camera is that the same as a (say) 30mm-200mm (ish)?


what would a nice portrait lens be (this side of the national debt)

what would a wide angle lens need to be to BE wide angle?


cheers

[Simpo Two]

It will have the same field of view as a 27-210mm lens on a 35mm 'full frame' body (the Nikon crop factor is 1.5x).

A 50mm ('standard') f1.8 lens makes a good portrait lens, as it's effectively 75mm and gives shallow DOF - for about £80.

Anything shorter than 'standard' - which on a crop sensor is 30-35mm - is arguably wide angle. The shorter the focal length the wider it is; 18mm is certainly wide angle.

[steveatesh]

Like Simpo says, the 50mm prime is the route I went down alongside the 18-140 you have already.

I got mine from here

http://www.hdewcameras.co.uk/nikon-af-s-dx-nikkor-...

At £129, and great service.

I'm still getting to know it though, I jumped straight into 1.8 and ended up with some poor portrait results. Advice from Simpo and others proved invaluable in using it! Very sharp if you get it right.

Best of luck with your selection.

[Upatdawn]

ref wide angle, how wide before its a fisheye? do all w/a become fisheye under a certain mm?

[RobDickinson]

Upatdawn said:

ref wide angle, how wide before its a fisheye? do all w/a become fisheye under a certain mm?

FIsheye is a style of lens, but usually very wide.

Most lenses are rectaliniar, ie straight lines are straight, fisheye this isnt corrected so the are curved.
So you can get very wide rectaliniar lenses or fisheyes ( which tend to produce full circle images etc)

[WWA]

steveatesh said:

Like Simpo says, the 50mm prime is the route I went down alongside the 18-140 you have already.

I got mine from here

http://www.hdewcameras.co.uk/nikon-af-s-dx-nikkor-...

At £129, and great service.

I'm still getting to know it though, I jumped straight into 1.8 and ended up with some poor portrait results. Advice from Simpo and others proved invaluable in using it! Very sharp if you get it right.

Best of luck with your selection.

Hi, any chance you could link into the thread where you received advice on using the 50? Thanks

[steveatesh]

WWA said:

Hi, any chance you could link into the thread where you received advice on using the 50? Thanks

Here you go:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

[rich888]

steveatesh said:

WWA said:

Hi, any chance you could link into the thread where you received advice on using the 50? Thanks

Here you go:

http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Thank you so much for that link because I've been looking for it also

Is the 50mm lens the best one to be using with a camera with a crop sensor rather than full frame, was reading a thread several weeks ago which went into considerable depth regarding this and seem to recollect that a 30mm or 40mm lens might be better - once again can't find the damn thread!

[Simpo Two]

rich888 said:

Is the 50mm lens the best one to be using with a camera with a crop sensor rather than full frame, was reading a thread several weeks ago which went into considerable depth regarding this and seem to recollect that a 30mm or 40mm lens might be better - once again can't find the damn thread!

It depends on the angle of view you want. On a 35mm camera a 50mm lens gives roughly the same as what you see, hence 'standard'. On a crop sensor camera this angle becomes narrower, ie gets less in, ie is slightly telephoto.

If you want roughly the same as what you see on a crop sensor, then look at 35mm lenses or thereabouts.

[WWA]

rich888 said:

Thank you so much for that link because I've been looking for it also

Is the 50mm lens the best one to be using with a camera with a crop sensor rather than full frame, was reading a thread several weeks ago which went into considerable depth regarding this and seem to recollect that a 30mm or 40mm lens might be better - once again can't find the damn thread!

Thank you for that, very interesting read.

[steveatesh]

rich888 said:

Thank you so much for that link because I've been looking for it also

Is the 50mm lens the best one to be using with a camera with a crop sensor rather than full frame, was reading a thread several weeks ago which went into considerable depth regarding this and seem to recollect that a 30mm or 40mm lens might be better - once again can't find the damn thread!

All I can offer is my brief experience and observation which is that there would be a risk with a 35 MM. that you have to be closer to the subject which makes it look a little distorted. So with a portrait the nose make go out of proportion for example.

The 50 allows you to be that little further away to help avoid it.

I have read that on full frame many people like the 85mm prime or the 70-200 2.8 zoom lens for portraits which I guess is for the same reason.

That was the main reason I picked the 50 for my current crop camera. If you have a kit lens, try setting it to 50 and 35 and take some shots to see what effect it has, I did that and it helped in my decision making.

[andy-xr]

General portraity people stuff - 35mm
General bit closer up people stuff - 50mm
Headshots, head and shoulders - 85/135mm

The closer you get to filling the frame with a face, the further away you need to be to avoid wonkyhead from lens distortion