Demise of the ' standard ' lens ?

Aside from viewfinder dimness and inreased depth of field at maximim aperture, a slowish lens is not really a problem for the modern DSLR IMO. With accurate and rapid auto focus not to mention sensors geared towards high ISO a slow zoom should be adequate ... and that's without taking image stabilization into consideration!
 
I can't comment on DSLRs with primes or zooms. I don't own one. I do have a 35mm kit of a Yashica FX 103, an 18-28mm zoom, 28-70mm zoom, 75-150mm zoom, and a 50mm f/1.4. With care, I find those zooms, (even the 18-28 Sam Sung) quite alright. But note I do have the 50mm. I just can't let it go.

I am experiencing a yearning to return to prime use only. I think I am going to do some experimenting with that idea. I never really liked some of the early zooms I had. The primes seemed so much better. An 80-200 went with me an awfully lot, but really didn't get used that much. And when I did, I wasn't really happy with the results. But the newer zooms, even from "non-pro" firms seem nice.

Just my point of view.
 
Interesting discussion. I use zooms on my DSLR for (working) speed and flexibility. But my move back to film has been all about primes. Shooting a 50mm f1.8 on a Nikon FM2n (and now a F90x), and then the Nokton 50mm f1.5 on a Bessa R3A helped me rediscover the elements of planning, choice and "selective vision" that drew me to photography in the first place. I love 50s because they are just a little longer, the DOF at large apertures narrower, than what I consider to be normal perspective. This forces me to select and abstract from real life - while staying within the range of recognizably "normal" vision - in a way that I personally find very appealing.

What's kept me away from the Leica M8s and the MFTs is the crop factor, in particular its effect on DOF. I guess I want my 50s to look like 50s (even if they are 25s or 35s). If I'm going to give up on that, I might as well shoot my DSLR.

Each to their own. Plenty of great work being done with zooms and cropped lens, of course! Thank goodness we're not all the same, or forced to use the same gear.
 
I must have been using all the wrong zooms, 'cause I can't seem to find one that costs less than a house and offers the same optical quality as any good ol' 50/1.8.
 
i tend to agree. i have shot a lot of zooms and NONE of them matches what my ancient "made in japan" version of the nikkor af 50mm f1.8 could produce. not by a long shot.
 
Last edited:
I shoot 50s most of the time with 35mm, and use 'standards' on my 120s too. If I change to anything it is wider, even though I have some short teles that I use at the end of a roll to see if anything 'good' will happen. My DSLR is fitted with a 35mm prime so it is close to 50. Yes, I like the look of a 50, besides as emrahoto says they are cleaner.
 
I have the AFS 18-70, and it's an OK travel lens for bright light outdoor summer shooting, and that's about it.

The new primes will give speed (35/1.8 AFS) and AF, but none of the qualities of early MIJ metal lenses like lack of distortion, build quality, MF accuracy, and sharpness.
 
My Leica zoom [ Dig 3 ] is undoubtedly beneficial when chasing kids around , but for that special moment , nothing beats a 50mm manual Pentax K lens on the K 10D or a 35 mm Rokkor on the Dig 3 .
I am of course , spoiled for choice with my USSR cameras and my Minoltas ... odd , I had a Sigma 35 - 70 sr fit years ago and seldom used it . Lest we forget an f1.8 is a heck of a lot easier to focus on an SLR .
I posted this here , in Roger's place 'cos his writings in AP cover a whole world of musings embracing all aspects of photography ... I hope that it's OK again .
 
Zooms are heavy and slow. DSLR viewfinders are dim and tiny. Autofocus lenses make it very difficult to accurately focus manually, especially coupled with a DSLR.

Hooray for "progress" :/

I just wish people would stop buying garbage then acting like it's awesome.
 
Last edited:
ampguy said:
... The new primes will give speed (35/1.8 AFS) and AF, but none of the qualities of early MIJ metal lenses like lack of distortion, build quality, MF accuracy, and sharpness.
Click to expand...

Not to mention that they are "G" lenses, which will only work on newer cameras - on older manual focus cameras, you cannot control the aperture. And AFS lenses don't manually focus very nicely either.
 
The funny thing is...

The funny thing is...

The funny thing is, some people are able to put those slow, cheap and crappy kit lenses and put most of the Leica crew to shame.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/39880760@N03/4014100553/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tmphotographyut/4351725555/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/29762462@N06/4347982908/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/xarma/4348170725/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rds08/4348608890/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hpfilho/4344787148/

These were all taken with the Canon EF-S 18-55mm lens, which can be picked up for a price of less than one of those "it might work, but then again it might not"-Jupiter lenses that some people rave about.

Personally, I like the 50mm and 35mm focal lengths - but I have a sweet spot for what these kit lenses are able to do.

I can't see that the "standard lens" is dead, they just slashed the price and added more focal length opportunities.
 
Last edited:
Manufacturers offered a 50/1.8 because it was cheap to make, not because they were concerned about image quality.

In the days before fast colour films (not that long ago!) you needed a fast ~f/2 lens to have a decent chance at a shot in many situations anyway. A 50mm was a decent compromise for a good price.

Once films became faster, and zoom construction easier (CAD, molded aspherics etc) more and better zooms were produced more cheaply, until we can get a 18-55 for as much as a 50 of old.

Nikon and Canon know that most people will never get another lens, so they do make the effort to make sure the kit lens performs well for its intended use. Low light is less of a problem, as most cameras have pop-up flashes.

Interestingly, both Panasonic and Olympus offer their m4/3 cameras in kits with primes. But they are obviously premium products aimed at a niche market.

I enjoy using primes, but I don't think they make me a better photographer. Their biggest advantage are size, so I can bring my camera everywhere. For travel or social settings I use a cheap zoom.

Sure, maybe the 50mm made some people better photographers by forcing them to adapt, but it also bored a lot more people, who left their SLR on the shelf. Zooms are more versatile, more fun, and have led to the SLR and then the DSLR to become a mass-market item, leading to more people shooting, and ultimately better photographers. That's progress, without quotes.
 
Interestingly, the midrange zoom was the popular kit lens in Europe beginning late '70s-early '80s while same bodies in US sold with fasti-ish 50.

Agree that the 50 forced many beginning photogs to learn the craft of composition. I still have many images where I can't tell if it was shot with 35 / 50 / or 85.

Can't underestimate the importance of f/1.4 and f/1.8 in the Kodachrome era, especially from 1950s to '70s.

I do a lot of work-related shooting with D40, kit 18-55 plus a 55-200 VR (nearly always at 200) and a 35/1.8. Do a LOT of available light shooting with the 35/1.8. Also do a lot of available light with fast old manual-focus primes, using the green "in focus" indicator. I'm shooting a lot of boring stuff like speakers, which benefit from the sharpness of wide open prime and naturalness of available light.

My 2nd body is always a Nikon rangefinder, mainly for the combination of small, fast primes.

When I did more photojournalism, before becoming an office manager, I found that two bodies solved most of the problem of non-zooms - wrong lens at wrong time. Main setup was 24 / 50 / 85 / 180. Could cover everything but serious pro sports and with two bodies always had a reasonable if not ideal lens at hand, with ability to change to ideal lens within about 2 seconds.

In 1990s, most news photographers seemed to evolve from fast primes to carrying two bodies, one with wide zoom and one with long zoom.
 
Nothing beats a real prime in my opinion, especially in the 80-135 range.

Years ago I used 135 2.0 and 85 1.2 on Canon for music and stage photography, these types of lenses lack nothing whatsoever in quality!

Part of the reason why I converted from Nikon to Sony, (dSLR-wise of course, my M8 is as good as ever) are the outstanding primes from Zeiss. The 85 1.4 is perfect in the studio or in low light, and I recently spent a few weeks with the 135 1.8...

Of ALL the optics I have used, which is quite a lot, this is THE best! Razor sharp from 1.8 upwards, and no flare or distortions that I can detect. Combine that with the in-house anti shake, and it gets real insane... I managed to do 100% sharp shots on 1/6th of a second - unheard of just some years ago...

I could not justify to own both an 85 and 135 though, and had to sell the 135 with a nice 10% profit :)

There will always be a place for primes like these, even when technology gets better. I suppose there are no real obstacles to making a 50mm 0.7 or 85mm 1.0 these days - and some time Leica, Zeiss or some other will do so I hope!
 
...and just now I caught hold of a really cheap (230 euro) summicron 90!

I know, not standard lenses - but still fast primes...
 
My "zoom lens" is my old (by digital standards) hacked Panny FZ1v2. 12X ASPH optical with image stabilization and f2.8 throughout the zoom range "Leica" lens all in a compact body. Have no issues with the lens or its lowly 2 megapixel count (I have several 8X10's framed from this camera that look perfectly fine to my eyes...) No IR filter means it does double duty with an IR filter. That's my "zoom" lens, and I just love the fact that I have f2.8 throughout the zoom range, unlike the pathetic speed of most zooms. For everything else? I prefer fast primes.

This is an old Washington Post article by Frank Van Ripper lauding this camera.

FZ-1: A Pro-Level Digital Point & Shoot

By Frank Van Riper

Inevitably, the question of pixels will come up. At a flimsy 2.0 megapixels, the FZ-1 certainly sounds anemic. And, one might argue, this shortcoming is one reason Panasonic can charge so comparatively little for it (list around $450; street $375-99).

But I keep coming back to Bruce Dale's spectacular 8x10 images...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/photo/essays/vanRiper/030807.htm

The average price for this camera at the big auction site is "$12.71" with a 0 - $71 dollar range, obviously due to its low megapixel count. But I'm tellin' ya, Frank Van Riper is right about this camera. And if it gets the attention of seasoned pros - really, whatever advances come next doesn't really matter, does it? Proof is in the puddin' and this "outdated" digital produces excellent results (and doubles as an IR camera). I'll never part with it.

The camera itself is a point-n-shooter but there was a firmware hack out on the web (I assume it's still there somewhere), you get aperture and shutter priority.

Mention because that's my stratergy and if someone doesn't want to part with the $$$ for a good (and probably slow) zoom. Just buy a cheaper than dirt (literally, judging from the last time I actually bought dirt) used FZ1. Find the firmware hack if you want more manual control. It's small enough to bring along with you and it's very "SLR"-like in design, handles nicely - like a camera. Need a zoom (or want to shoot IR)? It's FZ1v2. Then a proper fast prime for everything else. There is no substitute for a fast 1.4, 1.7, 1.8, 2.0 prime - esp. a standard 50mm. Per. E. ud. :)
 
Last edited:
I like primes because they make me work. I find that walking up closer to the subject doesn't look exactly the same as staying in my original position and zooming in. I don't know, maybe I just get nervous the closer I get.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top