lens

<p>hi i have just got my hasselbald cm and love it could you give me soom advise on what lens to get. I take portraits only and like to get right in there. What do you think?<br>

thank you.</p>

<p>The 150mm is the standard focal length for portraits due to getting you back far enough on heads shots to still get a tight crop and to avoid any distortions that would be introduced by the normal (80mm) range lenses. It performs very well in close or backed off for full length portraits as well. I have also used the 80mm for mid to full length with great results and the much longer 250mm and 500mm have been terrific is special situations where I wanted the effect that those long optics give. For portraits that include much of the environment or that are of large groups, the wide angle 50mm and even wider 40mm have been very effective.</p>

<p>So the answer is, in general, the 150mm might be your best overall choice, but all focal lengths have their moments when they are just the right lens for the portrait at hand.</p>

<p>If you like to get close, you may also consider the 120mm Planar or the 180mm Sonnar - depending on how much space you have available. They are both excellent, although more expensive than the 150mm.</p>

<p>A "normal", 80mm lens is arguably the most useful lens on the Hasselblad, followed by the 150mm and 50mm lenses for a second and third acquisition.</p>

<p>The 150 gives the most flattering perspective for an head-and-shoulders portrait. Working up close is more for the photographers benefit than that of the subject. You would need a closeup lens or short extension tube to use an 80 for a tight shot. However, medium format lends itself to a broader view, and the 80mm (or shorter) is very useful for environmental portraits.</p>

<p>hi<br>

thanks for advise i have a 80mm already but find i have to stand about three foot back min and i want to be able to get really close. I understand that i can get a lens that will give me a tight shot from a distance but i want a lens that will work when i am right on top of the subject. And also some of the big lenses can cost. could you tell me about the short extension tube please. sorry to be a pain and ask these questions but this is all very new to me.<br>

thank you</p>

<p>hi<br>

thanks for advise i have a 80mm already but find i have to stand about three foot back min and i want to be able to get really close. I understand that i can get a lens that will give me a tight shot from a distance but i want a lens that will work when i am right on top of the subject. And also some of the big lenses can cost. could you tell me about the short extension tube please. sorry to be a pain and ask these questions but this is all very new to me.<br>

thank you</p>

<p>David, If you are thinking of the short extension tube with your 80mm, it will certainly get you in quite close, but at the sacrifice of having a badly protruding nose and receding effects for the rest of the head in the portraits. It's a matter of needing to be further back with more magnification which is provided by the 120,150,180mm range of lenses. </p>

<p>Using the short tube on one of these lenses will be far better and work very easily, however, a close up filter/lens from Hasselblad may work even more easily and has two advantages. One is that an extension tube will subtract the amount of light reaching the film so you have to know how much to compensate in exposure. The second is that you have to mount and dismount the lens and tube from the camera in a specific order to keep from causing the lens shutter to fire as you remove it which means you have to then take a coin and manually wind the shutter key at the back of the lens before placing it on the camera again.</p>

<p>A close up filter needs no exposure compensation and mounts and dismounts with a slight turn from the front of the lens. No chance at the delay caused by having to reset the shutter.</p>

<p>The older 'C' series of Sonnars are still extremely good lenses and usually available at VERY reasonable prices, but there are growing parts availability issues that may affect future repairs. The CF lenses are extremely good and only slightly higher in price.</p>

<p>You might check for lenses through KEH.com. I've gotten extremely good deals on Hasse equipment from them with a strong warranty and great service.</p>

<p>Tim</p>

<p>thanks so much for all your advice but could you clarify what the close up filter is. Is it a lens or filter? and could you send me a link to one if possible thank you.<br>

david</p>

<p>thanks so much for all your advice but could you clarify what the close up filter is. Is it a lens or filter? and could you send me a link to one if possible thank you.<br>

david</p>

<p>Sure, David. Sorry I wasn't more specific. Technically it is a lens since it has a positive magnification to increase the size of the subject on the film by physically moving forward even closer than the closest normal focusing distance. A filter would affect the spectrum of light passing to the film to greater or lessor degree without changing magnification, where as a close up lens attachment only magnifies the image by allowing a closer focus.<br>

It is often referred to as a filter simply because it mounts like a filter to the front of the lens. These have been made (seems like forever) by many filter manufacturers as well as by the prime camera manufacturers and are available in tons of sizes and in threads or bayonet mounts to fit just about any camera lens or system you would want.<br>

Specifically, the one's for Hasselblad are called Proxars and they come in a few different magnifications depending on how close you want to get. If you buy one, be sure you get the right bayonet size as the "C" lenses are different from the "CF" lenses, etc.<br>

I don't have a link, but you can either Google "Hasselblad Proxar" or go to KEH.com and navigate from the "Shop for Gear" tab to "Medium Format", then to Hasselblad and finally to the section termed "close up and bellows accessories". There are several on sale there and you will see that they look just like a traditional filter in a ring.<br>

I have no experience with these on a Hasselblad, but they only make the finest optics for all their products so you should encounter no problems. I do know that in the strongest magnifications in some other sets, there is a center of extreme sharpness while the outer edges tend to soften. For that reason, I would stay with the .5 or 1.0 power magnification to be more certain of sharpness across the film.</p>

<p>Tim</p>

<p>It is a lens, but technically not because it has 'a positive magnification' (when a lens magnifies or not depends on what you do with it, not on being a lens as such).<br>

More specifically, it is a positive lens, because it makes rays of light converge (instead of diverge, as negative lenses do).<br>

So they do not come in different magnifications, but in different focal lengths. The focal lengths are usually expressed in the lens' power, measured in dioptres. (A dioptre is the reciprocal of the focal length in metres.)<br>

<br />I mention all that, because magnifications feature prominently in close-up photography, and it might cause unnecessary confusion to use the term to expres the power of cose-up lenses and/or what they do.</p>

<p>What adding a positive lens to another positive lens does, is create a combination that has a shorter focal length than that of each alone.<br />Given that the lens mounted on the camera remains in its position when you add the close-up supplementary lens (i.e. the lens to film distance remains unchanged), both the lens to subject distance decreases and the magnification of the combination increases.</p>

<p>That all without requiring exposure compensation (simplified: because the lens to film distance does not change).<br />But there is another price to pay: changing the lens' formula by adding a simple lens to it messes up the well balanced design and both increases the lens faults the original taking lens had left and introduces new ones the simple close-up lens has.</p>

<p>The Zeiss Proxars, opposed to what one would assume, are not the best you can get. <br />They are really simple (as in: consisting of one part only) double convex,spherical lenses. No effort was made by Zeiss at all to reduce any of the lens faults such simple thingies suffer from, nor to make sure they don't mess up the image quality of the combination.<br />Other manufacturers produce close-up lenses that at least are achromatic doublets, and those would be preferable to Zeiss Proxars.</p>

<p>So if you really want to maintain image quality, are not averse to the little more effort getting better image quality needs, use tubes, and not close-up supplementary lenses.<br />If you must use close-up lenses, look for some achromatic ones.</p>

<p><br />The thing you mention, Tim, about needing to recock the shutter is true. But only if you manage to do things the wrong way each and every time you add or remove tubes.<br />I use tubes frequently, and can't remember the last time i had to cock a shutter while the lens was off camera.</p>

<p>Q.G.,</p>

<p>Thanks for your added expertise.</p>

<p>I've had good and bad experiences with close up lenses (mostly on 35mm) for exactly the reasons you state, the change in optical formula that often leads to a very unhappy result in quality. As I stated , I have not used the actual Hasselblad Proxars and mentioned them only in blind faith as it relates to the outstanding quality of other Hasselblad optics. I appreciate your clearing up the possibility that they are not up to snuff.</p>

<p>I too use the tubes with great satisfaction, but unlike you, I use them infrequently and I tend to mess up the sequence when I want to change focal lengths, thus the heads up to David. To me, it's just a minor problem to avoid when I think of it. </p>

<p>Have a great day.</p>

<p>Tim</p>

<p> </p>

<p>180 and 16 extension tube.</p>

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="../photodb/user?user_id=4185361">Tim Ludwig</a> , May 20, 2010; 07:55 a.m.</p>

</blockquote>

 

<blockquote>

<p>The 150mm is the standard focal length for portraits due to getting you back far enough on heads shots to still get a tight crop and to avoid any distortions that would be introduced by the normal (80mm) range lenses. It performs very well in close or backed off for full length portraits as well. I have also used the 80mm for mid to full length with great results and the much longer 250mm and 500mm have been terrific is special situations where I wanted the effect that those long optics give. For portraits that include much of the environment or that are of large groups, the wide angle 50mm and even wider 40mm have been very effective.<br>

So the answer is, in general, the 150mm might be your best overall choice, but all focal lengths have their moments when they are just the right lens for the portrait at hand.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>The 150mm lens is my least used lens. I have 903 SWC CR 38mm, 50mm CR, 80mm CF, 150mm CF and 250mm CF. The 80mm CF is the most used lens. I suggest that you get the 8mm, 16mm, 32mm and 56mm extension tubes for close up work.</p>

<p>Steve</p>

 

<p>The 80mm and the 60mm is great for environmental portraits, but for normal portraits I´ll remommend a CF 120/4 Macro-Planar or a CF 150mm/4. I have both the CFE 80mm/2.8, CF 120/4 Macro-Planar and the CFi 150mm/4 (great lenses all). If I had to sell one of them, I´m sure I´d keep the CF 120/4 Macro-Planar and the CFE 80mm/2.8.</p>