Old standard lenses on EOS boider = better portrait lenses?

<p>I hope I did not post in a wrong area since it is more likely to be a cross topics question.<br /><br /><br />I am going to buy a EOS 500D body in this christmas. It is still early but I hope to have better understanding on it before I use my savings. I know that the CMOS on EOS 500D is much smaller and requires a factor for correcting the focal lenght of the lens. By multiplying 1.6 of the lens origianl focal lenght, that would be the relative focal length of the CMOS. So, an ordinoary 50mm would become 80mm in 500D. And here comes my questions:<br>

<br />1. After conversion, standard lens would be come the focal length of portrait lens, is that mean I no longer need a portrait lens (actual focal length = 85mm/ 80mm)?<br>

<br />2. I have some calssic standard lenses (like Biotar and Tessar in m42 mount) which are well performers. Is than mean these standard lens could perform similar characteristics that of a actual portrait lenses? And even much nicer than them?<br>

<br />3. Should I throw away my portrait lenses, or left it as tele-photo lenses after I brought a EOS 500D?<br>

<br />4. And finally, should I try to get more wide angle lenses, (28mm/35mm) as standard lens ( ~50mm in terms of the CMOS) for EOS 500D?<br>

<br />I am a film user who is planing to get a DSLR body. I am confused while I am learning the features of DSLR. Please help.<br>

Thank you. Kevin </p>

<p>1) and 2) Well, everyone has a different idea of what a "portrait lens" is. Some people use 50mm for half-body or 2/3 body shots, <strong>and </strong> then use the 85mm for tighter head-shots. (some people even use a 135mm). This is a personal preference and shooting style. Whether or not you personally feel the need to have a 50mm, 80mm or 135mm as portrait lenses is totally up to you, all these focal lengths would qualify as "portrait lenses".<br>

Keep in mind that classic lenses you mention will be manual focus, and you will need to buy an adapter to mount them on a EOS camera.</p>

<p>3) (Tele-photo lenses are also portrait lenses)... Keep them, try them on the 500D, if you like the angle of view, then keep them. Are they the classic lenses (manual focus, Tessar) you mention or are they Canon EOS lenses? If you choose to throw them away... I'll take them :)</p>

<p>4) I would recommend a 17-50mm zoom. Canon makes a 17-55 f/2.8 IS ($950) and Tamron makes a 17-50 f/2.8 ($450). If you prefer a cheaper route you can buy a 18-55mm IS from Canon ($150).<br>

If you prefer primes, Sigma has a 30mm f1.4. (Canon also has some primes in that range 28mm, 35mm, 24mm)</p>

<p>Good luck,<br>

Amol</p>

<p> </p>

<p>The classic (from 135 film) range for portrait is 80mm - 135mm ... so with the crop factor of 1.6 (which you seem to have understood), this range becomes 50mm to 80mm on a 500D.</p>

<p>so, your 80mm will serve you as portrait lens as well on crop 1.6 ... it just covers the other end.</p>

<p>your older 50mm M42 lenses can of course be adapted to the 500D (with exactly the same adapter you used for your film EOS) ... but you will very soon notice, how tricky focussing is, since the viewfinder screens of AF cameras aren't prepared for manual focussing ... no split image field, no micro prism ring ... and they are smaller than what you are used to from film times (at least with the crop-1.6 bodies)</p>

<p>You shouldn't throw away any lens before you tried it on the 500D ... there might be new uses for it.</p>

<p>You need something wide ... since 28mm is just "normal" ... that's why it is a good idea to get the kitklens with the camera (this should be the EFS 18-55/3.5-5-6 IS) ... this will give you wideangle equivalent to 28mm on film.</p>

<p>Kevin - you can use your old lenses on the 500D. Focusing must be done using Live View mode, which is precise, and not too difficult as long as your subject doesn't move. On this body, a 50mm lens will have the same field of view as an 85mm on a full-frame body. For flattering portraits, it's usually a good idea to be at least 8 feet (2.5 meters) away from the subject, regardless of focal length. Roughly speaking, at 8 feet working distance using the 500D, a 50mm lens give a waist-up view, an 85mm lens gives a head-and-shoulders view, and a 135mm lens gives a head-shot view. Of course, you can always crop tighter in post-processing, and with the high-resolution sensor of the 500D (at 400 ISO or less) you can crop quite aggressively without much of a noticeable loss of picture quality. (Obviously, this depends on how big you want to print. For web display and 8x10, you've got a lot of room for cropping.)</p>

<p>For general-purpose shooting, I agree with Amol and Rainer: an AF zoom gives you lots of flexibility. The kit lens from Canon is cheaply made but I've seen great work done with it, so you don't need to spend a fortune here to get nice results.</p>

<p>Shooting with digital is quite a liberation from the economies of film. Sure, it's expensive up-front, but then you can go crazy and take lots of shots that would have felt wasteful with film. That, plus the instant feedback of digital, made a huge difference in my photography and has been worth the money for sure. Good luck!</p>

<p>I am the one who prefer tranditional shooting (i.e. manual focus, metering, etc.). I asked one who have 350D to use manuasl lens, noticing that it is rather difficult to focus (no microprism/ split image). I have left DSLR for many years until now due to low price and mature technology.<br>

I notice the colour of the image of an old lens in DSLR is rather lighter than that of traditional SLR. Is that usual, and why?</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Focusing must be done using Live View mode</p>

</blockquote>

<p>May be done, <em>may</em> be done, not <em>must</em> . Although the viewfinder of the 500D is not "optimized" for manual focusing, it does work just fine if you focus carefully, and it's a lot easier in my opinion than fooling around with Live View. In an autofocus age, some people who have started out digital have never <em>learned</em> how to focus manually, so their troubles are not just the machinery....</p>

<p>Quick response to the parts of this I can answer. (I don't know anything about those other old lenses you mentioned.)</p>

<p>Yes, the 50mm focal length lens on the 1.6x cropped sensor camera provides an angle of view equivalent to using an 80mm lens on your old film SLR. The 50mm lens can function well on the new camera in those situations where the 80mm FL would have worked well on the old camera.</p>

<p>Yes, you will almost certainly want some shorter focal length lenses. As you have probably already figured out, to get an angle of view on the new camera equivalent to that provided by the 50mm "normal" lens on the old camera you would need a focal length of about 31mm. Something in the 28mm to 35mm range is often used as a "normal" prime on these cropped sensor DSLRs.</p>

<p>Regarding focusing... The AF systems of these cameras can most often do a fine job of getting focus. In fact, in the vast majority of cases the AF will do as well or better than you would do with manual focusing. Regardind live view... When I got my 5DII I thought that live view was going to be unimportant and a bother. In fact, I didn't even really try it out at first. Finally I did try it - and I have discovered that it is tremendously powerful for achieving good focus in certain situations where critical focus decisions need to be made. I would most certainly not use it for normal hand held shooting, but for tripod based work such as architecture, landscape, and night photography it has become indispensible to me.</p>

<p>Finally, it sounds like you have been doing this for some time, judging by some of the old equipment you mention. As my experience using live view might suggest, those of us who started out using gear much different than what is available today often cling to old notions of what the "right" equipment might be. Looking at your lens list, I think you should consider the modern zoom lenses as options. They are of very high quality and for most photographers the zooms provide some significant advantages. These advantages could be especially significant in comparison to trying to use those very old lenses with various adapters... and likely giving up most if not all of the automatic features available with newer lenses.</p>

<p>In fact, it would not be crazy to pick up that 500D with the wonderful little inexpensive EFS 18-55 IS kit lens just to figure out the whole "focal length on crop" business.</p>

<p>Dan</p>

<p>One thing you may find with old lenses on a digital body is that some do not work very well. I shoot quite a lot of images with old Canon FD lenses mounted on a Panasonic G1 Digital body (micro 4/3). This camera actually doubles the focal length of the Canon lens. There are two issues with old lenses. Some show significant CA, especially at the edge of the frame - while this is not an issue for film bodies it can be significant with a digital sensor. I know it can be corrected in post processing but I just choose not to use these lenses on a digital body. FD examples are generally the cheaper lenses - e.g. 28 F2.8 but include some more expensive lenses e.g. 200 f2.8. The top quality Canon FD lenses work really well on the digital body (e.g. 24 F2, 35 F2, 50 F1.4, 85 F1.2L, 135 F2, 80-200 F4L) but still have one issue - which can be a problem for some portrait work. When shooting towards a bright light source - even if it is outside the visible frame in the viewfinder (It is probably still in the shot as the full frame lens see much wider that the crop sensor) the contast can become very low. What I suspect happens is that the light comes into the lens (it is not visible in the viewfinder due to the crop). The light then refects of the sensor, back onto the rear lens element and back onto the sensor. This is not as much of a problem with more modern lenses designed for digital cameras as they have an anti-reflective coating on the rear lens element. Trial and error is the only way to determine which lenses work well on a digital body.</p>

<p>Thank you Dan and Philip 's explanation :)<br>

I also agree that I need an AF lens. The 500D kit with 18-55 shell be enough, since I have some lenses on my hand already. Someone suggest I should get a 18-200mm, which has much wider zoom range and enough to replace all necessary lenses. I don't know much about this lens quality. Is it better / weaker than 18-55mm, in terms of imaging quality?<br>

It is the first time I heard about light reflection on CMOS. Is that very serious when using old lenses, e.g. Primoplan and Flektogon?</p>

<p>I'd get the 18-55 IS kit lens. I have one and its quite decent even when compared to the much more expensive 17-55 f/2.8 IS which I also have. The kit lens is small and light whereas the 18-200 zoom is much more expensive and larger. I'm not sure that its image quality is as good as the kit lens. You can see reviews of both lenses here:<br>

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/Canon-EF-S-Lens-Reviews.aspx<br>

and here:<br>

http://www.photozone.de/canon-eos<br>

Also some third party manufacturers make focusing screens suitable for manual lenses though be aware you may get a dark viewfinder with some slow lenses. The Katz Eye ones apparently don't suffer as much with slow lenses. Katz Eye don't list one for the 500D yet but I'm sure they will in due course. See this link:<br>

http://www.katzeyeoptics.com/cat--Canon-DSLRs--cat_canon.html</p>

<p>I think that if you just get the camera with the 18-55IS kit lens, an M42 adapter and just have a play with it all before you go any further.</p>

<p>Cheers, Bob</p>

<p> </p>

<p>I believe that portrait lenses are at least partly so named because of the apparent depth they collapse in taking head shots. So for subjects with long noses, the telephoto perspective has the effect of shortening the nose. It also means that for close to subject shots the emphasis that would appear to make faces distorted (and noses longer) is absent. You are apparently in Hong Kong and the need to take portraits with lenses as long and longer than 100mm is going to depend upon your subjects. If you are after a portrait lens to have a shallow depth of field that can be accomplished at least partly with a fast lens such as a 35mm f2 or 50mm f1.4/1.8. Many of my subjects likely need 135mm to 200mm to be flattering not for selective focus on the eye and the blurring of the rest of the face. I think you need to see if you need both flattening of perspective and shallow depth of field or if you really only want one.</p>