Single Camera, Single Focal Length ? !

<p>More than a decade ago, a master street photographer adviced to focus myself in a single focal length and a single camera. By that time I was out of the street stuff, so the advice was not on the order of the day.</p>

<p>But in the last 7 years or so, I have been an amateur concentrating on Street Photography. After 7 years in the branch, I think he was quite right in his advice, at least for street photography. I think so because the branch requires me conspicuity for most of the times, and conspicuity requires the highest and fastest possible versatility with the camera as with the focal length I am using.</p>

<p>I feel I must stop playing with zooming and changing cameras as if they were clown balls, or much better said - in order to achieve the control of camera/lens as the clown controls the small balls, better to calm and stop changing cameras and lenses like if they were my underpants.</p>

<p>Of course there are so many approaches to Street Photography as the number of cameras ever manufactured, so many will disagree with my glorious conclusion and will be right, absolutely right, since this is the grandeur of the art. Every one can be in with his original approach, that cannot be thaught as The Ten Commandments.</p>

<p>I am very aware of highest quality street photographers using a zoom, and others with a single focal length. The former are no so much conspicuity style, while the latter are. </p>

<p>Overseas, as a stupid looking tourist, I do not need conspicuity. At home while every folk looks at my camera with horror, I do need conspicuity.</p>

<p>I will be happy to hear what do you think, about these issues. Now I am re-evaluating and open to advice.</p>

<p>Cheers,<br>

Ruben </p>

>>> I will be happy to hear what do you think, about these issues.

 

Whether through a single focal length lens, or zoom, the street photography I admire most is done up-close, with focal lengths of 50mm or less. I use a 35mm...

<p>I use mostly one single camera and one lens, normally of single focal length (50mm or 135mm). If I don't know the area, I go into, I might take a zoom (17-40mm or 24-105mm) instead. Different from Brad, I don't have a principle of up-close photography - for me it is a question of respect (according to circumstances) and not necessarily of quality of street photography.</p>

 

Ruben asked me via email if I could expand here on the thread how I arrived at 35mm as my focal length of choice.<P>

 

All focal length choices involve some compromise. I shoot two related, but very different types of photography on the street; Street

Photography and Street Portraiture.<P>

 

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Good street photography is done up-close. Anything larger than 50mm and you're not part of the energy or rhythm of the street, which is a very important element.

You're sniping from afar, and the results are rarely good. 35mm let's me work at the distance I'm most comfortable at. 50mm and I'd be

working too far away. I would like to go wider many times, say 24mm, but then that becomes problematic for the kind of street

portraiture I like to do<P>

 

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For street portraiture, 35 mm involves some compromise as well. For me, it satisfies several criteria. The first, is working close. I love

people and the process of engaging strangers. Good portraiture is not done from afar - great subject-photographer engagement is very important. Also, I like contextual background. 35mm gives me the

right amount for creating the type of street portraits I like to create. 50mm is too much of a telephoto and I'd have to work at a greater distance - on the street that's not practical most of the time. The downside with a 35mm

for portraiture is needing to be mindful of feature distortion shooting too close.<P>

 

Hope the above thought process and example photos help. A 35mm lens lets me do both street photography and street portraiture in the way I like to work, without having to swap out lenses, missing moments. But most importantly, I very much like the results I get.

<p>These days I'm shooting film mostly, color, on the street, but b/w or color for the last 5 years I've "settled on the 35mm, much for the reasons Brad said. Others' are for those times I need to shoot fast on sunny streets, 35mm offers a good depth of field. I have a little digital I sometimes use that uses a 28 mm equivalent and I'm comfortable with tha as well. For event work and weddings, I like digital zoom cameras 17-35 or 24-70 which are very useful and even a 70-200 for portraits of a certain type, but for the streets, I could live with one camera and a 35mm and not feel like I'm missing anything.</p>

<p>My current street kit is 2 bodies and 3 lenses. At least 80% of my shots (film) are taken with a rangefinder camera and a 35mm lens. That All I shot from 1990 to 1995. I have a second body and it has either a 50mm or a 21mm lens mounted. One lens one camera is great advice until you really know that combination and come to the conclusion that some shots are being missed with the 1 lens. I could totally live with 1 camera and a 35mm lens.</p>

 

<p>Brad are you using the 35mm on a "crop frame" or full frame/film camera?</p>

<p>Ruben--<br /> I've been using a 28mm prime a lot lately when I've deliberately set out to shoot on the street. But, most of the time, there's a 30-135 nikkor I got cheap on the camera. It's relatively wide and fast (f3.5) but I have a little reach if I need it, or if want to get that telephoto "compressed" look. It's also old, beat up, and built like a tank, so I don't mind taking it everywhere and letting it take a hit or two.</p>

>>> Brad are you using the 35mm on a "crop frame" or full frame/film camera?

 

Full frame...

<p>I only have a crop sensor (x1.5) with a fast 30mm. Have also used a 21mm before it went walkabouts. So the angles of view work out to be around that of a 45mm and a 32mm.</p>

<p>One of the major advantages, I find, is the ability to 'pre-frame', or whatever you might like to call it. If you use the single focal length enough, you know without bringing the camera to your eye, almost precisely where the edge of the frame will be, and also the depth of field any aperture will give you at the distance from your subject. I find it very useful for candid street work to have all this information without having to look through the viewfinder - makes everything a lot faster, and less obtrusive to the subject.</p>

<p>With my Nikon F2 I only have a 35mm lens. I used to use a 28mm but recently sold it since I wasn't using it. There are times that I wish I was using a 28mm but over all I'm happy with the 35mm. It's a stop faster then what my 28mm was and that's always a plus.</p>

<p>With my RZ67 it's a bit more complicated. For certain things I use the 110mm lens which is standard for 6x7. It's a f2.8, the fastest lens available in the RZ/RB family. For everything else I use a 50mm which about the same as a 28mm for 35mm shooting. However, this lens is a f4.5 so I really need to be in some good light since I usually shoot slow film. One thing that throws me also is the fact that the 6x7 negative is closer to a square then the 35mm negative which of course is more rectangle shaped. So my 35mm lens for my nikon seems more wide then my 50mm for my mamiya. For some reason, I never really cared for zooms. I had several with my first slr kit, but kept most of shooting with the two primes I had as well.</p>

<p>Here's a kind of amusing story. I was shooting recently with my Mamiya and had the 50mm lens on. I went up to two young women who had on bikini tops and ask if I could take a picture of them. They agreed and I told them that since I was using a very wide lens, I would have to get close up. I always warn people about this since I can imagine that having such a large camera thrust into someones face can be a bit annoying. I was shooting vertical and wanted a half length portrait. So I got in close, framed them how I wanted, focused and took the shot and thanked them. Now I had a buddy of mine with me who wanted to tag along (and whom I put to work carrying my bag and getting new rolls of film ready for me to reload) and he mentioned that I must have gotten a great titty shot. I thought about it and realized that even though I got the top of their heads down to about their waist in the shot, the lens would have been pointed directly at their breasts. This of course is also due to the having to hold such a camera low in order to see the ground glass.</p>

<p>Using a single focal length and adjust my position accordingly always feel faster to me than to adjust the focal length in my zoom to frame the scene correctly. It's probably a personal perception over reality. Since the former involved a flowing affirmative motion, an almost spontaneous see and grab action, while the latter feels like a search and pick action. Just my two cents.</p>

<p>I agree of course with Brad (fine shots, Brad !) getting as close as possible and with direct contacts with people is surely better than distance (for me 50/1.8 (full frame) or zoom down to 17/4 but a somewhat imposing lens). However, not all contexts are offering such optimal conditions. In some cases, distance is imposing itself, when the photographer is not "invited" (don't speak the language and people rejecting to be photographed or at least non communicative etc) and still (respectful) shots to be made (135/2). In such cases being part of the scene by being very close, does not add to the quality of the scene, and might even disturb/distort it, as far as I can see. I might of course be wrong.</p>

<p><em>In some cases, distance is imposing itself, when the photographer is not "invited" (don't speak the language and people rejecting to be photographed or at least non communicative etc) and still (respectful) shots to be made (135/2). In such cases being part of the scene by being very close, does not add to the quality of the scene, and might even disturb/distort it, as far as I can see. I might of course be wrong.</em></p>

<p>I think this depends on technique. I think with the classic focal lengths (say, 28, 35 or 50mm) you can be respectful and not disturb a scene, if you are unobtrusive enough in the way you shoot.</p>

<p>I shoot one camera or two, and each camera - when I shoot two cameras - always has a shorter, wider zoom on it, (tending toward the very wide) and another from the wide to the moderate (or longer) tele.<br>

I never carry a camera bag or expect to change lenses, though I might carry spares in a jacket pocket. Changing lenses for a street photographer is anathema to catching 'the moment', plus with digital changing lenses allows a chance for dust to enter the inner part of the camera and eventually to become a sensor dust problem - more a problem with some cameras than others depending on whether the camera has a dust avoidance/removal system (but none is perfect).<br>

Sometimes when I am shooting in crowds, I might find I use the wide zoom almost exclusively for long periods, then in one moment, I might spy someone or a group farther away whose facial expressions are priceless or who are engaged far away in interaction with others, and out comes the longer, more tele lens and 'snap' I've got that capture, then I revert to the wider zoom.<br>

Of course a wide angle allows 'separation' to appear between subjects that in reality are really quite close together, so a wide angle is great for working 'in close' and 'in crowds'.<br>

I do a great deal of subway or 'Metro' work, so I tend to use a very wide to wide zoom lens for most of that work. The wide angle also tends to suppress the effects of shooting at lower shutter speeds -- camera, conveyance and subject movement are minimized in the wide angles of such a lens.<br>

Why zoom? Because I often cannot afford to be seen to be taking the capture and thus giving myself away. I go to great lengths never to be 'warned' by police that shooting in the Metro where I shoot might be forbidden, so I cannot say for sure it might be forbidden, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it is, and I'm tolerated, so long as I'm keeping my cameras surreptitious, raise them only for the shot, then put them down quickly. I previsualize almost everything.<br>

Anything more, and even if photography itself were not forbidden, I'd be hustled out for 'obstructing pedestrian traffic' off and on the horribly crowded Metro cars. <br>

Right away, there are two good reasons for using a 'wide' lens -- separation of subjects that are jammed close together and for a zoom tele -- inability to move about -- or fear of 'giving one's self away when the magic moment might be disturbed BEFORE one can press the shutter (afterward I might share the capture, a la Alan Funt, -- for a good joke if it seems the subjects are in a good humor, and other times keep the capture all to myself . . . . using good judgment for which is the better approach, and keeping in mind my object is to get captures, not to schmooze.)<br>

In other circumstances, with broad boulevards, scarce pedestrians, big distances between things of interest, the camera with the medium distance to tele gets much more use, as any movement toward subjects will tend to give one's shooting away, and often destroy that magic moment. <br>

Not always of course, as any review of my portfolio will show, as sometimes I can be right on top of couples engaged in intense 'interpersonal relationships' and they could care less about the possibility of being photographed, they're so intimately involved right there in public, even if I'm right up next to them, or sitting on a seat right underneath them on a Metro!<br>

It all depends.<br>

But for those instances in which subjects are spread out or I want a true portrait, I need a long lens (I also have a penchant for the very wide angle portrait so don't type cast me). Long lenses do exceptionally well with certain types of portraiture, and especially at long distances, and for also for photographing groups at long distances.<br>

Late at Summer solstice last year with a 70-200 f2.8, I took one of my best photos, girls walking in lockstep through an illuminated city square. It was a one-off shot, and I didn't have high hopes for it, but raters and critics taught me otherwise . . . . . and they made their point well.<br>

If I had to go on the street with only one lens, and it were in a situation where I was expecting close circumstances, it would be with a 10-24 f 3.5-4.5 Nikkor or a 12-24 Nikkor f 4 on a crop sensor body, because of ligthness and probably (If I had the money) a D7000 because of high ISO capability).<br>

If I had to go out and didn't expect to be shooting in tight circumstances, I'd want to try any VR lens, (if not those non VR zoom wide angles) since they do better holding the subject in VERY LONG exposures which I often try to use. I also use a wide to long tele and would love to try the new 24~120 Nikkor f4 nanocrystal coating, for 'walking around'. I reserve the 70-200 f 2.8 for those instances when I'm carrying two cameras or have a special instance in mind. I like to carry two cameras when I can . . . . though it's a clear giveaway that I am planning on doing some serious photography. I dislike carrying three cameras and will avoid it like the plague.<br>

The not so lowly D90, because of its very low shutter slap, can be a most unobtrusive camera to use in tight situations, and it's cheaply purchased too (all major discounters have refurbs today at $650, some with free shipping in the continental US).<br>

But if you need frames per second, the D300(s) is the sina qua non of the crop sensor cameras and the D700 as well if you're going to shoot full frame. The D700 and the D7000 if you need high iso.<br>

I've shot them all and my style hardly varies. For me, shooting from one Nikkor to another is a rather seamless affair once I've made a few transitions because they mostly handle similarly, they feel alike, and the menus are mostly alike.<br>

I and even shot one of my very best with a D3000 at a full 1 second exposure at ISO 100 in a Metro, underground (at night). The subject was captured (and a little blurry) as well as the framed subjects which had subject motion, but the effect was superlative. That capture would not have been possible without a VR lens and a wide to tele zoom on the D3000 (purchased refurb as a gift for a friend for under $300.)<br>

I used to be a very big equipment buff with a very bad case of NAS, but I've learned to get over that and shoot well with whatever I've got in my hands. My recent Photo of the Week was shot with a D90 refurb, of all things and a wide zoom tele. I credit the low shutter noise of the D90 to keep the noise low enough from 100 + frames near a crowd not to disturb anyone around me, until I could get 'the shots' that were the ones I was after. (I chose one of several wonderful shots to post.)<br>

As to shooting with one body and a prime lens, I started out that way in the '60s, as there was no other choice, but was dismayed by how seldom the great shots came by, and then by how much moving about I had to do to frame properly which caused many potentially great scenes to disappear or deconstruct before I could press the shutter release. Modern day zooms have eliminated that problem and boosted my 'keeper' rate tremendously.<br>

I did get some great shots, even in my '20s, which is testament to how hard I pounded the pavement. With modern equipment, I think I'd have hundreds instead of 40 or so to keep and show now as my 'best of the best' from my 'early years'.<br>

john<br>

John (Crosley)</p>

<p>agree with john that the d90 is a good street shooter. i like to pair it with a 30 or 35 fast prime or a 17-50/2.8 zoom. if you set the 17-50 to 24 and leave it there,it works just like a 35mm film camera.</p>

<p>Rangefinder, 50mm or wider, black and white (unless you were Ernst Haas), film.<br>

Paul</p>

<p>I normally strongly agree with what you say John, but I have a different take on this issue.</p>

<p><em>Why zoom? Because I often cannot afford to be seen to be taking the capture and thus giving myself away.</em></p>

<p>I've found with the single standard prime, I'm given away a lot less. Part of this is due to the much smaller physical size of the gear, and part because you can know the frame before the look through the camera, so the camera is only to the eye for a split second.</p>

<p><em>As to shooting with one body and a prime lens, I started out that way in the '60s, as there was no other choice, but was dismayed by how seldom the great shots came by, and then by how much moving about I had to do to frame properly which caused many potentially great scenes to disappear or deconstruct before I could press the shutter release. Modern day zooms have eliminated that problem and boosted my 'keeper' rate tremendously.</em></p>

<p>Interestingly, I went the other way. I find I get more good stuff out of the single prime set up. The zoom was too slow - choosing focal length and a good aperture for that focal length, whereas the prime gets to just be intuition.</p>

<p>In saying that I disagree, the main thing is, of course, to do whatever works for you. If that's a zoom, then use a zoom.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>Apostolos, funnily enough I was just looking at an Ernst Haas book,<em> In Black and White</em>. I knew he shot a little black and white, but not this much, or of such quality. It's superb, check it out.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>Good street photography is done up-close.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Brad is right. I also think it's the very fundament of what we do out there.</p>

<p>As for a single focal length in my experience one of the most profound advantages is what Camus hinted at in what he called "pre-framing". It's a great, if not the best, tool to develop ones compositional skills. When I trained as a photographer it was mandatory to use a standard lens, only one kind of film and no cropping allowed for two years and I've benefitted from that ever since.<br>

Nowadays I crop as much as I need to but find I hardly ever have to. Composing becomes second nature.</p>

<p>Still, I think zooms got some great advantages and I've used one (still do in fact) for many years. The main reason to get back into primes is quality and low light capability. Nowadays it seems most people are looking for ever increasing high ISO capability but I prefer to shoot most of my work at ISO 100, or when I really have to 400 and very seldom 1600.</p>

<p>In the end however it still comes down to the basics i.e. how you compose your shots and how you use light. Photography is quite easy when you think about it ;-)</p>

<p>C Wyatt, thanks for pointing out the B&W work of Ernst Haas; it's a magnificent book. To stay in context with this thread, let me add that Haas' original camera was a TLR Rolleiflex--hence one body and one prime lens! He soon turned to Leica, though.<br>

Paul</p>

<p>And W. Eugene Smith certainly didn't have a problem with multiple cameras and lenses.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=199165723464935&set=pu.109238772457631&type=1&theater">http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=199165723464935&set=pu.109238772457631&type=1&theater</a></p>

I use a crop body and a 18-50 zoom for street work,mostly used at the 18mm end.Anything longer I find very unsatisfying,it's just the way I see.Lately I have been playing with flash at that focal length.The results and reactions have been interesting so far(Not good but interesting!).Anything to shake it up a little{;~o

<p>For SP, with film & FF, I use a 28mm most, followed by 24mm, 35mm, 50mm and rarely 85 or 105. Or their equivalents in Dx. I also use zooms, particularly in stronger light, but leave them set at one focal length most of the time, as if they were a single focal length. With my film rangefinders, I mostly use the 35mm focal length. When the subjects are static, and there's enough light, I prefer zooms. On one of my older Dx DSLRs, I use one of two old 35-70's for outdoor SP portraits.</p>

<p>After doing SP n and off for several decades, would I advise a newbie to stick to one focal length? No. Exploration is part of making one's way in any art.</p>

<p>Any given focal length can be used in any number of ways, I range from 21 to 100 (21,28,35,50,100) zeiss (manual focus) primes on a D700. I would use the 21mm at distance for cityscapes<br>

<img src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5012/5542945028_26b99f67e9_z.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="426" /><br>

or 21mm up close<br>

<img src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5065/5597859500_ef1ccd2ff7_z.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="426" /><br>

100mm at distance<br>

<img src="http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4113/5191501985_8e3510b95b_z.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="426" /><br>

or 100mm up close<br>

<img src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3312/5796889370_7db0cb8924_z.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="426" /><br>

I pick a lens for the day but always have the 100 handy. The city or my mood usually tells me what lens. 28 and 35 are the 'classical' lengths but my favorite is the lens I am using.<br>

I wont be afraid to say it but I hate zooms for street. A zoom photog will usually stand in the same spot regardless of what zoom length is chosen. Focal Length affects perspective but how can you stand in the one spot and have so many perspectives of the same scene. Instead zooms are used as in camera crops and they suffer badly for it. Only the prime users will know what it means to compose (with zero crop) for a scene ....and perspective is 9tenths of composition.<br>

Zooms are convenient but you have to pay the piper<br>

..<br>

ɹǝpun uʍop puɐl ǝɥʇ ɯoɹɟ</p>