New Lens

Café Culture
Originally uploaded by Nostromoo

I've recently enjoyed taking photographs in The Perfect 5th club in Taunton. But the lighting isn't great, it's pretty dark, so one needs a fast lens. The first time I went I took my 85mm f/1.4 which was acceptable. I only had to drop to 640 ASA ish and got some nice sharp images. But the focal length was a bit restrictive. It was fine if there was only one person on stage, but there was no hope of getting a whole band in so I needed something wider.

I trawled eBay for some cheap wider angles, I toyed with the idea of the AiS 28mm or 35mm f/2.8 lenses but a gig was coming up and I needed something now and I kept loosing auctions, so I plopped for a brand new 50mm online, but I went for the f/1.8 rather than the 1.4 for price reasons (I needed it the next day really, and could find a reasonably priced 1.4 in time). 50mm it turned out was actually wide enough for my needs so I was very happy with it.

So of course I took the lens to Spain, and I've almost fallen in love. The lens is just amazing. It focuses so close you can almost put the camera in someone's face (if you wanted.) This shot I took across the table from Pixie when she was having a cup of coffee. It's sharp beyond belief, this is wide open at f/1.8 too! Stopped down a little it's unbelievably good.

The things I don't like about it are that it feels like it's made of plastic - it feels very cheap (which it was). And it's actually such a short lens I have trouble sometimes focusing because I can't get my fingers on the focus ring - it's much nearer the body than I grab for after using my 85mm, which is monstrously large in comparison.

But I adore the results. I'm so tempted to get the 50mm f/1.2 AiS now, or maybe the equivalent Zeiss ZF mount.

50mm is actually a really useful focal length, even on DX sensors, and this baby is real pleasure to use. And this lens, even shooting MF and MA, which I do a lot now, you can get some cracking exposures from it.