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sdrcow

What Lens do you use for Photography?

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sdrcow

Hello everyone! I've been messing around with my camera for the last two weeks and got to wondering... what does everyone else use on their DSLRs?
Currently using a 50mm Macro Lens + Canon 70D (or my T5i when my 70D battery dies...)

My issue is I need a decent amount of space to get a good DoF~ So... what do you guys use? 

Examples of my 50MM Macro: 
spacer.pngspacer.pngspacer.png

Thanks for reading~!

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cfx

On a full frame DSLR, I like 50mm or better 85mm if I have enough working room to use that. Anything shorter I feel gives too much perspective distortion making the dolls look odd, the same problem you typically get with phone cameras and their wide-angle lenses. Pretty much I'm trying to adapt the same rules for full-sized human photography to doll use. I don't have any macro lenses so just use regular ones.

Since you are using Canon APS-C, in theory your 50mm has about the same angle of view as an 85mm on full-frame.

That's with the idea of doing doll portraiture or fashion photography like what you have. For something more environmental where a doll is a smaller part of a larger scene, or for some special effect, I might use a wide angle lens.

Your pictures are very nice, especially the last one with the blurred background and nice bokeh.

Depth-of-field should mainly be a function of aperture, right?

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Tierparkzone
22 hours ago, cfx said:

Depth-of-field should mainly be a function of aperture, right?

Yup, mainly dependent on aperture but also on focal length.

If you want a nice strong bokeh you'll want your aperture wide open (low aperture value) and a somewhat shorter focal length. If you instead want multiple layers of a scene to stay in focus, this is much easier with a tele lens.

I'm usually running my Canon Eos 60D with a general purpose 17-85mm zoom lens, which I think works well enough for doll photography. I also have a set of extension tubes to convert it for macro use (for taking photos of figmas etc. - the 60cm dolls are so big, you don't really need macro).

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sdrcow
On 10/16/2019 at 10:39 PM, cfx said:

On a full frame DSLR, I like 50mm or better 85mm if I have enough working room to use that. Anything shorter I feel gives too much perspective distortion making the dolls look odd, the same problem you typically get with phone cameras and their wide-angle lenses. Pretty much I'm trying to adapt the same rules for full-sized human photography to doll use. I don't have any macro lenses so just use regular ones.

Since you are using Canon APS-C, in theory your 50mm has about the same angle of view as an 85mm on full-frame.

That's with the idea of doing doll portraiture or fashion photography like what you have. For something more environmental where a doll is a smaller part of a larger scene, or for some special effect, I might use a wide angle lens.

Your pictures are very nice, especially the last one with the blurred background and nice bokeh.

Depth-of-field should mainly be a function of aperture, right?

Oh thank you for that! I never thought about the distortion you can get from wide-angle etc. That's a very good factor to remember! 
And thank you for the compliment! I appreciate it!~

Annnnnd as far as DoF goes, yes: I usually run with my aperture wide open, but still at times have trouble getting a good blur due to closed spaces.

On 10/17/2019 at 9:41 PM, Tierparkzone said:

Yup, mainly dependent on aperture but also on focal length.

If you want a nice strong bokeh you'll want your aperture wide open (low aperture value) and a somewhat shorter focal length. If you instead want multiple layers of a scene to stay in focus, this is much easier with a tele lens.

I'm usually running my Canon Eos 60D with a general purpose 17-85mm zoom lens, which I think works well enough for doll photography. I also have a set of extension tubes to convert it for macro use (for taking photos of figmas etc. - the 60cm dolls are so big, you don't really need macro).

Thank you! :) I usually do run with my aperture wide open because I personally love a good blur and heavy Depth of field, I guess my main problem is usually focal length (which is why I opt for my 50mm macro vs my 50mm). I've not got a good blur really with any of my other lenses unless I start to sacrifice for extra noise or loss of focus... probably should have been more specific with my original post! (still trying to get the hang of photography lol) 

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cfx
35 minutes ago, sdrcow said:

Oh thank you for that! I never thought about the distortion you can get from wide-angle etc. That's a very good factor to remember! 
And thank you for the compliment! I appreciate it!~

Annnnnd as far as DoF goes, yes: I usually run with my aperture wide open, but still at times have trouble getting a good blur due to closed spaces.

I misread your intent, thinking you wanted more DOF, not less, and with that was thinking about working distance being camera-to-subject distance, as that's what I have usually read it to mean.

I don't know what specific macro lens you have, but they're typically f2.8 or f3.5 maximum aperture, and even wide-open with that isn't really enough to a very shallow depth-of-field. With that, primarily what you would need, and this I'm sure is where you're running into the space issue, is the background needs to be further away from the doll in order for it to be blurred out. I'm guessing your non-macro 50mm is either f1.8 or f1.4 and you can get a much more shallow DOF with that; however depending on the lens is it may not focus close enough for what you're trying to do.

As far as perspective goes, for full frame, 85mm, 105mm or 135mm are what's typically suggested for portraiture of real humans, but if you look into what pro fashion photographers use, it's typically longer than that, 200mm is common and sometimes 300mm. While it's out of the price range of anything but professionals, I've seen beautiful work with beautiful shallow DOF and bokeh with the 200mm f2 lenses by both Canon and Nikon. Since DDs are much smaller than real people, we don't need lenses that long of course, but I keep those guidelines in mind and try to adapt them for DD photography use.

I just use the full-frame numbers because I'm old and used 35mm film cameras in high school, so those numbers and what they mean are what means anything to me. It's the main reason I stuck to full frame with digital because it was what I was used to. You can certainly create great results with APS-C, but I can't speak with any experience about the slight differences that the format creates. I only know of the different angle of view for the same lens length. I think I've read there is a difference with DOF as well, but there are a lot of misunderstandings out there so I'm not even sure of that.

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sdrcow
3 minutes ago, cfx said:

I misread your intent, thinking you wanted more DOF, not less, and with that was thinking about working distance being camera-to-subject distance, as that's what I have usually read it to mean.

I don't know what specific macro lens you have, but they're typically f2.8 or f3.5 maximum aperture, and even wide-open with that isn't really enough to a very shallow depth-of-field. With that, primarily what you would need, and this I'm sure is where you're running into the space issue, is the background needs to be further away from the doll in order for it to be blurred out. I'm guessing your non-macro 50mm is either f1.8 or f1.4 and you can get a much more shallow DOF with that; however depending on the lens is it may not focus close enough for what you're trying to do.

As far as perspective goes, for full frame, 85mm, 105mm or 135mm are what's typically suggested for portraiture of real humans, but if you look into what pro fashion photographers use, it's typically longer than that, 200mm is common and sometimes 300mm. While it's out of the price range of anything but professionals, I've seen beautiful work with beautiful shallow DOF and bokeh with the 200mm f2 lenses by both Canon and Nikon. Since DDs are much smaller than real people, we don't need lenses that long of course, but I keep those guidelines in mind and try to adapt them for DD photography use.

I just use the full-frame numbers because I'm old and used 35mm film cameras in high school, so those numbers and what they mean are what means anything to me. It's the main reason I stuck to full frame with digital because it was what I was used to. You can certainly create great results with APS-C, but I can't speak with any experience about the slight differences that the format creates. I only know of the different angle of view for the same lens length. I think I've read there is a difference with DOF as well, but there are a lot of misunderstandings out there so I'm not even sure of that.

Well... I can totally see that as all this time I've been thinking a larger depth of field = MORE blur... but now that I think that out loud.... that makes no sense. LOL So if anything you've helped me understand that I need to reverse what I've been saying haha

And I'm using (generally) a canon 50mm Macro - But I might try these tele lens out. I remember when i used to photograph people I'd use that to get a blur background so the process should still work the same! Thanks mucho!!! 😄

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cfx

I had looked that up, but in their current line Canon has two different 50mm macros, with different maximum apertures so I wasn't sure still exactly what yours is.

If you have a 50mm f2.8, it behaves about like a 81mm f4.5 lens would perform on full frame, according to this calculator: https://mmcalc.com/

F4 isn't going to give very shallow DOF. That same calculator says a 50mm f1.8 is equivalent to a 81mm f2.9 on full frame, which would be quite a bit shallower DOF.

Edited by cfx

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sdrcow

Hrm, I guess I'm not sure, when I check my camera it says It's an F2.5? I know it was the cheaper of the two options. Lol

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cfx
8 minutes ago, sdrcow said:

Hrm, I guess I'm not sure, when I check my camera it says It's an F2.5? I know it was the cheaper of the two options. Lol

I found it; it's discontnued so isn't listed on the Canon site when you go through the menus; they don't have a 50mm macro now. The page is still on the site though:

https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/products/details/lenses/ef/macro/ef-50mm-f-2-5-compact-macro

According to that calculator, f2.5 is equivalent to f4 on full frame, so indeed you won't get really shallow DOF with that.

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sdrcow
1 minute ago, cfx said:

I found it; it's discontnued so isn't listed on the Canon site when you go through the menus; they don't have a 50mm macro now. The page is still on the site though:

https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home/products/details/lenses/ef/macro/ef-50mm-f-2-5-compact-macro

According to that calculator, f2.5 is equivalent to f4 on full frame, so indeed you won't get really shallow DOF with that.

Well Drat. BUT - thank you! Because now I at least know it's not fully ME unable to achieve it without some actual room (background actually a good 5+feet away). I appreciate you for sure!~ :)

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sinclair

I prefer to use my Canon nFD 50/1.8 on my mFT camera (which makes it a 100mm), but only because of the shallow DOF.  If I could get a 24mm or 28mm Canon nFD with a f stop under 2.0 (For 48 or 56 mm) I'd use that instead, but I don't have the funds for such.

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cfx

I know this topic has been dead for a while, but I stumbled onto this tweet that shows the very shallow DOF attainable in doll photography with a 135mm lens. Unfortunately no further information is given so I don't know if it's on full frame (I'd guess it is) or what aperture is used, but it would have to be pretty open to achieve this:

 

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Koala-Krash

CFX, I feel like most of these amazing pics we see from Japanese photographs are from full frame...

 


It's been a moment thant I'm using a D7200 Nikon, and my fav lens for portraits is a fix 60mm. I love the blurry and bokeh effects it allows (a bit like your pics sdrcow).


 

Spoiler

 

49327977056_ae8723aede_c.jpg

49308749553_0b270bd342_c.jpg

 

 

But recently I bought a new phone, a HuaWei P30, and I must confess I've fallen into the lazy pit of taking doll pics with it. It gots 3 different lenses and the quality is pretty neat for a phone! 😵(I'm also flirting with the idea of buying lenses for smartphone...)

 

Spoiler

49003468702_bd7b0da0a8_c.jpg

 

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Tasuke

 

i've a NIKON D5000 with 18/55mm DX ZOOM that i've been using exclusively since new in 2009;

D5000%2012-10-19%201.jpg

D5000%2012-10-19%202.png

MACGYVERNIKOND500019.jpg

MACGYVERNIKOND500020.jpg

MACGYVERNIKOND5000.jpg

MACGYVERNIKOND50002.jpg

 

i've also a FUJI FinePix S2 Pro, -a $2000.00 model in the early-2000's- with TAMRON 28/105 mm, that i found at a thrift for all of $10.00 a couple/three years ago;

FinePix%20S2%20Pro%20JOHN%201-13-20.jpg

 

Edited by Tasuke

 

2020164095_ANightatKonomi12-18-23550px.Horizont..png.35eaba54e8b03fbe6a7f7cd252209e94.png

 

 

 

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qudoll
On 1/13/2020 at 4:51 AM, cfx said:

I know this topic has been dead for a while, but I stumbled onto this tweet that shows the very shallow DOF attainable in doll photography with a 135mm lens. Unfortunately no further information is given so I don't know if it's on full frame (I'd guess it is) or what aperture is used, but it would have to be pretty open to achieve this:

 

You can cheat by getting as close to the doll as possible on some standard lens, and then cropping the photo to simulate getting a longer lens and shallower DOF. 😄

Edited by qudoll

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cfx
15 minutes ago, qudoll said:

You can cheat by getting as close to the doll as possible on some standard lens, and then cropping the photo to simulate getting a longer lens and shallower DOF.

That doesn't seem correct. While true that you can reduce DOF this way, if you get close enough to do that with a "standard" lens (i.e. ~50mm on full frame) you won't need to crop because you'll have filled the frame already by being so close; in fact to get close enough to get that kind of DOF you may be so close you can't get everything in the frame you want to. If you're shooting a wider lens than that, you can get closer, but the closer you get the more perspective distortion you will see, like is all too common today with phone cameras and their wide-angle lenses. And if you're talking about the usual f4 or slower typical "kit" lens, unless the background is quite far away from the doll, it won't be possible to get the background that out of focus with such a small aperture.

That brings up a point that should be made though; perspective is solely a function of camera to subject distance, so to be completely accurate attributing that kind of distorted perspective to wide-angle lenses isn't totally accurate. It's not the lens' angle of view that causes the distortion, it's a side effect of it because in order to get the subject larger in frame, it's necessary to get unnaturally close to the subject, causing the distorted perspective. Close one eye and put your head a couple of inches away from a doll and you'll see the same distorted perspective.

Significant cropping also throws away resolution unless you've got megapixels to spare.

There's a reason professional portrait photographers use 85mm, 105mm, 135mm or even longer lenses like 200mm; it's flattering and makes faces look like we expect them to look. From the standpoint of photography, dolls are little 1/3 people so the same ideas apply. Since it is 1/3 scale the lens length can go down some over 1/1 too, but 50mm is vastly preferable to say 28mm. Unless the idea is to show a doll as a smaller part of a scene, when wider can be perfect for the situation, but that's a case where you are going to want a blurred out background anyway.

A less extreme version of the same idea can work though. If you have a 50mm f2.8 lens instead of a f1.4, keep the same camera-to-subject (doll) distance but if you can change the setup where any background is much further away you can get effectively narrow DOF.

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Rajke

Currently using a Canon 2000D with objectief EF-S 18-55 mm IS II. 
Before this camera I used mainly my IPhone and an old camera from Sony that I used till 2018 because of a dead battery. 

Really happy with the Canon and learning to know the camera before buying additional lenses. 


@onion20@   This is a signature.

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Angered-Icon

I'm super armature with my photography but I'm still learning and learning. I haven't gone up to the BIG DAWG cameras but I've at least come up from a generic point and shoot. Currently my camera is an Olympus Pen Lite E-PL6. I mostly use a Lumix 25mm lens to give me decent boke and more light for dark indoor pictures.

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chef_mai

If I'm really lazy, I'll use my iPad to take a picture. These photos have a dull look to them, but it does the job for the reviews and utility pics.

If there's some natural light, and nobody else is around, I'll break out my camera. I feel a bit bad not taking better pics of my dolls since I use the camera pretty extensively for other hobbies.

I take most shots posted here at close range (using a 35/1.8 or 50/1.8 equiv) because of limited space for taking pictures near the window with a solid backdrop that's about 18" wide. This is why I heavily side-crop most of my photos.

However, today, I propped Mai my on bed and used a nicer tele-portrait lens (150/1.8 equiv) from overhead for a better looking shot. This trick doesn't work for Mochi because of her twintails. 

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battrastard

I've mostly been using the camera on my Samsung Galaxy phone for my pics. 

Recently, I picked up a Canon EOS M50 MkII with a 15-45 IS lens, and I'm still farting around with how it works. 

So far, I'm happy with its performance, but, I'm also lazy and haven't really gotten into the different settings to bring out its full potential. 

(although, I love the bluetooth features! It's much easier to load pics to Flickr compared to my stubborn phone!!) 

 

Edit: The swivel touchscreen on the back is another plus for me, I've tortured my knees and back too often with my old EOS 40D!!

Edited by battrastard

"Madness takes it's toll, Please have exact change!"

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nChoco

I used to use a Canon 5Dmk2, but I have switched to the Fuji XT-2.

It's lighter than a DSLR, so it's easier to bring around places.

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SFSakana

I used to have DSLR Canon 450D with 50mm F2.8 shooting my BJD.

I switched to mirrorless Fujiflim X100t with 35mm prime lens in 2020 when I start shooting DD.

My current gear is sx10 with 35mm prime lens, thinking to get another micro lens or zoom lens in future. 

Edited by SFSakana
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BeyondTime

I've been using my D800 with either a 50mm f1.4, or a 105mm f1.4 for closeups. 


The difference between Dollfie Dreams and Heroin? Heroin is illegal, Dollfie Dreams probably should be.

“Empty wallets, full hearts.” That’s probably an apt description for the effects of DD addiction

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ChrisFhey

I've used a Nikon D5300 for the longest time, mainly paired with a 35mm f1.8 lens. But I don't own that camera anymore.

I recently upgraded to a Z6, and I mostly use a 40mm f2.0 lens with it. I also have a 85mm f1.8 lens, but I feel it's not very practical for indoor use.
I think the largest benefit I've noticed is that I no longer have to use the viewfinder, as using the screen to make photos is just as quick. (Used to be different on the D5300).
It makes taking photos at low angles so much less of a hassle, since I don't have to get in an awkward position to aim and shoot.

I've also been considering investing in a macro lens, as I feel my current lenses can't get close enough for close-ups.

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