135mm long lens?

[deckardScott1980]

want to get another lens for my sgpro, just wondering about long lenses. Im eyeing a 135mm lens. What shots are used for longer lenses. i hear there are good for extreme close ups. but can they be used for medium shots as well, and what kind of look would i excpect from them?

 

[Taylor Rudd]

http://flickr.com/photos/tags/135mm/interesting/

These all have tags that say "135mm" - not all of the photographs are at that focal length. You should be able to tell which ones are, though.

 

[Huy Vu]

It depends on how far you have to zoom in to clear vignetting and where you are relative to the subject so mileage will vary. Here are two examples, the first is a close up

The second is a medium shot, but I had to back away quite a bit

 

[AwakenedFilms]

I like the 135mm for ECUs. I find its too long on the Letus for realistic use on medium shots, like the second shot Huy Vu posted (you'd have to back up like 50 feet or so). An 85mm is a little better for MCU portrait use. 200mm is a little better for wildlife than a 135mm.

I have an old manual nikkor 135mm and it has a very long focus range (nearly a full turn), but the ring is kind of stiff.

I find if I want to have very shallow focus, I do not just grab the longest lens, but think about how far away I can shoot and whether I want a wider or shallower field of view. An important point to note is that if the camera has to be back far enough that the subject is focused near infinity (in order to frame your med shot), you will in essence have very deep depth of field (even at f2.8).


Jason

 

[William_Robinette]

I like using longer lenses like a 135mm for medium shots where I want to blur out the background. You can really only do this outside though, like Huy's last shot.

 

[hoarp001]

Get a 75-210 F4 zoom. Ive got one, its my favorite lens. Its a trombone (push-pull) design, which is abit of a pain, but its pinsharp, and it produces brilliant bokeh and DOF.

I got mine for £30 (about $60) on ebay, FD mount. Very good deal for such a nice lens.

The shopping bags are to ballence it, the drag control on that head was bust.

I shot this video with my 75-210 zoom on SGpro R3 flip and HVX200.

http://www.vimeo.com/1309330