Best Portrait Lens Buying Guide

Portrait photography, otherwise known as portraiture, is the type of photograph capture that is focused on the face and expression of the subject. The subject can be a single person or a small group of people. Basically, the aim of having a portrait is to display the likeness, mood, and personality of the subject. In order to achieve this goal, it is advised to choose the most appropriate camera lens that will work in conjunction with your DSLR.

There are hundreds of camera lenses available in the market today. Some of the most popular brands are Nikon, Canon, Sony, Pentax, and Olympus. You have to take time considering the basic camera lens parameters when making the selection among the diverse array of models. In general, it is best to make a research first of the camera lenses that possess the advised focal length, aperture size and shape, and other specifications indicated below.

A good starting point in knowing the factors to be considered when searching for the best portrait lenses is the understanding of point of view or perspective. It should be clear that the perspective is not directly affected by the camera lens. Both long and short lenses only affect the image frame to provide either narrower or wider view. The perspective also remains the same when you have to increase or decrease your distance to the subject by changing the focal length of the lens. Rather, the perspective is affected by the change in your position. There is a 15-foot rule stating that you should be about 15 feet away from the subject in order for your brain to create an image of his or her facial features.

According to this rule, distortions could occur if the distance between the camera and the subject is less than 15 feet. With that rule, it can also be said that the complete view of the subject can be achieved with 50-70mm lens when standing and 70-105mm when seated. It also follows that the best capture for head and shoulders is through the 200-300mm lens.

Another important factor is the background details that a camera lens can produce and alter. In most cases, the background is not the focus for digital portrait photos. In order to decrease the focus on the background, it is best to choose a camera lens that features a large aperture or lens opening. Ideal values for this parameter are f/2.8 or f/2. Also, the shape of the aperture determines the quality of a parameter, called bokeh. This parameter provides more detail or texture to the unfocused background. For quality bokeh, the camera lens should have a near-circular aperture with shape-optimized diaphragms

Lens speed is also an important factor when choosing a camera lens. For commercial-level applications, camera lenses having aperture of f/5.6 and below are considered fast enough to capture quality portrait images. More precise portrait imaging, on the other hand, suggests photographers to use camera lenses with maximum aperture of f/1.8 or f/2. However, if you focus on the lens speed, other factors like the perspective and background details will be compromised. As mentioned earlier, the best shallow focus effect on the background or the best quality of bokeh can be achieved with lens aperture of f/2.8 or f/2. This means that you have to choose between the lens speed and the background defocusing effect. As a suggestion, you may consider camera lenses with adjustable focal length and aperture. In this way, you can have more options on combining focal settings, depending on your specific application. The problem is that you have to be skilled enough to make the most suitable adjustments. That is why most photograph experts suggest that it is best to prefer camera lenses with fixed values.

Furthermore, it is also necessary to consider your specific application and the type of environment where the portrait will be taken. When taking headshots in a studio setting, ideal focal length ranges from 80mm to 400mm. Longer focal lengths are then advised in fashion photography. Meanwhile, glamour photography basically requires soft focus or spherical aberration to get rid of the “gauzy” look in the images. Ideal camera lenses for this type of application have focal length around 135mm and aperture size of f/2.8.

To date, among the most preferred camera lenses by photograph experts are Olympus 40-150mm f/4-5.6, Phase One Sekor AF 110mm f/2.8 LS D, Canon 85mm f/1.8 USM, Pentax 70mm f/2.4 pancake lens, and Nikon 105mm f/2 DC Nikkor. Each of these models excels in its own specific application. Below are some details about these camera lenses.

Olympus 40-150mm f/4-5.6

With the camera’s smaller and lighter sensor, the Olympus 40-150mm f/4-5.6 can be a great choice for a wide variety of photographic applications. Among its main features are the seven rounded diaphragm blades with circular aperture. It is capable of translating normal images into natural-looking out-of-focus areas of picture enhanced with round specular highlights.

Phase One Sekor AF 110mm f/2.8 LS D

The phase One Sekor AF 110mm f/2.8 LS D has a critically sharp design to produce softening and vignetting effects in portrait images. It has a 1/1600s leaf shutter flash and works perfectly even in full sunlight.

Canon 85mm f/1.8 USM

Another camera lens that offer pleasing background blur is the Canon 85mm f/1.8 USM. It works very well with full-frame sensor-based DSLRs. It has a light weight, quiet and fast USM autofocus motor, and relatively low price. This is also an ideal camera lens for candid photography, whether in studio or outdoor, because of its large aperture size.

Pentax 70mm f/2.4 Pancake Lens

Through its legendary innovative design, the Pentax 70mm f/2.4 is an excellent camera lens for moderate telephoto portrait applications. It has a Quick-Shift Focus system that you can use to instantly switch between auto and manual focus.

Nikon 105mm f/2 DC Nikkor

The Nikon 105mm f/2 DC Nikkor is among the top choices when it comes to good bokeh quality. This camera lens also allows you to control its aperture shape in order to adjust the blurring effect of the image.

More About Best Portrait Lens For Canon:

Finding the good portrait lens is not something difficult. However, it is difficult for you to know that which ones are qualified to be good indeed.Before you try to go to the stores and place and order, you surely need to take a look at the camera bag in your home and check whether you have the quality Canon portrait lens. If you want to get the best portrait lens for Canon, you always need to work hard to ensure that you are doing well in the research process.

First of all, you need to consider the image quality. This is something really important indeed. You surely would not want to find the lenses which only give the poor quality of image, right? You would try to use the portrait lens to shoot people. Many of the people would be vain about the appearance. Therefore, you need to care a lot about the quality of the images. If you shoot scenery, the scenery would not complain that you cannot take the beautiful side of them, but human would.

Secondly, you definitely need to consider the focal length. The portraits would usually be taken with the type of lens which would be short as about 50mm and long as 300mm. Some of the favorite portrait lens for canon refers to the extra-long ones because it can be used to get the great quality. However, the normal portrait lenses would not use the extra-long ones.One the other hand, you need to consider the aperture if you want to have the favorite portrait lens for canon. The wide apertures would be better for people to get the quality photos. There would be very shallow depth of the field with the use of a wider aperture. Therefore, it can also help the photographers to enjoy the good and sharp focus on the eyes of the subject indeed. If you are finding your favorite portrait lens for canon, you would find that the lenses with single focal length would be better for portraits.

If you really have a limited amount of money to be spent, you can consider setting a budget before you go. It is because this can usually help you to make sure that you are buying the lens which is affordable to you In conclusion, you can find the best portrait lens for canon if you really work hard to find. And it is very important for you to understand the real needs of you before you go to buy the lenses. It is because there are so many products in the market and it is actually quite difficult for you to go through all types of the lenses before you really buy them. Therefore, you can try to consult the opinion from some experts in the photography field before you buy them. This can help you to select some of the possible products and this can reduce the time that you need to spend on finding and buying the favorite portrait lens for canon.

More About Best Portrait Lens For Nikon:

When you try to search online, you will surely find that there are some people who are the experienced photographers in the portrait aspect. Therefore, you will find that they have a lot of useful experiences in guiding the others, including you, to find the best portrait lens for Nikon.

When you try to ask them to help you find your favorite portrait lens for Nikon, they would have a lot to say as well. According to these experts, the good way to start is to take a look at the focal length of the lens. You can try to take the measure of the sensor or the film in the diagonal way. You can then multiply it by two. If the film diagonal is about 80mm, then you would need to use the corresponding lens according to above method. This can help you to find the best portrait lens for Nikon in terms of the focal length.

On the other hand, the size of the sensor should be considered as well. If the camera is th full frame one, you can try to use the normal setting that you can find in many of the forums. But if the sensor is only about half of the size, you need to consider something else. For example, the D80 camera from Nikon would be about 2/3 of the normal frame of size 35mm. Therefore, the ‘conversion factor’ for the lens would be about 1.5. Therefore, 100mm lens on the 35mm camera would help to make the 150mm lens on the camera with that 1.5 conversion factor.

Moreover, the perspective deserves your attention as well. It is dependent on the distance between you and the subject, instead of the lens. You need to take images for the same object using the tripod. Then, you can try to change the focal length all the time. While some images would have differences, you would find that the perspective would remain the same indeed.

Last but not least, you need to consider the zooming of the lenses as well. Some people think that their camera can perform well without zooming and the camera would then perform well after zooming. However, this is definitely not the truth. Many of the cameras may not have the same quality of effect while they are undergoing the zooming process. After you try to zoom your camera, you would find that the subject would be blurred.

This is one of the problems that you need to address while you try to find the best portrait lens for Nikon. Many of the lenses of Nikon would have satisfying zooming effects, but some of them may not. Therefore, you need to search online and find the relevant comments. This is something that people often ignore while they are searching for their favorite portrait lens for Nikon, but they are always important indeed.To conclude, the best portrait lens for Nikon depends on the camera that you want to use and other factors such as the budget in your mind.