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Here are a couple of pics I took on the weekend, first time using my new lens (50mm 1. so go easy!

f2.8, 1/320sec, iso400


f1.8, 1/13sec, iso400 using the overhead light in the car
Normally wouldn't use that sort of shutter speed as it's nearly impossible to get a sharp image but was playing with the new lens and liked the lighting and mood it created


f1.8, 1/60, iso400
This one's interesting lighting was due to natural light coming in through the front window, and a very yellow light behind. Apart from taking a different angle, is there a way to combat this?


I've learned very quickly that this lens isn't sharp until about f2.8, but it's good to have the ability to go wider at a pinch... I will try and get some more up the next time I use it. Not much processing done on these, and what do you think about sharpness? eg the first especially, I think photobucket is sharpening them for me a bit?

Josh

I've got the same lens and just adore it.. its sharp as a tack and sooooo much fun! I like your images btw the last one is a stand out for me with its great bokeh and good colours (well on my monitor anyway).. can I make a suggestion though.. in the first image of the older guy.. he needs more neck in the pic as it kinda looks like he's chopped off (an easy mistake to make and I know I've done it on more than one occassion lol).. and in the second I'm a little unsure on what the focus point is.. ideally her eye's should be focus but they look a little soft - although I really like the pose in this one!

Haha the neck was chopped off, as I realised after the shot that there was a chair in the foreground which looks even worse! In regards to the second image, I believe the eyes are in focus, but as it was taken handheld at such a slow shutter speed and wide open, this is where the softness is coming from... I could be wrong though... The last is my favorite too, my girlfriend is a quirky type full of character and this picture shows some of that

Hi Josh,

These are really good images, and you should be well satisfied with them. The first is nice and sharp, and the second has a great softness to it, which suits both the way it's been shot, as well as the subject. And I'm not at all troubled by the deep shadow on the lh side of your lady's face; this seems to suit the subject and image quite nicely.

In the third, you refer to the issue with the two different types (and colours) of light. That's a tough one; you could kill the internal light, or perhaps draw some curtains on the window.

What I would have probably done though is considered which of the light sources was the more powerful, and balanced my image towards that. As it stands, I think your image has been balanced towards the interior light source, and consequently the primary source - daylight - appears to be a little off colour in terms of its wb. Had you gone the other way, this would have added more warmth into the colouration.

If you shot this in raw, have a play with your wb settings, and see what you can do with it.

sully wrote:I've learned very quickly that this lens isn't sharp until about f2.8,

What you may be seeing is not so much just that the lens sharpens up as you stop down - which it certainly does - but also you might need to bear in mind that a large aperture settings you have a very narrow range of DoF. If your focus is even marginally off, this will be very evident in your images.

As you stop the lens down, your DoF range increases, and focus errors become less of an issue, but wide open they can be very obvious.

From what we're seeing here, this lens is very sharp at f/2.8, but I encourage you to play with it and see where it's best: find the lens's sweet spot, so that you can take advantage of it.

gstark wrote:This one's interesting lighting was due to natural light coming in through the front window, and a very yellow light behind. Apart from taking a different angle, is there a way to combat this?

Several ways; I assume you had manually set the WB to daylight.

1. Switch it off and use a reflector or off camera flash (which is daylight balanced)
2. Gel the tungsten light with lots of CTB gel to convert it to daylight
3. Use a gradient in photoshop to correct the colour
4. extreme method would be use a large CTO gel on the window to balance to tungsten and use tungten WB on camera.

Hope to see more of your work.