Maybe i'm a fifties guy [pov 35vs50]

Jaime M

Jaime M

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I've been always searching for a cheap Summicron 35. The 35mm POV is in my opinion perfect. I love the content wideness of this focal.

I've been shooting with several fifties for four years, waiting for the Summicron, but since a few months i have an Hexar AF as a substitute for the 'cron and i'm realising that it is very difficult to me frame with this focal length! Never notice this before with other cameras with a 35 equivalent.

Two toughs in my mind.. 1) It is matter of time that i need to get use to the focal length.
2) Why Konica did not make a 50mm version of the Hexar too? 😀 It's a incredibly great camera
 
50mm is a wonderfully useful lens but it is sometimes too narrow for a lot of situations. 35mm is a great compromise. Wide enough generally but not wide enough to distort appreciably. I tend to use a 28mm more than a 35. More of a wide view with an appreciable difference in perspective from a 50mm. If I had to choose one lens though, I would choose a 35 as the ideal compromise.
 
35mm, 28mm, and 24/25mm are the "natural vision" lenses (for me). They see what I see. Anything outside that range is used "as needed" but the view is not so instinctively correct for me.
 
I had to use an SLR to appreciate a 50mm. When I picked up my Miranda which has 1:1 viewing when using a 50mm, I suddenly found 50mm being a lot easier to compose with. With an RF 45mm or 35mm seems more natural.
 
i use both the 50 & 35mm & I find the 35 intimidates me. As much as I love my CV 35 color skopar I keep finding I'm usually not close enough to my subject. The 50 keeps me at a safe distance. I so much want to develop a close relationship with the 35.
 
tunalegs said:
I had to use an SLR to appreciate a 50mm. When I picked up my Miranda which has 1:1 viewing when using a 50mm, I suddenly found 50mm being a lot easier to compose with. With an RF 45mm or 35mm seems more natural.
Click to expand...

Yes, the field of view can appear a bit wider and more adequate in the SLR finder, because the rangefinder's framelines usually under-represent what will go on the film. I've noticed that, too. Still, 50mm seems tight to me, even on an SLR.
 
I'm a 50mm person. The focal length is perfect for me. Or at least, an approximation of it is perfect. I've been happy with 45mm lenses (Contax G) and 58mm lenses (m42). It's 50-ish that I always come back to. I don't mind 35mm lenses on compacts, but I prefer a 50 as my walking around lens.

If Konica had made a Hexar with a 45 or 50mm lens, I would sell my M3 in a shot.
 
It is of course a matter of taste and way of working. Personally I like the fifties. Back in the days before digital my students often got themselves a cheap SLR with a 50-something (Petri/Practika/Zenit/etc) and their first question usually was: "Shall I get some other lenses?" My answer would always be: "Yes at some point, but get to know the 50 first. If you are not into sports or wildlife you'll be able to do 90% of your shooting with the 50."
I have always worked in accordance with this myself, shooting reportage, portraits, tabletop mainly using lenses in the fifties or their equiv. in other formats. I still prefer a 50 as a walk around lens, although I usually work with a 28-135 zoom for reportage these days just to make things easier and that is of course on a dSLR - so it does not really count 😉
 
I gave up on the 35 a few years ago but I'm now doing more film and realised what a big gap there is between my 50mm Summicron and the 25mm CV. I've just bought a fairly cheap Olympus XA and am looking forward to seeing what comes of that.
 
gap? lenses are not about coverage but about resolving specific problems with a mission.
I always giggle when I read about the "problems" people have with "overlap" or "gaps" with their DSLR Zooms. A lens should fit a specific need and the old rule was to double on focal lenghts.

Of course there is a big difference between 28 and 50! no questioning, but that is exactly the point 🙂
 
I always giggle when I read about the "problems" people have with "overlap" or "gaps" with their DSLR Zooms. A lens should fit a specific need and the old rule was to double on focal lenghts.
Click to expand...

Here's some information about the diagonal field of view given by some common lenses for the 36 x 24mm frame...

15mm = 110 degrees = 235%
21mm = 92 degrees = 196%
25mm = 82 degrees = 174%
28mm = 75 degrees = 160%
35mm = 63 degrees = 134%
50mm = 47 degrees = 0%
75mm = 32 degrees = 68%
85mm = 29 degrees = 62%
90mm = 27 degrees = 57%
100mm = 24 degrees = 51%
135mm = 18 degrees = 38%
200mm = 12 degrees = 25%

(all figures rounded to integer) You'll see that, to double the 50mm's field of view you'd need something like a 20mm lens, but going the other way, you neatly halve the field of view by doubling the focal length. I used this calculator to do the numbers.
 
Here's some information about the diagonal field of view given by some common lenses for the 36 x 24mm frame...
Click to expand...

In fact, we're interested in the area covered by the lens, so what we actually find is this...


Length - Horizontal - Vertical - Area Covered - Relative %
15 - 100.40 - 77.30 - 7760.92 - 725.86%
21 - 81.20 - 59.50 - 4831.40 - 451.87%
25 - 71.50 - 51.30 - 3667.95 - 343.05%
28 - 65.50 - 46.40 - 3039.20 - 284.25%
35 - 54.40 - 37.80 - 2056.32 - 192.32%
50 - 39.60 - 27.00 - 1069.20 - 100%
75 - 27.00 - 18.20 - 491.40 - 45.95%
85 - 23.90 - 16.10 - 384.79 - 35.98%
90 - 22.60 - 15.20 - 343.52 - 32.12%
135 - 15.20 - 10.20 - 155.04 - 14.50%
200 - 10.30 - 6.90 - 71.07 - 6.64%


...so the concerns about "filling in the gap" seem justified to me
 
I have been a fifties guy for 20 years with SLR cameras after which I started using a 35mm lens more often with RF cameras.
Then, I bounced back to the 50's. They give a classic look.
I want to take with me only one lens to a trip this year, and I will maybe use the 50 or the 35. The 35 is more versatile, but the 50 is better for portraits. Both are very useful, in my opinion. It is a toss.
 
I always used to shoot with a 50 (or equivalent) as my main lens across the board, 35mm SLR, 35mm RF, DSLR and with MF (hence equivalent). However, when I acquired a 35mm for my Bessa R, I never looked back. On an RF, it just made sense to me. It worked. Maybe my eyes are wider than others'?
 
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