f1.2 - but where to point it?

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johnnyrod

More cameras than shots
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I've had my Pentax f1.2 50mm (SLR) lens fixed by a pro, and am looking forward to giving it its first tryout. In all honesty I was lucky, I bought another camera (K2) that turned out to have this attached, in other words I didn't make a conscious choice to go and buy this lens. Huge great thing, but the question is, what sort of thing does shooting below about f2 suit?
 
Photos, where ultimate resolution doesn't matter so much. All at f1.4:

Scan-120415-0002.jpg


Scan-111106-0045-X2.jpg


jonwed-X2.jpg


One of my favorites, probably doesn't mean anything to others ...

NP1600-2-07.jpg


Roland.
 
Hi,

As you didn't plan to buy it I'd suggest you sell it on and pocket the cash. Then buy more film or put it in the repair fund.

My experience of very fast lenses is that I seldom need them and when I don't the normal standard lens is more than enough and turns out better pictures a lot of the time. Also, I don't worry about it so much...

BTW, I've never had the Pentax ones so others may correct me.

Regards, David
 
Check DOF online calculator for 1.2 and 135 format. You'll get the "picturte".
At 1.2 on 135 film camera it is kind of close to 4x5 with normal length lens wide open.
I don't use my 50 1.2 on our SLR, not an SLR guy, but I do take family portraits with this lens wide open.
Knowing limiting of DOF at 1.2 is handy for portraits, I'm not big fan of portraits where next to nothing is in focus, but with 1.2 if handled carefully it gives special separation of main object.

at f1.2.
_MG_2436.JPG
 
Aside from possible bragging rights (like bragging about how much water you waste in the desert), I have never had much use for super fast lenses. I know I'm swimming against the tide (or running against the lemmings), but that is it.
There are time when a photog needs a fast lens. The only photo I ever got printed in Life magazine was taken at f 1.4 on a 50mm Nikkor. It was a photo taken at an indoor track meet in Madison Square Garden, the Melrose Games in 1970.
A young actresss, grossly underrpaid, got into a TV show that became a hit. and the producers bought her a Ferarri instead of raising her salary. She hated it. On the car-jammed Hollywood Freeway on the way to work it would always overheat. Think about it.
 
I think one of the main advantages of a fast lens on an Slr was a brighter viewfinder and some of the 70's cameras where pretty dim. Viewfinders today are all pretty bright.
 

Close Focus by unoh7, M9 75 Lux

Many shooters seem to latch on to one style, and subject matter. The advantage of many lenses and shooting many situations is you are forced to "try and make it work".

At F/8, where HCB lived (and where I also often shoot), your results are down to framing, and cell phones start to look threatening. 😉

But the subject isolation, and look of the background can make an image quite striking.


Take my hand by unoh7, Nikkor 300/2.8

Of course taste comes well into it. Some would say these images are fantasy. Well so is black and white, but it's never been so popular, since there was no practical option 🙂

Everything in moderation....but photography all the time. That's my motto 🙂
 
Great pictures Marek! Roland - mainly low light? I did wonder about trying out a bit of that, my handle on exposure isn't great so could try experimenting a bit. David - fair point, but I'll likely never have something like this again so want to see what it's like. Aside from the £150 spent in 1998 on my second SLR, nothing I have now cost more than £30. Uhoh thanks for the link (and your great pictures too), will have to trawl some of those. I'm more of a snapper than a street/landscape/well-defined genre photographer - the story is the picture (like the TV one above of Marek's) so the separation of the subject from everything is an aesthetic I do like, if pulled off well.

Really good replies, will be interested to hear more!
 
Hi,

Interesting points about the shallow DoF but, at my age, precise focus is sometime difficult and f/2 -ish gives a better fudge factor. Also the usual f/2 85/90mm's (or 135mm as I've yet to find the OM one in a flea market... ) are what I prefer for shallow DoF. Don't know why they work when 50mm doesn't but I don't complain.

Regards, David

PS And if you do decide to sell it then Christmas is a good time to put it on the market.
 
Thanks, Michael.

johnnyrod said:
Roland - mainly low light? I did wonder about trying out a bit of that, my handle on exposure isn't great so could try experimenting a bit.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I was trying to show something else but the obvious soft portrait / bokeh shot.

IMHO, these lenses are made not for bragging rights, but for the ones of us who like to go to bed late. Use it in the late evening, 400 ASA, keep the lens open, 1/30 of a seconds and see what you get 🙂 Technically your 1.2 is a very good lens, BTW.

Another f1.4 if I remember right, but this time digital:

L1002144%20-1-bw-XL.jpg


Roland.
 
If I can put this in, since the philosophical problem is the same, here's the 50/1.1 Nokton on Leica M4. It was shot on-the-fly,
and the lighting is just the streetlight type you see in the background--it was very dark, which is why I bought the lens. I'm
having some bit of crisis, because my new Nikon D7200 will do nearly the same thing, better quality, at EI8000 with a
ridiculously high shutter speed and a $100 lens, and flawlessly instant AF. Obviously, for me it's more about the situations I
can shoot in than the visual effect of the wider opening. My film world is shaken, at the moment.


Annie on Halsted
by Michael Darnton, on Flickr
 
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