Stuck in a jam: 35mm, 40mm or 50mm

I've settled on 35, 40, and 50mm. :)

The 35 is a vintage, slow Summaron, the 40 is a modern, fast CV, and there are still several 50's hanging around.

Hope that helps, but doubt that it does.
 
I shot mostly 35's until I got my R-D1. Then using my 35/1.2 on that became a 50. Now I find myself using a 50mm on my R2A and liking it for the most part, although there's definitely occasions when I want more width, you just have to shoot around it.
 
What shooting I did for twenty years was with a 50mm -- did not even care that other lenses existed. After careful consideration and thought, I switched to the 35 and never looked back. YMMV

Best - P
 
ooo -- ooo -- ooo -- ahhh -- ahhh -- ahhh

(swats open palm on floor in front of him while crotched in squatting position)

You're just pushing me to get all three. ;-)

It's the fact that I could so easily use the 40mm with the R3x that has me picking bugs out of my coat.

The jump from 28 to 50 never seemed right to me, and 28 to 35 seems way too close.
 
The 35 and 50 are different enough to justify having both. It's not only the field of view that's different, but it's also how DOF works with them.

If I'm shooting from the hip in ordinary lighting situations with the shutter at 1/focal-length, the 50 can not be closed down enough to get the amount of DOF I need to compensate for scale focussing errors.

The 35 on the other hand can do that. Shooting at 1/focal-length already allows closing down a stop more (more DOF), and the wider nature gives an extra boost to DOF as well..
 
If I were a minimalist, I would say 28+50.
If I were realistic, I would say 28-35-75.
But if I were broke, I would say 35.
 
Take a look here: http://ferider.smugmug.com/gallery/738131_eLWKG#32486189_7wWt7 and decide for yourself. Focal length choice is so personal that only you can decide what suits you best.

If you follow that link you'll find diagrams showing the field of view of progression of focal lengths.

To me, the best 3-lens kit seems 35-50-90 or 28-40-75/90. For a 4-lens kit I'd say 25-35-50-90 or 21-28-40-75/90.
 
I have a CV21, Canon 28, Summaron 35, CV40, several 50s, an Elmar90, and a Hector135.
The last 2 long lenses, I never use. The 35 and 40 are interchangeable depending on need for speed.
I had a CV25, but thought that if I need wide, I need wider than 25, so I sold the 25 and got the 21. (Plus, the 25 was too close to the 28.)

YMMV
 
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I suggest that you should use 1 lense only for a few months until you figured out whether wide-angle or tele is more suitable for you. Create your own style and set. I started out with Nokton 50mm and going to purchase Nokton 35mm f1.2 soon, since I'm old-fashion and like to capture only what I can see
 
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