I've been trying to figure out just where my comfort level is with portrait focal lengths and APS-C cameras. I think I'm narrowing in on the right mix...

Fadya. Photographed with a Nikon D7100 and the older 85mm f1.8 AF lens.

I bought the 60mm f2.4 macro for the Fuji X system a few weeks ago and used it to very good effect on several shoots. I used it for a marketing assignment at Zach Theatre in support of their production of "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" where it was both a great portrait lens and also vital for all the close ups I did on the principal actor's face. It's a great lens for casual portraits where you might want some "air" (space) around the subject. I like the way it renders portraits but found myself wanting a lens that's a little longer. A longer lens compresses space a bit more. I also decided I'd like a faster lens; preferably one that's very sharp wide open (ruling out some MF alt-brand offerings in the near range; sorry Samyang). I settled on the Fuji 90mm f2.0 and started reading reviews in earnest. 

How I wish I could get paid for just sitting in my comfortable office chair reading lens and camera reviews...

The folks at www.Lenstip.com and https://www.opticallimits.com both had glowing things to say about the lens. I was starting to get hooked but thought I'd look through my Lightroom library with hundreds and hundreds of thousands of photographs and see if the 135mm equivalent focal length was something I'd actually use in day-to-day work. Turns out I like that focal length a lot and have used it extensively over the years. 

But it was the $250 rebate that clinched the deal. I saw the price drop on Amazon.com and was about to push the "one-click" button until I remembered that we're blessed here in Austin with one of the finest bricks and mortar camera stores in all of north America. I went to their site and found that, of course, they have exactly the same rebate offer, the same price, and that I could drive up there on my way to lunch and walk out the door with my latest heart throb lens. So I did. 

Of course, the benefits of buying local are legion so I won't go into that here; you already know this. Especially so if your access to a local dealer has vanished.

I checked out the lens and kept the boxes and packing material in the bag the store supplied. If something had been wrong, off, jinky, or otherwise with the lens I knew I could call the store and they'd send a replacement over ASAP and pick up the faulty product on their way out my door. But, of course, the lens has tested out to be exactly as it should be. I'm keeping the 90mm and an XH1 with me for the rest of the day, just looking for opportunities to, A: Discover Austin's Next Supermodel and, B: Test out the qualities of my latest lens acquisition. 

I included the image of Fadya, above, because it's an example of one of my consistent uses for a lens in this focal length and, well, because I think Fadya is cool. 

It's now safe and easy to comment. Try it out. No more muss or fuss. Just pure opinion launching at its best. 

And since I like the Fuji 90mm I'm actually going to include a link to the product: 

Don't you just hate it when........

You buy a new lens and you don't have time to put it on your camera and test it right away? I headed over to Precision Camera this morning to pick up the Fujifilm 90mm f2.0 lens I asked them to put on hold for me yesterday. My sales guy and I we're catching up; post sale, when I realized that I was supposed to be at lunch with a fun, happy, creative director at Maudie's Restaurant in mid-town. I said a hasty goodbye, grabbed my new lens and headed South. Driving on the freeway is not the time to open a box and marvel at the fit and finish of the latest acquisition and I didn't feel right about bringing the box into the restaurant and ignoring my lunch date. Immediate gratification partially denied... ("partially"? Well, yes. The Caldo, chips, hot sauce and tacos momentarily distracted me from all things optical....). 

When I got back to the office I was about to de-box the lens when Studio Dog gave me a wry look and telepathically suggested that she needed to be brushed, walked and given a treat of some sort. That of course takes precedence over lens openings. We're back now and I'm heading into the studio to see exactly what it is I've talked myself into this time. Studio Dog is uninterested in the unveiling so I guess I'm on my own. 

Normally I'd put the lens on a handy camera body and go for a walk through downtown but I've got a happy hour with a CFO at 5pm and I'd hate to try my luck at getting back over to this side of town through rush hour traffic (which, in Austin, is from 4 am until 11:30 pm most days...). I guess I'll just put the lens on an XH1 and point it around the studio for a bit. 

Anyway, the eagle has landed; the lens is in my possession. Now we'll see if my family's food money for the month was well spent or not. *

* For the staunchly literal I have to make this disclaimer: I did not use money earmarked for my family's food budget and I am not plunging myself into poverty with this lens purchase. In fact, I bought it only because I know I'll use it for at least three jobs in February that call for people photographs in which the backgrounds are rendered mostly out of focus. We budget a certain amount each year for equipment to be used in the business and we are pretty frugal about hitting budgets and staying in the black. We are not in debt and I no longer have a tuition/room/board bill to pay for the kid. He's launched. The lens will be expensed, over time. Please rest easy knowing that I'll still be able to pay my swim team dues going forward. 

More about the lens as the information (and experience) become available. Thank, Kirk

(Photos included just to spark up an otherwise drab post...).

A.B.T. = Always Be Testing.

A quick post about posting comments!!!! Hello John and Bill...

Noellia. MF Camera. Lens also MF.

Dear readers of all ages. I love comments. Love them very much. Such good feedback. Lately we've been getting spammed by hundreds of mindless anonymous comments a day (yes, "a day"). I turned on the 'verification' that made people select boxes of out-of -focus crap in order to send comments. It worked on the spam but pissed off large numbers of people who used to comment regularly. 

I have turned off the verification in comments. No one should see the nasty grid of boxes filled with out-of-focus visual garbage. I've turned off my own Google+ account and no one should have to use any social media affiliation in order to comment. 

I still have "moderation" enabled so I will go through and "approve" each comment, that's why your posted comment doesn't show up right away... You can put your name in the box when you comment or you can just put your name in the body of your comment if you like. You can even comment anonymously and as long as you are not referencing a site where I can buy edible sponges or dual use toilet paper and I'll probably push your comment right through and share it with the VSL hive. 

Please comment. Your feedback, in part, informs what I will write about and also how often I write. 

If you are a world famous novelist or photojournalist your comments also make me feel special. But all smart and topical comments give me warm and fuzzy feelings.

Repeating for emphasis: the obnoxious boxes are gone. The need to be affiliated with social media in order to comment is gone. It's just me and the comments. 

Buy something on the affiliate links here. Oh, wait! No affiliate link in this post. No ads either. You mean all I get out of this is comments? Well then you better deliver!!!

Portrait of Dyan. Unretouched.

Everybody seems to retouch the crap out of everyone who doesn't need retouching and to skip retouching on the unfortunate souls who could benefit from it. I prefer to light people in a flattering way rather than spend a lot of time converting their skin into smooth plastic. A young woman like Dyan really doesn't need you to flatten out and smooth over every pore... Just thinking about all the portrait images I've seen lately with laser sharp lips and eyes and then skin like a glass of milk. Forget body image issues for a second; I'm now worried about complexion image issues. Since when did ultra smooth skin become a mandatory "feature" of portrait photography?

Looking for light. Brushing past the preconceptions and leveraging what the location gives you.

 When Selena and I photographed on a friend's ranch we purposely traveled light; just a shoulder bag with some cameras and lenses and no lights or stands. It meant that we couldn't really shape the existing light, we'd have to find light we liked and then lean into it and depend on our shooting angles to get the most out of it. I find that I always want some kind of light streaming across the background of my photographs to break the main subject from the background. In black and white we'd see this as "local contrast" but in color I see it as "color tones". Working in color can be more forgiving because you can use contrasting colors to differentiate between tones even if they are the same luminance value.

In the image above we found a series of exterior windows behind and to the right of camera position and moved Selena into a position where the window light came across her face in such a way as to create a shadow to the right side of her face. We kept nudging over her position until I had the soft green back wall showing on either side of her head, effectively separating her from the background.

Then the real game is to pick an exposure that yields a shutter speed you have some promise of being able to handhold well. Using the faster frame rate of a camera helps in giving you more chances of coming away with a sharp frame...

In this particular photo I used an APS-H format camera, the Canon 1D mk2, an a 50mm lens. It certainly was one of those days when you needed to keep your eyes open to the direction and quality of light. There were no auxiliary lights or ready tripods with which to bail myself out.

But it's a fun exercise for someone who sometimes gets too depend on being able to control all the aspects of most shoots...

The right lens makes a difference. Doesn't matter which format you shoot as long as you get the angle of view right.

Selena and I were out shooting at the ranch of a famous Texas musician. It was a breezy, cool day with lots of clouds. I was shooting with a Canon 1D mk2 and a couple different lenses. The lens that seemed most appropriate most of the time was an older 85mm f1.8. A close second was the 100mm f2.0. Both were fine lenses and both were useful right near their wide open apertures. 

The camera and lenses were definitely "old school." There wasn't any image stabilization available other than my good hand holding techniques but I'm not sure it would have affected the final results one way or the other. The camera was an APS-H format which is almost forgotten these days. It's about half way between APS-C and full frame. It's also the same format we enjoyed shooting in the old Kodak DCS 760 camera too. Something about that format just made sense to me. Big enough to share the same kinds of shallow depth of field we associate with full frame but at the same time the camera gave me a nice look with certain lenses; it made the 100mm f2.0 look a bit more like a fast 135mm. 

Selena and I spent most of the middle of the day making photos and then we headed back into Austin as the first rain started falling. I'm just revisiting these files after having set them aside for three or four years. It's fun to come back to old work, many times you bring along a new perspective. 

VSL Brain Picking Time. Who Has an Opinion About the Fujifilm 90mm f2.0 ? I'm itching to buy one now that they are on sale for $699......but......any hidden gotchas?

shot on assignment in Jamaica.

I've always liked the 135mm (full frame) equivalent focal length for portraits. That focal length, especially when paired with a fast and sharp f-stop, does a great job compressing images and focusing viewer attention on the primary subject in the frame. I've owned the Nikon 135mm f2.0, the Canon 135mm f2.0 and lenses in other formats that are in the same angle of view category. I've liked almost all of them. 

I noticed that the 90mm f2.0 lens, which is usually priced at around $950, is currently (and apparently through March) available at retailers for the reduced price of $699. Or $698, depending on the dealer....

I have a project for which this lens would be most welcome but before I pull the trigger on yet another lens in the Fuji system (I just bought the 14mm f2.8 a little over a week ago) I thought I'd check in with all of you Fuji shooters and see what your take on this lens might be. 

I understand that it does not have image stabilization but I figure I can work with that given my (again---recent) purchase of two XH1 cameras which feature in body image stabilization. Anything else it may be advantageous to know?

Thanks, Kirk

A few more favorites from my days with 135mm lenses....

Paris.

Genius.

Love.

Kirov. Russia.

location.

Actor.

Artist.

Legit street photographer.

Creator.

Ice cream. Park bench.

Dancer feet.

coffee shop customer.