Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/11/07
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]on 11/7/00 6:02 PM, Mark Rabiner at mark@rabiner.cncoffice.com wrote: > Robert Appleby wrote: >> >>>>>> >> Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2000 00:20:32 +0100 >> From: "Alan Hull" <hull@telia.com> >> Subject: Re: [Leica]Why a 35mm lens? >> Message-ID: <200011070621.HAA10357@d1o915.telia.com> >> References: >> >>> From: John Collier >>> find that I use an M body with a 35 lens for about 99% of my >> shooting. I >> - --------------------- >> John and others. I find it interesting that so many luggers seem to >> prefer the 35mm lens. When I was starting out in photography the most >> common advice was ... Fill the frame. Followed by ... but do not get >> too close because of perspective distortion. >> >> May I ask those luggers who use the 35mm (or shorter) lens MORE than >> any other, if they can explain why they do so. For instance, is it >> ease of use or do you actually like the results. >> >> For me, I find that anything less than 50mm is an "in your face " >> style. >> >> TIA >> Alan >> <<<<< >> <Snip> > > Recently I've been going out on my treks with more than the lens than the lens > on my camera. > I've gone out with both the 50 Summicron and 35 Summicron Asph. > The 50 feels like my telephoto. And the 35 is seldom not as wide as i need. > I anticipate having this be my mini kit often for the next 50 years. > mark rabiner The most eloquent argument for the 35 mm lens can be found in the photographs of the people use use it as their main tool. A great many of the photographs in National Geographic, for example, are made with the 35mm (and the 28mm) lens. For a different style, you might look at the work of Lee Freidlander, who used wide angle lenses mounted on a Leica M body for most of his career. Anyway, here's why I like the 35mm the best: It's practical. Wide enough for landscapes, narrow enough for people. Generally, through, I like to combine the two and present people in context. I still try to fill the frame with the 35mm. (I like to think of it as "finishing off the edges.") Instead of filling the frame with the subject, I think it's an interesting challenge to include other forms that intensify the meaning of the picture. A close-up of an old man in the park is good. An old man in the park with some kids playing in the background might be even better. The kids can provide visual balance and add meaning - one generation replacing another and all that. National Geographic is full of pictures that work in this manner. So is Friedlander's work. A good example is Friedlander's photo of a "girl's wanted" sign in the right half of the frame while, way up in the left hand corner, the feet of two women are coming into the frame. Looks like it was done with a 28mm. Without those feet way off on the other side, you don't have a picture. You just can't pull that kind of thing off with a portrait length lens. A kid dressed as a hobo for Halloween is a nice picture. A kid dressed as a hobo for Halloween with a homeless person pushing a cart off in the background might be a great picture. When you see this kind of moment coming together, a 35mm is handy for getting it. I find that it's easier for me to get acceptable pictures with my 90m Summicron. It's a lot harder to find a meaningful order for all the visual information that a 35mm or 28mm takes bring to the eye. Often, the lens will include forms that distract from the main subject, rather than to reinforce it. That's the big challenge - learning to see and bring order to the complex visual world out there. (Hmmm...this sounds as if I wrote it with the help of that well-known operating system "Soapbox 98.")