Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2010/03/27
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]> If you are shooting at f5.6 Leica lenses are a bit of a waste of money. My > Leica 50mm f1.4 is noticeable better that my Nikon 50mm f1.4 -at- f1.4, > but at > f5.6 i see very little difference. The price differential is almost 10:1. > That is my experience in general, sure all lenses get better stopped down, > very particularly the cheap ones. What makes Leica worth the money (if you > have it) is it loses so little quality as you open up, compared to others. > IME. > Frank Its good to be able to shoot wide open when you need to. The idea that you'd almost never NOT need to is pretty amazing to me as a commercial photographer for 33 years. Wide open shooting was luxury my work in any area could seldom afford. Even in the photojournalism I did I shot it at f 8 or f11 and used a flash. Certainly not the landscape work I did and fine art stuff I did for a show which I did about once a year in some gallery even if it was a coffee shop. Half my stuff was on the white seamless backdrop I shot it at f11. When shooting commercially I fot the distant from the front of the object I needed in focus to the back. Then I calculated which f stop I need to get the whole thing front to back in focus. It was never wide open. Sometimes it was on a tripod and it was f22. I got my M6 with the idea of only using it for my fine art street shooting but soon used it on the backdrop and shot a variety of jobs with it. About none of it wide open. Wide open shooting seems to be a thing photojournist have done in the past ten years or so this super selected razor thing area of what's in focus it hardly is done for the bulk of photography. And its a style which I think has come to an end. In the beginning of digital when everyone was shooting cropped format it was certainly given up then. With the smaller format I was near impossible to get the limited in focus are look. You got everything in focus even it 2.8 with a wide zoom. Ok I just image Googled "best photojournalism photo" and I can't find one shot which appears to be shot wide open. Try it. Deep depth of field seems to be back. "best photojournalism photo" [Rabs] Mark William Rabiner