The best allround while also being a portrait lens?

[Olaf_ZG]

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As the week passed by, I am rethinking my initial thought: I don’t need an allrounder, I have the 24-90 already, which is a perfect allrounder.

So now it is about portraits. If I buy a 50mm, for sure in the future I will want a 90mm as well which will double the investment. Maybe a 75mm is still the best option?
 

(and later on adding the 21 or 28 or a zoom)

[robb]

For portraits,

The 90 apo will make you dislike using the 24-90 on the long end…  the 90 apo is great.  

I still vote 75 apo.  It needs less room inside when shooting portraits vs the 90

similar look to both 75 and 90.  To me the main difference is working space.  

90 is great for people noticing you just a little less.

but to further drag you back into the fray… 50 apo is still an amazing lens to me.  Could be a one and done lens to do most everything well including portraits where you have less room.  You just need to find your backgrounds behind people that are further away to assist in the blur. 

Robb

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[robb]

I feel like I will never use the 24-90 and apo lenses (other than the 90-280) ever “together” on the same shoot.

I’ll either grab the zoom(s) or the apo primes but rarely ever have them with me together.  I pick one type or the other and roll with what I bring based on my main needs.

Robb

[Olaf_ZG]

@robb: what would be your prime if you can pick only one: 50 or 75?

If 50, lux or cron?

[robb]

8 hours ago, Olaf_ZG said:

@robb: what would be your prime if you can pick only one: 50 or 75?

If 50, lux or cron?

There’s no real wrong answer.  And there might not be a perfect answer either.  So I’m sorry for the long write-up.  

you prefaced the thread title toward portraits.  I’m generally trying to shoot portraits with longer lenses.  The 24-90 in that dept has disappointed me with fine focusing on the eyes at 75-90 focal lengths.  I always have to manually touch it up and it’s not as sharp at the long end as the apo’s  I still own the 24-90 for different uses.  It rocks for 24-50 and for general purpose images all the way to 90 in many cases.  I rarely shoot it less than 5.6 or 8.0 these days.  Would I still choose it over the 24-70.  Yes.  I think it’s built better and it’s one of the best zooms I’ve ever owned against canon and Nikon.

 if you generally have room (shooting distance) 75 apo wins over the 50 apo because of extra compression.  It’s great for portraits and nice for travel and street for details and layered scenes.  The focal length feels so natural to me.

 

the 75 apo is my desert island one lens - only lens… over any single lens made by any manufacturer ever.  So I’d steer you to the 75apo.  
 

 

I cannot possibly imagine you being disappointed by it… ever.  It always nails focus, is fairly light, way sharper than the m apo 75 and will cause you to question the need for the 24-90……. so I warn you about all the apo’s having that effect.  I shoot it 95% of the time between f2 and f4.  It’s Stunning always.

I would never carry a 50 and 75 together.  They are too close in focal length to me.  So I agree, buy one or the other if you can’t have more.

in order for me to shoot smarter (and lighter) with my work and even on a vacation where I bring the cameras, I’ll opt for a 3 lens apo summicron set 

two bodies with a 21,35,75 or two bodies with the 28,50,90  but in some circumstances, the 75 and one body may be the only combo that comes out of the roller bag the whole day if I am photographing people in offices or lit portraits.  I WANT to use that combo.  For location work for projects in the field, I’ll travel lighter again with 28,50,90-280.  That’s a stunning trio that can hit most everything.  I don’t want to carry extra stuff anymore.  We can all just work smarter and save our backs and have less distractions about what to use in the moment.  Do I ever miss Nikon or canon with these combos.  Not at all.  

owned the m 75 1.4 previously.  Nice background.  Not sharp wide open or even at f2.  While I can appreciate the old school feel cause I’M old school… lol, I’m not willing to shoot with lenses to get some “character” that people refer to and lose sharpness.  I love the apo SL character.

I used to own the voigtlander 50 1.0 in m mount adapted to the sl2 cameras.  It was a very nice lens.  Sharp.  Beautiful blown out background.  Sometimes had trouble on portraits with both eyes in focus at the same time.  But I decided that while I love great background blur, the apo lenses still gave that to me just fine and I had both eyes in focus (which I prefer)… sold the voigtlander and bought the apo SL 50.  Could not be happier.  Sometimes miss the voigt but not because the apo has any issues or lacks anything.  They do different things and are different flavors.

I had the zeiss zm 35 1,4.  Compared it to the apo SL 35.  Sold the zeiss.  The apo 35 looked so similar to background blur and I didn’t need the extra stop and loved the autofocus, weathersealing, and just mating with the camera ready to go.  I didn’t enjoy, pairing the zm lens with the body all the time for the ibis to work properly.  Adapting lenses many times just slowed me down.

so I’ve enjoyed trying many different lenses on the sl2 and sl2-s but decided I prefer the apo lens look, sharpness, clarity, etc.  so I got rid of my extra gear and just enjoy making money at my work and using the Leica’s with the apo’s to do that.  
 

go get your mint 75 SL apo and go set some records this year.

Robb

 

[Dr. G]

@robb You're killing me.  I'm heading to an event in Grand Cayman next week and last year I took my 35 & 75 APO Summicron-SL lenses with my SL2-S.  It was crowded, so my working distance was a little tough with the 75.  Everything I took with it looked amazing, though.  My plan this year was to either just take my Q3 or take the Q3 and my 50 APO SL.  Now you're making me reconsider and maybe the Q3 and 75 is the way to go.  Sometimes I wish I just had one lens, it would make these decisions easier.  

[Olaf_ZG]

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@robb thank you for your detailed answer. I will let it sink in a bit and play with those f/l’s with the m lenses. I really enjoy the 24-90 as is so versatile, but need to decide for myself first what I really want to photograph with the SL. When I know that, I can select the lenses accordingly.

[Jeff S]

2 hours ago, Olaf_ZG said:

.. but need to decide for myself first what I really want to photograph with the SL. When I know that, I can select the lenses accordingly.

Heresy…. that’s no way to feed forum GAS.

Jeff

[Olaf_ZG]

9 minutes ago, Jeff S said:

Heresy…. that’s no way to feed forum GAS.

Jeff

Sorry about that… I try to be wise at least some days a year…

 

without kidding, as some projects are forming in my head, I don’t want to buy anything till I know where to go. Bought and sold maybe too much the last years, and though fun, it aint photography.

[Jeff S]

20 minutes ago, Olaf_ZG said:

without kidding, as some projects are forming in my head, I don’t want to buy anything till I know where to go. Bought and sold maybe too much the last years, and though fun, it aint photography.

Yet you aleady bought a new bag, which  is now influencing your criteria for lens selection (post #40). 🤪

Jeff

[Olaf_ZG]

47 minutes ago, Jeff S said:

Yet you aleady bought a new bag, which  is now influencing your criteria for lens selection (post #40). 🤪

Jeff

The bag is bought, as either SL cron is the same size, it will fit, only the lux won’t.

 If I screw up, I need to buy another bag. This is at least easy to explain to my wife, she does the same… 😎

[SoarFM]

On 1/2/2024 at 3:50 PM, robb said:

For portraits,

<snip>

but to further drag you back into the fray… 50 apo is still an amazing lens to me.  Could be a one and done lens to do most everything well including portraits where you have less room.  You just need to find your backgrounds behind people that are further away to assist in the blur. 

Robb

That is a seriously good little tip.

The APO’s are insanely good and not just about “sharpness”. I happen to also have the the 50 lux SL. The 1.4 v 2.0 does not seem terribly significant regarding background blur and I find myself on the fence about selling off the Lux i.e., I should but I haven’t… The lux renders differently—but is it really that much different?  I know we are on a site and in a thread where these differences mean something to us and the enjoyment of our art and craft even if it is not always apparent to our audience (or in your case, your clients as well)

As an aside, when I’m really feeling the desire for something less perfect, on goes the M to L adapter and the 50 1.2 Noctilux or 1.0 Noctilux. Yes, I have too many 50s… 

 

[Dr. G]

10 hours ago, SoarFM said:

That is a seriously good little tip.

The APO’s are insanely good and not just about “sharpness”. I happen to also have the the 50 lux SL. The 1.4 v 2.0 does not seem terribly significant regarding background blur and I find myself on the fence about selling off the Lux i.e., I should but I haven’t… The lux renders differently—but is it really that much different?  I know we are on a site and in a thread where these differences mean something to us and the enjoyment of our art and craft even if it is not always apparent to our audience (or in your case, your clients as well)

As an aside, when I’m really feeling the desire for something less perfect, on goes the M to L adapter and the 50 1.2 Noctilux or 1.0 Noctilux. Yes, I have too many 50s… 

 

I came back to revisit this thread because I’m leaving to shoot an event and I was on the fence about what to take.  My initial thought was to try to shoot it all with the Q3 because I get about an f/3 equivalent at 50mm plus the ability to shoot up close at 50mm in its macro mode (which I really look at as a close focus mode).   I ultimately decided I was also going to take my SL2-S and a 50.  My initial thought was to take the 50 Lux.  Just for good measure I ran through my library and looked at my 50 Lux images vs my 50 APO images.  Pros for the Lux were smoother out of focus areas and a smoother falloff.  As @SoarFM mentions, the out of focus areas aren’t that different and, as much as it’s blasphemous to say so, I can easily get them really close in post.  The interesting thing about the 50 APO is that subject separation sometimes seems even better than the Lux.  This goes against what we would think, but I think it comes down to the falloff.  The APO has a very abrupt falloff right behind the focal plane whereas the Lux has a smoother transition through the focal plane.  If I were only shooting portraits I would have definitely taken the Lux.  For this event I want to have a little more pop to my images.  Plus, I’ll need to do some product style shooting and the APO gives me a better minimum focus distance.  Low light shooting isn’t much of a factor with the SL2-S as one stop more or less doesn’t have a tremendous impact, so having 1.4 vs 2 isn’t a dealbreaker.  Just for fun I also threw my Voigtlander 40 f1.2 in the bag (since I had the room without the Lux).  That lens, although manual focus, has its own character - and it’s definitely not perfect.  So between my Q3, APO 50 and 40 Nokton I have the ability to get three different looks in the 40-50mm range.  

I guess I’ll know in a few days if I made the right choice.

 

Also, FYI for those with both the SL and a Q camera, The Oberwerth small SL bag can actually hold the S2/SL2-S with one of the APO Lenses mounted and the Q3 at the same time if you put the SL in sideways, lay the divider over it and then keep the Q face down over the lens side of the SL.  Looking at the bag you would never think you could get both in there, but it all fits and you can still use the top lock button.  

[Simone_DF]

13 hours ago, SoarFM said:

Yes, I have too many 50s… 

 

Nonsense. No such thing as too many 50s.