Shooting with a 50mm Lens
Let’s talk about an amazing workhorse of a lens. The 50mm lens, probably one of my most used lens’. The 50mm is a versatile tool that can be used for a variety of photography styles, including portraits, landscapes, street photography, and low-light situations. Its wide aperture allows for shallow depth of field, which is probably my favorite thing about the 50mm. It’s great for creating a blurred, creamy background effect in portraits. Something else to note, its normal focal length means that it can capture scenes as the human eye sees them, making it a good choice for street photography and documentary-style shooting. As a photographer that photographs a lot of children and families, I feel like it creates the feeling of being there, in that moment and being a part of the memory.
Side note, the 50 mm is considered a prime lens. For anyone that isn’t sure what a prime lens is, The 50 mm is a type of camera lens with a fixed focal length, meaning it can’t zoom in or out. It’s also known for producing sharp images and having a wider aperture, allowing for better low-light performance and a shallow depth of field. (that’s where you get that creamy texture) If you have taken myphotography course, you know that the lower the aperture, the more light is allowed onto your photo.
Ok, so who should use this lens? Anyone, the answer is…. anyone.
Portrait photographers: The 50mm lens is a great option for portrait photography since it produces a natural-looking image with a shallow depth of field.
Street photographers: The compact size of the 50mm lens makes it a great choice for street photography, allowing you to capture candid shots without drawing too much attention to yourself, it’s super fast focusing is also a plus.
Low light photography: The wide aperture of the 50mm lens allows for better performance in low light situations, producing clear and sharp images. This is best utilized when shooting in manual. You can really take advantage of your cameras capabilities when you know how to control it.
Product photographers: The 50mm lens can also be used for product photography, allowing you to capture detailed and sharp images of small objects. This can be done quickly and easily, which is huge. I know I don’t like spending a ton of time photographing products. I need it easy and quick.
Landscape photographers: While not typically the first choice for landscape photography, the 50mm lens can still produce stunning images with a unique perspective.
If this floats your boat or rocks your world…. then I have something pretty awesome for you. I wrote this amazing course, Auto 2 Awesome, that is full of easy to understand instructions on shooting in manual. I have been shooting for more years than I can count and teaching has always been something I have loved doing. It started in my living room, grew to my studio and now I get to teach it online and would love to see this grow to hundreds, let’s dream BIG, thousands of women!!!! This is the busy woman’s guide to shooting in manual. You can read about it here.
