Like I said, 1.4 really isn't the most practical aperture to use in any situation. The only thing it is good for is just experimenting. Aren't we really just splitting hairs here? If I use this at 2.2 or above I get amazing portraits.
BTW, I did an experiment and showed my wife that american pitbull picture. I asked if she saw anything wrong with the picture. She told me no, she loves the picture. Sometimes I think we as photographers tend to forgot that the majority of people who see our pictures are not going to say, wow, that is ever so slightly soft, or, look at that bokeh, the OoF highlights are octagonal instead of circular! Take it away mum, I don't like it!
edkaye wrote:
Like I said, 1.4 really isn't the most practical aperture to use in any situation. The only thing it is good for is just experimenting. Aren't we really just splitting hairs here? If I use this at 2.2 or above I get amazing portraits.
BTW, I did an experiment and showed my wife that american pitbull picture. I asked if she saw anything wrong with the picture. She told me no, she loves the picture. Sometimes I think we as photographers tend to forgot that the majority of people who see our pictures are not going to say, wow, that is ever so slightly soft, or, look at that bokeh, the OoF highlights are octagonal instead of circular! Take it away mum, I don't like it!...Show more →
It IS a nice picture I hope you didn't get the impression I was critisizing your photo on composition, technique or esthetics. And your right about us photog seeing things somethings differently (more technical) than others. However, being a photog I can see the 50 1.4 signature in the photo. And there's nothing wrong with that. As I said, it's a matter of taste and preferences I loved my 50 1.4 (before I dropped it ). Happy shooting!
BTW, I did an experiment and showed my wife that american pitbull picture. I asked if she saw anything wrong with the picture. She told me no, she loves the picture. Sometimes I think we as photographers tend to forgot that the majority of people who see our pictures are not going to say, wow, that is ever so slightly soft, or, look at that bokeh, the OoF highlights are octagonal instead of circular! Take it away mum, I don't like it!
I can't say that I disagree with you that much, but what is distracting is the focal point of that photo. It is not the eyes, so to me it is a bit distracting.. I don't know if you focused/recomposed, but your 100% crop is definitely no the sharpest part of the photo. I could care less about "how razor sharp" it is, but when the sharpest part of the photo is not the eyes in a "candid portrait" like this.............it does feel odd, to me. "Take it away mum?", no, but put that photo side by side with a photo of the eyes in focus............Which one do you think would look better?
what are you guy's assessment of the background in edward's shot?
Definitely not what it should and could be. Q@ to Edward: Is there a filter in front of the lens? If so take it off. If this doesn't help there is something wrong this lens. This is definitely not the kind of bokeh quality of a 50/1.4, neither is the sharpness and CA I can see in the crop. This lens is capable of giving more EOSfun.
Actually, I think it is precisely the bokeh of a 50/1.4... and why I sold my otherwise very sharp copy. Of course different shots will appear differently, but this is an example of what I termed the "impenetrable wall" (for which a number of people scoffed at me in another thread).
>>This is definitely not the kind of bokeh quality of a 50/1.4
dfresh wrote:
I think it's backfocussing... The collar seems sharper than the eye...
dIggO
That image looks front focused to me. Look at the cracks in the wall in the bottom right hand corner...
The photog is shooting the dog from above. So the focal plane is at an angle (touching the collar and the pavement). In any case, focus isn't were it should be. Although it is difficult to see since we have only got a 100% crop of the dog's eyes
Daan B wrote:
[So the focal plane is at an angle (touching the collar and the pavement).
That doesn't matter as long as you compare parts of the pic that are at the same distance measured from the top or the bottom of the picture.
dfresh wrote:
That image looks front focused to me. Look at the cracks in the wall in the bottom right hand corner...
As you can see is the dog's head in front of that edge of the pavement. So to my opinion when the eyes would be in focus that part of the pavement wouldn't even be in focus...And as it is taken with an angle, camera facing downwards and a little to the side, the part of the pavement should not be in focus. Unless the angle to the side would be big enough to justify it.
The graph of aperture vs. resolution of all lenses is a bell-shape curve with the greatest resolution generally occurring at an aperture about 3 stops smaller than wide open, or about f/4 for a f/1.4 lens.
This is a very good site for objectively comparing lens resolution. You and select and compare two different lenses at various f/stops. The link below compares the 50mm f/1.4 with the 50mm f/1.2 L at f/1.4. Resolution is about the same but the L appears to have much more CA. LINK
Change the f/stop setting and you can see visually how the resolving power of the lens changes.
Actually, I think it is precisely the bokeh of a 50/1.4... and why I sold my otherwise very sharp copy.
No it's not. If a 50/1.4 performs like that there is something wrong. I recommend the poster of that picture to verify a filter (when attached) and otherwise to have the lens checked. I can see why someone would sell his lens for this reasons, because that kind of result is really not EOSfun.
eosfun wrote:
No it's not. If a 50/1.4 performs like that there is something wrong. I recommend the poster of that picture to verify a filter (when attached) and otherwise to have the lens checked. I can see why someone would sell his lens for this reasons, because that kind of result is really not EOSfun.
It looks like typical 50 1.4 bokeh to me also... I had similair results and my copy was checked by Canon Service and proved to be OK.
bokeh is highly dependent on background, if you don't shoot backgrounds like this or any other huge number of other backgrounds that trigger this effect, then you can happily use the lens.
There are photos posted all the time that show this kind of bokeh...
I agree the sharpness seems off.
I doubt a filter will alter bokeh much... if at all.
I took many fine photos with my 50/1.4... just too many with this kind of bokeh to feel good about shooting that lens.
I doubt a filter will alter bokeh much... if at all.
Usually a good clean filter won't alter bokeh at all. The plan parallel glass of a UV filter doesn't change the optical formula (except for blocking UV). But some cheap filters sometimes show slight "glass tension" which can effect bokeh. If it's the case one can mostly notify the uneven effect of glass tension in a filter with the naked eye. A dirty or damaged filter can effect bokeh as well with some parallel or radial smudge, or slight scratching. I must admit that the picture above shown doesn't give me the impression it does have it's cause in a filter, but I asked the question to just rule out this as a possible cause. With what I see a lens element that is out of position is more likely, this typically can create the "wild" image of highlights in grass or tree brenches.
Anyway, I find it hard to draw a conclusion from just one picture, so I still would recommend the poster to have the lens checked by a dealer or service centre.
cgardner wrote:
The graph of aperture vs. resolution of all lenses is a bell-shape curve with the greatest resolution generally occurring at an aperture about 3 stops smaller than wide open, or about f/4 for a f/1.4 lens.
This is a very good site for objectively comparing lens resolution. You and select and compare two different lenses at various f/stops. The link below compares the 50mm f/1.4 with the 50mm f/1.2 L at f/1.4. Resolution is about the same but the L appears to have much more CA. LINK
Change the f/stop setting and you can see visually how the resolving power of the lens changes.
That's a great site and I use it often, but you also need to read his reviews as well. The 50/1.2L review states "The relatively close proximity of the ISO 12233 resolution chart did not bring out the best in this lens." so looking at the charts shouldn't be all the research you do
quote]edkaye wrote:
Like I said, 1.4 really isn't the most practical aperture to use in any situation. The only thing it is good for is just experimenting. Aren't we really just splitting hairs here? If I use this at 2.2 or above I get amazing portraits.
While definitely not so practical, It's definitely useful at 1.4 for low light work when you have no other options.
This was taken at 1/60 f1.4, iso 1600.
Daan B wrote:
It IS a nice picture I hope you didn't get the impression I was critisizing your photo on composition, technique or esthetics. And your right about us photog seeing things somethings differently (more technical) than others. However, being a photog I can see the 50 1.4 signature in the photo. And there's nothing wrong with that. As I said, it's a matter of taste and preferences I loved my 50 1.4 (before I dropped it ). Happy shooting!
To both guys that thought I was getting defensive about the dog picture. that is not my picture. That was a different Edward Edward Castro
While definitely not so practical, It's definitely useful at 1.4 for low light work when you have no other options.
This was taken at 1/60 f1.4, iso 1600.
Yeah, that is exactly why you would use f/1.4. It is very useful for low light. However, I meant I would rarely use it in an every day situation. I love to use this lens for portraits though. I find it too cropped to use as a normal lens on my 40D, which is why I am thinking of getting a 35mm f/2.0
edkaye wrote:
To both guys that thought I was getting defensive about the dog picture. that is not my picture. That was a different Edward Edward Castro
I hope you didn't get the impression I was critisizing your photo on composition, technique or esthetics. And your right about us photog seeing things somethings differently (more technical) than others. However, being a photog I can see the 50 1.4 signature in the photo. And there's nothing wrong with that. As I said, it's a matter of taste and preferences 
). Happy shooting!