Just a quick portrait/lens question...

How many of you find the need for a genuine macro lens in portraiture? I'm beginning to become a fan of the cropping in tight idea and am pushing the lenses I've got. Is this something the rest of you come across or am I just a bit strange...?

I use an 85mm f/1.8.

Is this tight enough?

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No. lol.

Erm, stuff like this here:- clicky But more so. I think you can do portraiture (as in telling the story of the person) whilst cropping and shooting as tight as that. (I should clarify, I hate cropping photos, rather shoot them correctly first.) Been using the 24-70L which has some macro on it but I'm beginning to yearn more.

This is probably my tightest shot, and also done with the 85.

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Is that on the limits of what the lens focuses at? And I'm presuming f/1.8 not a 1.2?

That's pretty close, though I have a yearning to try closer still which I know will mean a macro like the 100 or 180. I just wondered if anyone had experience of these lenses for portraits that close?

Most models cant take (or want) macro closeness. An 85mm should be great.

I used my 24-70 plus a 25mm tube for this one:

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Aha, yes. Canon ext tube? Not thought of that! Is it a pain to use like that?

On the subject of models not liking it, keep searching til you find one that does!

manipula wrote in post #3037619
Aha, yes. Canon ext tube? Not thought of that! Is it a pain to use like that?

On the subject of models not liking it, keep searching til you find one that does!

Yeah the Canon 25mm EF tube. Easy as pie to use. Just mount it to the lens, mount that to the camera, and shoot. AF and everything is retained. That's a selfy. Uncropped, just resized. On a 10D though, so it wouldn't be as close on a 1.3x or full frame body. Although I don't even think I was at the minimum focus distance either. I might have had enough room to get closer yet. I don't remember for sure but I think I had to remove the big arse hood to get close enough and keep light on myself.

BTW if you do it a lot, it might be worth getting a long-ish dedicated macro so you have the additional working space. If it's just an occasional thing (like all my small/close stuff is for me) then the tubes are fine...and cheaper. heh.

Cheers for that, exactly what I was after. If I went for another lens, it'd have to be as long as I could afford I think, as I can't get the crop factor helping me out.

I use a Sigma 105mm F/2.8 with a full set of ext tubes.

HTH

Lisa