50mm for Trophy Shots

[SherpaPhil]

What lens do you all recommend for trophy shots? I am thinking about picking up the Canon 50mm f/1.8. The price is great, and it seems like the fixed 50 would be the ticket, able to open it up wide to get better shots after sunset or around the campfire, blur out the background if I really want to highlight the trophy instead of the scenery, etc. Has anyone use this or a similar lens? Thoughts? Thanks!

 

[quackaddict]

They are super sharp, produces great bokah, and the price is great. They are slow to focus, but for what they are, they can't be beat.

 

[Cornell2012]

A couple thoughts:

1) The lens is plastic, and therefore pretty light, but carrying around a DSLR body might add more weight than you would like.

2) The 50 is a nice lens for the price, but I'm not sure you'll want to open it up all the way to 1.8 because of how shallow the focus is at 1.8. You might have the person in focus but the animal out of focus.

3) If you are worried about low light, you'll probably want a tripod anyhow (the 50mm doesn't have IS), even if just one of the fold-able Jobys.

4) A 50mm lens is not very good for those shots where you hold the animal at a full arm's length away to make it look bigger. A wide angle is better for those.

 

[quackaddict]

A couple thoughts:

1) The lens is plastic, and therefore pretty light, but carrying around a DSLR body might add more weight than you would like.

2) The 50 is a nice lens for the price, but I'm not sure you'll want to open it up all the way to 1.8 because of how shallow the focus is at 1.8. You might have the person in focus but the animal out of focus.

3) If you are worried about low light, you'll probably want a tripod anyhow (the 50mm doesn't have IS), even if just one of the fold-able Jobys.

4) A 50mm lens is not very good for those shots where you hold the animal at a full arm's length away to make it look bigger. A wide angle is better for those.

2 - 1.8 is nice to have for "artsy" shots. When the lens gets stopped down, it's still really sharp.

3 - You can bump your ISO up and handhold that lens down to really low speeds.

 

[Deerhunter80]

I have that exact lens - I like it, but as mentioned - the DOF is thin so wouldn't be great on hero shots due to the differing distances to the subjects. It is possible to correct for this at distance but then you lose the effect you are looking for with this type of lens. As mentioned you can adjust it using a tripod and holding it open for a bit longer. I really do like the lens for taking pics of people with it and candid photos. Also very cool for pics of gear or single subject matter like flowers / foliage / architecture etc. Also great for some landscape photography but once you start getting varying depths at close distance it starts to lose its value. Never the less the nifty 50 is a great lens with many applications.

 

[Carl]

On a 1.6 crop, 50mm will be pretty tight for hero shots. I even find my Nikon 35mm on the tight side for that...

 

[SherpaPhil]

I picked up the lens and have been practicing with it a bit. Happy so far, but you do need to be careful of the narrow DOF when its wide open.