Fauxtogs who should end up on the main page…

[bitchslapoftruth]

Also, most of these links aren’t working for me and I am deeply saddened.

[warrenjrphotography]

Quote –

Maybe I’ve got a bad copy of the 55-250 but mine is so soft on the long end that I can see it even in the viewfinder and needs stopping down to about f8 before it gets acceptably sharp. Also my point was that the kit lens isn’t hot, especially if you use it as a fixed f5.6 compared to a fixed 2.8. At 2.8 you will let in four times the amount of light meaning you can use a quarter of the shutterspeed which is not to be sniffed at. It doesn’t help with IS if you have to go to 1/20s shutter speeds since your subject will have moved during the exposure. I would much rather take a tamron 17-50 than the two canon kit lenses together because if you have the option of 2.8 on the long end you can always stop down for more sharpness and contrast, neither of which are amazing on the kit lenses wide open. At f8 they are fine but wide open not so much. Then with the large aperture primes you have another two stops. I think you should probably point this out in the article as you’ve entirely left out the effect of having the ability to close down the aperture for better sharpness or leaving it wide open for better shutter speeds. The larger aperture will also make your flash photography easier since you can dial down the power on the flash and thus getting shorter recycle times. Fair enough on the ability to change the perspective but I’m not a fan of portraits at over 200mm since the perspective starts to get a bit funny.

Alexandra, for a sec I thought they had hired on that Cain guy /end Quote

1. I have found that the F5.6 aperture is just perfectly sharp throughout the zoom range and that it does not need to be stopped down for me at all.

2. At F2.8 you let in 4X as much light but you can also lose 4X  the length of focus and could have too narrow of a DOF where you can have focus in one eye and not the other or miss focus completely…..I have found that on the 55-250 even at F5.6 sometimes I like to stop down to F8-F11 depending on my zoom range and distance to my subject and the type of shot that I’m going for (headshots will naturally have a thinner DOF because you’re so zoomed in) and using an 85 1.8 for a good amount of time exclusively I can attest that even at 85mm on crop body anything lower than say around F4 on a  headshot will result in the whole subjects head not being in focus especially if they are facing you at an angle.

3. I use flash most of the time which freezes motion so I can drag the shutter all of the way down to 1/15 if necessary using good handle hold technique combined with IS and still get tack in sharp focus photos with no motion blur thanks to me using off camera flash.

4. I disagree with the kit lenses lacking contrast/sharpness. Again, I used the Tamron 17-50 exclusively for many months, the canon 85 1.8 exclusively for many months, and now the 55-250 for many months and the kit lens has better contrast/sharpness than the Tamron in my experience and there is no major difference in sharpness contrast between the 85 1.8 & 55-250  in regards to contrast & sharpness even with the 85 1.8 stopped down to say F4 or F5.6. This has been my experience and I have photos taken with all lenses.

5. I have not seen any noticeably distortions that would adversely effect my portraits from using longer focal lengths over 200mm.

I might even go ahead and make an article comparing the perspective effects of the 55-250 at different focal lengths to show that the effects are minor and really related into how compressed your backdrop becomes or not becomes (depends on focal length) and how there are not major difference in facial figure or bodily figure at longer focal lengths after a certain focal length.

With that said I had a headshot session 3 days ago with an African American women as you can see on my website and in the original photos you can see the tiniest details in her skin, perfect reflections of the main light source and reflector in her eye, I could zoom in well over 100% and it still looked tack sharp (as sharp and sharper than some of the photos that I have taken with the 85 1.8 closed down) and it had excellent contrast & color.

With a little bit of PP work (cleaning blemishes, raising saturation, selective color enhancing, boosting vibrance (all of this takes about a minute in light room) I could tell people that I took the photos with a $2,000 Canon 70-200 2.8 IS II USM and they would believe me.

However primes do have their spots in the world I just wish that they all had IS. The 50 1.4 is an excellent lens from what I’ve seen but it does not have IS and for me that is a deal breaker as I can not drag the shutter as low as my kit lenses without the backdrop blurring out.

The Canon 200mm F2 IS & Canon 35 F2 IS do look attractive though as they have the major benefit of a fast aperture & IS so you can drag the shutter really really low with the 35F2 while shooting portraits as long as as you have a main light to freeze your subject.

All the best.

 

 

[nesgran]

But with a big aperture there is no need to keep the shutter at 1/15, that is what I’m trying to say. You are fooling yourself if you think the colour rendition, contrast and sharpness will be as nice with the kit lens as one of the best L lenses available if you did a bit of PP on both of them. That said, the kit lenses are good for what they cost but they can’t compete with the versatility of the better lenses available. What you are finding is that the long focal lengths are thinning your DOF, why not just step closer with a shorter focal length if you are finding that the far eye is out of focus? What you gain with the bigger aperture is versatility, if you want you can stop it down but you can also chose not to depending on the shot.

The 200mm f2 is a beautiful lens but it costs about $6k new and is too long (imo) on a crop body for portraits. With the longer focal lengths you get the appearance that the ears are too close to the face as you get the compression setting in.

[dont.care]

While I encourage your enthusiasm Warren, I must content that a kit lens vs. one of Canon’s most celebrated L lenses for which myself and many others have paid a substantial amount of money for; there is a substantial difference in contrast/IQ/CA/distortion/fringing/etc. Most Professional lenses tout the price tag because they are indeed extremely high quality. Otherwise, why would someone pay $2,299 for a nearly 3 pound piece of glass when there’s a perfect alternate that cost $299?

You can say, “bragging rights”. However, I’d rather be called cheap and purchase a lens that costs $299–if it were just as good.. Bragging rights means absolutely nothing in this case.. (This is a rhetorical statement)

I will say, that the 70-200 f/4 non-is can be had for substantially less, you lose a stop, but the IQ is nearly indiscernible, and it weighs substantially less.

While I realize that not every piece of L glass that’s hit the market has been astoundingly successful–it could’ve been a variety of reasons, but if you get a bad L lens, its generally just your copy (that the distributor/mfg) will repair, free.

If you’re happy with what you use, that’s your prerogative, and you should be; it works for you. However, professionally for an agency that has a real marketing team with an eye for details will generally scrutinize any prospective photographers kit to ensure maximum IQ for that particular shoot. Some even spec what you can use. Imagine that? 🙂

Standard dictates that one who professes him/herself a professional, should in fact have the professional tools for that particular trade. As an analogy–Don’t go trying to get a job as a carpenter with hobbyist tools. People want someone with a particular standard that can be reassuring, and reliable.. I apologize for the crudeness, but a $299.00 lens being used as a professional tool, ought not happen. They market lenses at different capacities and to different criteria of people based on the principal that one is Consumer and the other is Prosumer. The difference is in manufacturing, materials, handling, down to the people who actually assemble it. They are not going to put joe-blow who started a month ago in the same room with seasoned technicians assembling 1500-13,000 dollar glass.

 

my $0.02 cents

[dont.care]

http://www.the-digital-picture.com/Reviews/ISO-12233-Sample-Crops.aspx?Lens=456&Camera=474&Sample=0&FLI=4&API=1&LensComp=687&CameraComp=736&SampleComp=0&FLIComp=3&APIComp=3

[warrenjrphotography]

You don’t need L lenses to be a “professional”….don’t knew where you got that ideology from but there are even professional musicians that use crap gear that are inexpensive and professional photographers using Micro 4/3rds, Iphones, and Rebels that produce outstanding photos…….

I also never compared the Canon kit lenses to the L lenses I compared the 55-250 to the 85 1.8 (not an L lens) and to the other cheap prime lenses.

I’m sure that the image quality of the 70-200 2.8 is greater than the 55-250 but if someone took a great photo and said that it was taken with the 70-200L lens but it was really with the 55-250 most would not argue with the person and be able to tell the difference in clarity or bokeh.

Also this is to Nesgren. With a big aperture when shooting at say 200mm or 135mm F2.8 is not going to cut it for headshots if you want everything to be in focus so you’re probably already going to be stepping down to atleast F4-F5.6 anyways.

Also there are situations where I want to compress the scene and isolate my subject which is not possible with a shorter focal length so stepping back and zooming in compresses the background with my subject allowing me to further isolate my subject and a large zoom range allows me to get pretty much any perspective that I want.

I’d probably find the 70-200 lenses to be too limiting perspective wise as I’m a big fan of going past 200mm 35mm equiv.

If I had the money I’d have the 24-105L F4 IS, 70-200L 2.8 IS, 200-400L F4 IS with built in 1.4TC, 200L F2.0 IS , 85L 1.2, 50L 1.2, 135L F2, 16-35L F2.8, 2 1Dx’s but in reality who has that kind of money besides the few? lol

55-250 gets the job done just fine until I switch to FF in which case I will be using all L lenses.

Bottom line is that I don’t need a lens faster than F5.6 as I use off camera flash and shoot during the day or golden hour (no weddings or fast events where fast lenses would be useful) so I see no use in upgrading at this moment.

 

[Worst Case Scenario]

well done to bitchslapoftruth for finding this one

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=250897348337960&set=pb.162814303812932.-2207520000.1373493069.&type=3&theater

That TRULY should be on the front page. I just can’t imagine in what parallel universe it would be okay to make a kid look deformed like that! AND they are called  witness the miracle photography!

[nesgran]

View post on imgur.com

View post on imgur.com

Left comparison is a less than amazing sigma 70-200 @f2.8 in first and @f5.6 in the second. On the right is a 55-250 @f5.6 in both. All at 70mm. Sigmas are known to render colours a bit warmer than canons but that would just be down to sorting the balance out in post from a grey card which I didn’t do here but I set the colour temp and colour balance to the same for comparisons sake. All three shots are straight out of camera apart from a small (1/4 stop) increase in exposure on the canon as it isn’t as transmissive at the same aperture. There is also a softbox on the right with a speedlight in it.

[fstopper89]

Not to argue here, but I have shot extensively with both the Canon 55-250 kit lens, and the Sigma 70-200 f/2.8 OS (the second version) and there is A HUGE difference in sharpness, contrast, and ease of use. My 55-250 is just awful when it comes to sharpness. I do like it for the bokeh and depth of field but that’s about it. It’s good for taking out hiking or on adventures. I will never shoot any professional portraits with that lens. for me, it does not deliver professional results like my Sigma does.

[iliketag]

I’ll have to expand on this a little later, but I really think the backbiting for recommending professional grade equipment for a professional service is REALLY unprofessional on your part Warren. It’s one thing to defend your position but to say that no one could tell the difference between an L and your telephoto currently is outrageous. A customer without the knowledge of equipment? Sure, they won’t necessarily know the difference (or even care!) but another photographer would definitely see the difference. Especially if comparing a scene shot with both side by side.

I don’t care what equipment you use. Complaining about the cost of the high end, professional level equipment really annoys me and when people are like “I just can’t afford ______”. Guess what then, you can’t afford to invest in your business and that really puts a doubt in a client’s mind. Even if the images are great, it catches someone off guard and gives a poor impression to show up to a paid shoot with consumer level equipment. I know, I’ve done it…

I’m not trying to say you’re bad or you can’t continue doing what you’re doing… I just advise you to think about the impression you make. People are shallow, it’s not something they necessarily control at first. You can change their mind with great images, but it’s just one of those things to consider.

 

Also, don’t ever tell me to compare my 70-200 to a 55-250. I have both, and they are worlds different in quality. (<- that’s my angry moment)

 

[warrenjrphotography]

Quote –

http://i.imgur.com/sVGfYOM.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/qOtU72E.jpg

Left comparison is a less than amazing sigma 70-200 @f2.8 in first and @f5.6 in the second. On the right is a 55-250 @f5.6 in both. All at 70mm. Sigmas are known to render colours a bit warmer than canons but that would just be down to sorting the balance out in post from a grey card which I didn’t do here but I set the colour temp and colour balance to the same for comparisons sake. All three shots are straight out of camera apart from a small (1/4 stop) increase in exposure on the canon as it isn’t as transmissive at the same aperture. There is also a softbox on the right with a speedlight in it. End Quote

 

I looked at both comparison photos. I don’t see a significant difference between the $1,000 Sigma and the Canon 55-250.  In both photos I could not tell which lens is which.

Quote –

I’ll have to expand on this a little later, but I really think the backbiting for recommending professional grade equipment for a professional service is REALLY unprofessional on your part Warren. It’s one thing to defend your position but to say that no one could tell the difference between an L and your telephoto currently is outrageous. A customer without the knowledge of equipment? Sure, they won’t necessarily know the difference (or even care!) but another photographer would definitely see the difference. Especially if comparing a scene shot with both side by side.

I don’t care what equipment you use. Complaining about the cost of the high end, professional level equipment really annoys me and when people are like “I just can’t afford ______”. Guess what then, you can’t afford to invest in your business and that really puts a doubt in a client’s mind. Even if the images are great, it catches someone off guard and gives a poor impression to show up to a paid shoot with consumer level equipment. I know, I’ve done it…

I’m not trying to say you’re bad or you can’t continue doing what you’re doing… I just advise you to think about the impression you make. People are shallow, it’s not something they necessarily control at first. You can change their mind with great images, but it’s just one of those things to consider.

 

Also, don’t ever tell me to compare my 70-200 to a 55-250. I have both, and they are worlds different in quality. (<- that’s my angry moment)

End Quote

The 55-250 is professional enough for me. It’s been dropped, banged, taken a true beating and still holds up just fine.

Anyone that says that it is not “sharp enough” has not used it extensively.

Why would I want to go out of my way to spend $2,000 on a lens where my 55-250 is already TOO SHARP for my needs. The amount of PP that I need to do to remove blemishes, very tine spots, and reduce the sharpness is insane to the point where I’m considering getting some light cloth to cover my lens to make the lens a little bit less sharp when photographing women.

Also, yes I do realize that the L lenses are going to be better lenses but really you’re getting into the law of diminishing returns once you go past the kit lenses.

Case in point, the $2,100 Canon 70-200L F2.8 IS USM II is not going to be 21X times better than the 55-250 considering build quality, image quality, and IS/USM.

I know photographers with 1DX’s and 5Dmkii’s and L prime lenses that take crap photos…..I’d say it’s less about the gear that you use and more about lighting….after all photography is painting with light. I spend/have spent enough money on quality lighting and editing software and those two are going to be more important than any lens or camera body that I buy.

Like I said, there are pros shooting with cheap body’s and kit lenses it’s the same thing with a lot of musicians. Why should I spend $2,100 on a lens when my current equipment does everything that I need it to do? It makes no sense whatsoever.

You can consider the 55-250 to be “unprofessional” all you want but in reality I’d rather put my money into marketing and eventually when I feel like it upgrade to FF and L lenses which I’m suspecting will still follow the trend of diminishing returns as I am friends with guys that shoot with 5Dmkii’s and L lenses with good lighting and it all comes down to lighting, technique, and PP not if you used a 55-250 or 70-200 to get a photo.

Also, would you consider the Tamron 17-50 2.8 & Sigma 17-50 a long with the Sigma/Tamron 70-200’s to be unprofessional as well since they cost less than the Canon equivalent and are not encased in a metal body?

Your last point was about impression. Well I know for a fact that most clients do not care about what kind of lens that you use they are much more impressed with the lighting equipment that I bring with me as I get comments on that all of the time that I go out shooting on location.

They care about how you look, how good your website looks (I admit my website still has a lot of work that needs to be done, I need to get a good template and fix a few things), and your personality not your gear. Having big lenses like the 70-200  F2.8 IS II might even make some clients nervous at first hence why on BHPhoto you can buy stickers to make your lenses look less intimidating and a few pros that I know off of the top of my hand use those stickers for that reason.

A Canon kit 55-250 or 18-55 is not going to be intimidating. Also, would the 24-105F4L also be considering inferior and not “professional” to you as well? After all that is considered a kit lens as well…..

Food for thought.

 

[warrenjrphotography]

Also, none of my clients are going to be getting poster sized prints done where the tiny differences in sharpness & micro contrast do show up in and even if they did the lenses that I use a long with PP technique and lighting will still produce good posters……

Most will be using smaller files on their website and for advertisements and possibly extremely small photos on their business cards where even the best photographers/pixel peepers will not see a difference between lenses.

[nesgran]

What I forgot to add to my reply that the reason I chose the sigma lens was that the lens in question was bought used from a real shop for £40 more than the 55-250 is being sold for new. The camera used is a 40D so the same that you are using. The equipment doesn’t make the photo but if you don’t have the right kind of gear you will simply not be able to achieve a lot of things. If I’m out I want to be able to completely melt away a distracting background, just look at the difference in overall look in my comparisons a few posts up. Even at the same aperture there is a vast difference in the quality of the bokeh simply because the sigma is a much better lens. So what if the ears aren’t tack sharp and you can work around the loss of sharpness in the far eye, in fact it doesn’t matter that much as the viewer will be drawn to the closer eye. There is a reason many pros that use canon shoot with the 85mm f1.2 wide open. Blurring the background is more important that keeping the entire head in focus. Of course, if you are in a studio with a backdrop there is no reason not to use f8 or smaller but outdoors there is.

BEG, yours is actually the fourth version which is better than my first gen, especially at f2.8. I should really get round to selling it off

Warren, what will you do when you smack your camera and the plastic mount breaks off? What will you do when it starts drizzling? What about if you want to use a circular polarizer? What will you do when the lego motor that powers the AF breaks down? These are some of the reasons why people who charge should be using pro level gear. It doesn’t have to be very expensive, a canon 24-105L isn’t that expensive you if you get it used, same with a 70-200 f4L IS. The 17-40 f4L is one of the cheapest L lenses available. What would give you more bang for your buck though would be a full frame camera, even if it was a 5D classic. I’m honestly getting the impression you have never handled pro level gear.

Don’t think that I’m bashing your pictures, I’m not, in fact I like most of them. What I am saying is that your equipment side of things is completely skewed. Just look at how you respond to the comments in your ETTR article as well as your responses here.

[warrenjrphotography]

Your opinion of vastly different is way different than mines.

I saw no difference in image quality which includes sharpness or micro contrast/clarity.

Sure, the first photo had less DOF but I can zoom in the 55-250 to the equiv of 400mm and blow out the background just as well.

Also my style does not revolve around completely blown out backgrounds.

I still like some details in the background hence why IS and dragging the shutter is so important for me……if I wanted completely blown out backgrounds I’d just go get another Canon 85 1.8. or zoom to 250mm @ F5.6.

Not all photographers shoot the same either. Like I said I started out shooting the whole blow the background out completely style but than I started to incorporate my background more with my subject. The blow te background style is the easiest in my opinion hence why theres so many photographers that shoot with fast primes and no additional lighting quipment. They just blow the background out and most of the time the photos look great BUT if a photographer learns to incorporate the background with the subject and leave some background detail in, in my opinion photos turn out more appealing to my eye but we come back to square one….what looks good to some looks bad to others….photography is subjective.

The only time that I like to completely blow out the background is if the background does not add to my subject in which case I zoom out to 135mm+ and use F5.6 or lower which for me, blows out the background completely.

About the quality of gear.

I already dropped my 55-250 on concrete and it’s still fine. A lens is only as strong as it’s weakest part (it’s glass).

I know a photographer that dropped his 24-70 off an 8 foot platform and it destroyed the glass even though it had a metal body.

So the question should be, what if any photographer drops his lens on a photoshoot with a client and the glass cracks? The answer is simple. Bring backups lenses.

I will be acquiring a Canon 18-200 F5.6 IS in the near future which will be my backup.

I have used my 55-250 in the rain and have had no problems with rain not to mention not all $1,000+ lenses are weather sealed.

I don’t use circular polarizers I see no point when I can bracket or bring down the sky in PP.

If the AF motor dies I’ll switch lenses or switch to a backup.

Also, just because you buy an expensive L lens DOES NOT mean that any of the above problems can happen to you.

I have heard and know of photograpgers that dropped their L glass on a photo shoot, the AF stops working on their USM motor, the glass breaks, or it rains and gets inside the lens or the body is not weather proof and the body goes down the crapper.

If anything I can have even more backups than someone that invests all of their money into 1 or 2 L lenses. I could afford 10 Canon standard lenses and have more backups than them if need be (I would bever do this I’m jyust making a point).

Expensive cars just like expensive lenses break as well and your lens will only be as strong as it;s weakest point (the glass).

Also, why would I get a 24-105F4L? Again, it’s only 1 stop faster than my 55-250 AND it’s zoom range is not even comparable and the IS is not as good (3 stop vs 4 stop I believe) and my 18-55 can go wider.

The 17-40L is also a waste in my opinion. Why get that when I can get the Tamron 17-50 2.8 for $350 brand new?

I have used FF body’s by the way. I have used the 1DX, 5Dc, 5Dmkii, and the Nikon D3. The difference between even FF and crop body at the lower isos that I use them at is neglible.

You put too much emphasis on the gear and not enough emphasis on the lighting, technique, posing, and PP skills in my opinion.

Also believe it or not I have yet to meet a single pro that uses ETTR when shooting portraiture.

I still stand by what I had to say about it. I have tested it out and have not seen a difference but the risk of blowing highlights.

Me and you obviously disagree on many points I think that it’s best that we stop here.

All the best to you and your photography/business.

 

[iliketag]

You’re arguing with people who defended you from that jerk that posted you here in the first place! I think this is what is frustrating me the most. You’re being overly defensive and honestly, now you’re kind of talking down to us.

[Author]

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