55mm or 85mm for street photography?

[darkobar]

Hi everyone,

I'm looking to get more serious about my photography and I'm not sure what kind of camera/lens to get. My budget is up to 1000.- USD for both a camera and lenses. I'm going to use it mostly for street photography.

I have couple of questions:

1. On a crop frame camera, which lens is better to use for street photography? 55mm f/1.8 or 85mm f/1.8? From what I understood when doing the research, aperture is very important for street photography and that bokeh effect. Is 1.8 good enough? Going to 1.4 makes the price jump like crazy, not sure that's necessary.

2. Is there a difference between picture quality when using 55mm and 85mm lens assuming I move closer with the 85mm lens?

3. I am thinking about getting a Nikon D5300 (or similar) body and Nikkor 55mm or 85mm f/1.8. Is that a good idea/combo for street photography? Would Canon equivalents be better?

Sorry for a lot of questions, am new at this. Thanks a lot for your help.

 

[Designer]

From what I understood when doing the research, aperture is very important for street photography and that bokeh effect.

Welcome!

Please define "street photography". Actually, never mind that. If what you're hoping to do is capture candid portraits of strangers, and while doing so, separate your subjects from the backgrounds, then I might recommend the longer 85mm for more separation.

Having written that, I will now state that the focal length of your lens is going to have a lot to do with how close or far you can be from your subjects and still have a nice composition. The longer 85mm lens will mean that you will need to be farther away, while the 50mm will mean that you will probably be closer, although you don't need to be.

1. Get the AF-S 50mm 1:1.8 G.

2. Both lenses have very good image quality.

3. Get the Nikon D5300 or whatever D5xxx or D3xxx that fits within your budget. These Nikon entry-level cameras are affordable, handy, well-engineered, and have later sensor technology and a wider dynamic range than some other makes. If you purchase new, they will come bundled with the 18-55mm zoom which is a good lens, although with a smaller maximum aperture than f/1.8.

Good luck!

 

[benhasajeep]

Welcome.

One thing to realize is what's called full frame and crop sensor cameras. Full frame camera have a sensor the same size as a 35mm negative. Crop sensor cameras have a smaller sensor. A crop sensor in Nikon system you have a multiplier of 1.5x due to the smaller sensor. So if you put a 50mm f/1.8 lens on a DX camera (Nikon crop sensor) the picture that results looks like it was taken by a FX (Nikon full frame camera) 75mm lens.

So, if your interested in the D5600 camera (the current new version of D5300) a 50m f/1.8 lens will take the same picture of a 75mm. And the 85mm f/1.8 will be like a 127mm.

Your normal vision is close to 50mm in field of view in cameras. So, 50mm is considered standard lens. But with a crop (DX) camera you would need a 30 to 35mm lens to get that standard view.

With your budget you could get the new D5600 a 18-55mm kit lens, and a 35mm f/1.8g for your fast aperture street lens.

 

[Overread]

I don't do this kind of photography, but I will just throw out that you will find that there isn't an answer. I'm not saying that to be rude and I appreciate that its hard to make some purchase choices; but a lot of this is going to come down to personal preference. Some people like to snipe and might even use a 70-200mm to be further back and others like to be right up close and would use a 35mm or 50mm.

So in a way the only way to get an answer is to get out there and find out what works for you and what you're comfortable shooting and what it gives you. Especaily as the concept of "street" photography is very varied so your idea of street might not match up to others.


You could consider short term renting each lens and giving them a try-out; or even if there's a local store to you a few moments standing in the street outside and testing each one might even give you all you need.
Another option is just to pick one and jump in and find out how it goes.

 

[limr]

This ^^^

 

[benhasajeep]

With a D5300 / D5500 / D5600 series camera and a 35mm lens (DX format). In horizontal mode (holding camera normal) you would need to be about 15' back to get a person from head to toe (basically door opening height).

 

[Designer]

.. and a 35mm f/1.8g for your fast aperture street lens.

He wants "bokeh", and with the 35mm lens, he will be disappointed. Longer focal length gives more OOF backgrounds and foregrounds. Like the 85mm for instance. But some people think shoving a camera in some stranger's face is the way to do "street photography", so whatever.

 

[jaomul]

You'll find most Street photography is a little wider than normal than say portrait photography, and many that do this type of photography will say smaller cameras draw less attention and therefore the photography opportunity are better due to this.

I'd suggest a micro four thirds camera with a kit lens. Tweak your lens choice as you progress, but it's always good to have a kit lens in your kit. You'd pick up a nice camera and kit lens easily second hand for 300 dollars

 

[Designer]

Depending on how earnestly he wants the out-of-focus effect, and his budget, he should go for a camera with a larger sensor (a so-called "full-frame"). But if his budget is small, he will be getting a used copy of an older "full frame" camera, so the technology will be older. What is the tolerance for a compromise?

The best OOF effect will be found using a larger sensor, a longer lens, with a wider aperture, at some distance.

The only factor he will have is the wider aperture, nothing else.

He will be disappointed in your suggestion.

He will then go ask someone who can help him in his quest.

 

[benhasajeep]

.. and a 35mm f/1.8g for your fast aperture street lens.

He wants "bokeh", and with the 35mm lens, he will be disappointed. Longer focal length gives more OOF backgrounds and foregrounds. Like the 85mm for instance. But some people think shoving a camera in some stranger's face is the way to do "street photography", so whatever.

I don't disagree with that. But I was giving an example of distances needed with an example that could be visualized. So if he were across a 2 lane street in town, and wanted to get a full store front with a person in the door, and get the whole first floor in the shot. The 35mm would be the lens to have. Anything longer he would have to switch to vertical. The 35mm is not a bad lens either! And it happens to be on sale now as well for $170. Pretty low price for a decent lens. And yes Sigma does have a much better one, but for quite a bit more.

 

[Gary A.]

I shoot a lot of Street. For a neophyte I suggest a 35mm on a FF or a 23mm on an APS-C camera. My favorite Street camera is the Fuji X100S, X100T or the latest model the X100F. These are a 'Fixed' 23mm lens on a gorgeous, rangefinder-esque looking camera. Overread is correct, there is no 'correct' lens for Street or any other genre for that matter. Typically I shoot Street with two cameras, one camera with a long lens the other with a wide angle. One time, just to amp up the challenge, I shot with a 200mm on one camera and a 8mm fisheye on the other, (see below).

But to start, a 35mm FF or a 23mm APS-C is a good place to start.

For clarity, the Fuji X100F has a fixed 23mm lens. The X100F does not accept interchangeable lenses. So you're kinda stuck with that focal length. (Yeah, Fuji makes a screw-in conversion lens which will make the 23mm a bit longer for portrait and a screw-in to make it a bit wider for landscapes ... but basically it is a one focal length camera.) If/when you want to shoot sports or landscapes or a different genre, you most likely would want something other than a 23mm lens, which means you gotta purchase a different camera to go with that sports or landscape lens. But for general Street photography and for someone starting out ... the X100F/T/S is ideal.

Samples of Street with Extreme Focal Lengths:
#1

Fuji X-Pro1 w/Fijinon 500-200 @ 200mm (300mm FF)

#2

Fuji X-Pro1 w/Rokinon 8mm Fisheye (12mm FF)

#3

Fuji XT1 w/ Fujinon 50-200

#4

Fuji X-T1 w/Rokinon 8mm Fisheye (12mm FF)

 

[limr]

.. and a 35mm f/1.8g for your fast aperture street lens.

He wants "bokeh", and with the 35mm lens, he will be disappointed. Longer focal length gives more OOF backgrounds and foregrounds. Like the 85mm for instance. But some people think shoving a camera in some stranger's face is the way to do "street photography", so whatever.

Well, to be fair, he said that he'd read that bokeh is important. Knowing that you want something and being told that it's important are different things.

OP, would you like to share the names of some street photographers whose work you enjoy or styles you would like to try? You say you want to "get better at my photography" so you have already done some stuff and have an idea of what you're going for, but you're also new enough at it that you may need to mess around before really settling on your purpose and style of street photography. Is that a fair assessment?

Street photography can mean a lot of things, and the dof of an image should depend on what the photographer is trying to capture in that image. So that wide aperture could be really useful or it might end up being useless because you're spending all your time at f8.

 

[Designer]

O.K., then never mind.

Please ignore posts #2, 7, & 9 as I have been outnumbered.

Instead of deleting my posts, I will leave them here so the people who know better than I what you want will have something to gloat over as your photography career advances.

 

[Gary A.]

PS- The further away from what is considered the "Ideal" or "Optimal" focal lengths for a particular genre, the greater the difficulty in capturing a successful image ... hence the less 'keepers'. As an example, the ideal/optimal focal length for portraits is considered between 85mm and 135mm on a full frame camera. The further away from 85mm-135mm the more difficult it will be to capture a successful portrait ... the harder you have to work, the better your own pre-visualization of the final image and the finally your consistency rate falls ... but, in return a successful image shot outside the ideal/optimal focal range may/should deliver an image with more drama.

 

[Gary A.]

PPS- On an APS-C and for a first timer to Street, I would say neither 55mm or 85mm. For an APS-C, I'd say around 20mm to 28mm if you desire to shoot the people near and around you on the sidewalk.