You may have heard of the inverse square law and seen some posts and videos going through the technical aspects of the inverse square law. I will try to stay clear of the technical aspects here, and simply say that light falloff is the fact that the intensity of the light drops fast, as you move your light source away from your subject.
Quite counter intuitively, the light falloff does not happen in a linear way, rather it drops like a stone! In the beginning that is. So if you move your flash from 1 foot away from you subject to 2 feet away, the intensity of the light has dropped not by 50% but by 75%! So by doubling the distance, you only get a quarter of the light on your subject. This is what the inverse square law is all about: the non linear relationship between light intensity and distance. You can maybe see it in the picture below, where I have taken a LED light and put it close to a white wall:
Good news is that the curve flattens quickly, so 3 feet away the light has dropped to 11% of the original light, 4 feet away it is 6 % and so on. So if you are very far away from your light source, moving one foot closer or further away means very little.
The intensity of the light drops dramatically as distance to the light source increases.
In the example above, had there been a 4th cup, it would get only 6%! If you draw a curve of the intensity of the light as a function of distance, you will get what I call a hockey stick curve – it drops a lot as distance increases only to flatten the more the distance is increased.
If you photograph a group of people and light them up using a flash, the ones standing in the rear will get a lot less light than the ones standing in the front, if you have the flash (or modifier) close to the front row. The solution is to move the flash further away from the subject to make the relative drop in light less. The price you pay is that your flash will need to work harder and that the light is less soft.
You can use the light falloff to produce a grey or black background, even if you have a white backdrop. Just make sure the distance between your subject and the backdrop is sufficient, then the light falloff will take care of “dimming” the backdrop to grey or even black! See the examples below, where the only thing changed is the increased distance between subject and the backdrop:
Here some light is still reflected from the backdrop. But not much, hence the grey color.
Here the background is black due to light falloff. But IRL the backdrop is pure white!
Using a flash and the effect of light falloff, I was able to make these withered leaves stand out on a dark background. If you are thinking that it did not look like this IRL, then you are absolutely right!
High Dynamic Range (HDR) is a technique used to get the best dynamic range in a picture, when the subject is comprised of both very dark parts and very bright parts. Your eyes have an amazing capability to see bright and dark subjects at the same time. Your camera does not, at least not to the same degree, although dynamic range has improved a lot over the recent years. So your camera has to cheat a bit, and combine an over exposed, an under exposed and a normally exposed picture into one, picking the best parts from each picture.
HDR on your smartphone
You probably have heard about HDR from your smartphone, where HDR is a feature that can be switched on and off. Often the camera factory settings is so that the camera will make the call if HDR is needed and it then processes the pictures behind the scenes without involving you, simply presenting you the final result as one picture and ditching the individual pictures.
Most DSLRs and mirrorless cameras do not offer this service level – all they do is enable you to take a series of pictures with different exposure levels, so the combination of the pictures has to be done like post processing software like Photoshop or Lightroom. And the camera manufacturers will refer to the series of pictures as bracketing – and to complicate matters you can bracket for all sorts of things other than exposure, but to keep things simple we stay with exposure here.
Example HDR
Your DSLR or mirrorless will typically have a mode selector or a menu option that enables bracketing. Factory settings are typically that the camera takes one normally exposed picture, one over exposed and one under exposed. However, it is possible to increase number of pictures to 5, 7 or even 9 and also control how much each picture is over and under exposed. I normally stay with 3 pictures and over/under expose by 2 stops, but more pictures and smaller exposure steps would probably yield a better result.
Take a look at these 3 pictures. The one to the left is under exposed, the one to the right is over exposed and the one in the middle is normally exposed.
The camera typically varies the shutter speed or the ISO or a combination to over and under expose the pictures. In the picture to the right, you can see the details in the wood, but the horizon and the sky is completely blown out. It will hence make sense to use the rightmost picture for the woodwork. Similarly, the sky and the clouds are most visible in the center and leftmost picture, so the horizon part of the picture should be picked here.
Luckily the post processing software has the ability to figure out all this so we can enjoy the combined picture without worrying too much about which parts are combined:
The combined result.
Of course the above picture has had more editing done than the simple combination of the pictures, but the result above would not have been possible had the dynamic range not been built with the help from all 3 pictures.
When you use a long lens in photography relative to a short lens, the long lens will – all things being equal – give the impression of the picture being compressed. On other words, the background will appear to be moving closer to the subject.
Intuitively, you would expect that if you took a picture with a short lens, then mounted a long lens and walked back until your subject would fill the same in the frame, then the two pictures would be about the same. But they are not. For two reasons. One is compression, the background will appear to have moved closer to the subject, and the other is field of view. The long lens sees a much narrower part of the surroundings of the subject. Sounds complicated? Lets look at some examples.
The first picture here is taken at 18mm focal length:
18mm
You can see that I have put a shovel behind the chair to help me size the subject in the frame as I start to walk backward. Notice the greenhouse to the right.
Next picture is shot at 70mm:
Notice how the greenhouse to the right has disappeared due to the more narrow field of view. And the fence at the back of the garden seems closer – the picture is more “compressed”. Hence the name. And notice also how the arms on the chair no longer point so much outwards, they appear more parallel in the 70mm picture.
If we take it one step further to 135 mm:
You will notice that the black chair behind the brown chair in the foreground suddenly appears. This is because I have walked so far back and the field of view is so narrow that the brown chair no longer “shades” the black chair. And the fence has moved even closer. And finally 300mm:
More of the same: fence is closer, black chair even more visible, greenhouse long gone, etc.
What happens is illustrated below. As you can see, the angle of view is much more narrow with a long lens and hence the greenhouse disappears from the frame in the examples above.
Did you notice how the chair looked more and more natural as the focal length increased? In the first picture the arms pointed very much outwards, but this became better and better with increasing focal length. This is useful for portrait photographers, because shooting too close to your subject with a too wide lens will give a less pleasing picture. You can try to take a selfie with your nose into the lens, and I can assure you that it will not be pleasing! Therefore many portrait photographers prefer relatively long lenses, typically 85 to 135mm.
You will also see that the composition of your picture changes when the focal length is increased. There is less distracting elements in the pictures with the long lens, simply because the angle of view is more narrow. So you can make a picture where the subject is less disturbed by distracting elements around it.
Manual mode is to many an off limits discipline, but there is no need to shy away from manual mode as it is a small investment to learn, and it pays off in great dividends in terms of better control of the camera and hence the pictures you take. And the good side effect is that by knowing manual mode, you also automatically know Shutter priority and Aperture priority, as these are “sub sets” of manual mode. But I advice you to practice manual mode until you have it “under your skin” and the controls and dials are – if not second nature – then at least part of your muscle memory, so you don’t have to think too much about the controls when you start shooting in manual mode for real.
If you want more detail on the exposure triangle, this post may be of interest to you.
Manual mode selector
To initiate manual mode, you need to select mode “M” on the mode dial, located on the top left of your D750 camera. Remember to push down the center button while turning the dial, otherwise your camera is less cooperative.
The Nikon D750 set to manual mode
Aperture
The aperture is controlled via the command dial on the top right front of the camera. By turning the wheel left and right, the aperture changes accordingly. In the LCD display on the top right of the camera, you can see the selected aperture. In the picture below, the aperture is set to F/10:
f/10, 1/100th shutter speed and ISO 12800 (auto).
Shutter speed
The shutter speed is c controlled via the command dial on the top right rear of the camera. By turning the wheel left and right, the shutter speed changes accordingly. In the picture above, the shutter speed is set to 1/1000th of a second, which is pretty fast. This is shown as 1000 – the “1/” is implicit. So a quarter of a second (1/4) is shown as 4.
ISO
The ISO has a dedicated button at the bottom left if the camera, the second button from the bottom.
The ISO button on the left side of the D750
When you push and hold that button as shown below, the ISO selection menu appears. Notice that only bottom half of the screen relates to the ISO – it is boxed in by a thin frame. The front command dial now controls the ISO auto setting (on/off) and the rear command dial controls the ISO value. You can see the graphics illustrate this to the very right. The selected value here is ISO 125 and ISO Auto setting to on.
When ISO setting is on, the camera selects the ISO as it sees fit (remember, you still control the Aperture and Shutter speed). If Auto ISO is on, the selected ISO sensitivity is ignored by the camera, but as soon as you set Auto ISO to off, then the camera uses the value selected here.
ISO sensitivity settings
You can re-program the record button on the top of the camera (the one with the red dot, sitting right behind the shutter release button) to act as the ISO button. Press the menu button on the rear of the camera, top left, select the custom settings menu (aka the pencil menu), select f for controls and scroll down to F9. Here you can set the record button to act as an ISO selector:
Using the movie record button for ISO
Many find this configuration useful, as the entire exposure triangle can no be controlled with the 3 buttons/dials sitting right next to each other on the top right of the camera, with no need to move the eye away from the viewfinder.
Ok, that concludes the walk through of the controls and dials on the Nikon D750. Please don’t hesitate to drop a line in the comment section below if you have any questions or the like.
The exposure triangle is probably not new to you, the point is simply that the aperture, the shutter speed and the ISO controls what level of exposure your picture will get. Changing one of the three in upwards direction will require one (or both) of the other two to drop accordingly to maintain the same exposure. And the other way around. In (fully) manual mode, you set all 3 values.
Apertureis the iris of the lens. The more light you let in, i.e. the more open the aperture is, the more exposed your picture will get. The confusing part is that the aperture is measured in f-stop numbers, and these are “upside down”, meaning that a low F-stop number means the lens is letting in a lot of light.
Shutter speed is more intuitive, if you ask me. The longer the shutter speed the more light is allowed to hit the sensor. A fast shutter speed is great if you want to avoid camera shake (you move the camera while the shutter is open) or motion blur (the subject moves while the shutter is open). But fast shutters lets in only a little light, so a balance it to be found.
Finally ISO is how sensitive your sensor appears to be. I say appears to be, as it technically is a gain that is applied to the base sensitivity of your sensor, but don’t focus too much on this part. All we need to know is that higher ISO means more sensitive to light. There is no free lunch in photography – so the price to pay for high ISO is grain. So we want to keep the ISO at bay. Modern cameras can ramp up the ISO with impressive results, but for now let’s just say that beyond 1600 you need to be more cautious.
The exposure triangle – Aperture, ISO and shutter speed.
In order to use your vintage glass on the Fuji X-T20, the first thing you need is an adapter that enables you to mount the vintage glass on the Fuji body. I always go for a “dumb” adapter, meaning that there is no communication between the lens and the camera body which of course means the camera has no idea what focal length is mounted or what aperture is used, but I can live with that. What is probably worse is that you also loose the auto focus, but if you shoot mainly stills, portrait, landscape and street, then I think you will find the manual focus to be ok, some even start to like it more than auto focus, as they feel more involved in the process of taking a picture.
In my case, I have Nikkor (Nikon) vintage glass made for full frame cameras, and as the Fuji is a cropped APS-C camera, that means I will have to multiply the length of the lens with 1.5 due to the crop factor. However, you can get a so called speed booster to reverse this effect, and in addition it gives you a stop more light, i.e. makes your lens faster. I went for the Zhongyi Lens Turbo II:
Zhongyi Lens Turbo II adapter.
But there are many other good options to choose from. Here you can see what the Nikon 135mm f/2.8 looks like with the speed boost adapter mounted:
Zhongyi Lens Turbo II with the Nikon 135mm
And here is the camera with the 135mm lens mounted:
Zhongyi Lens Turbo II with the Nikon 135mm on the Fuji XT20
As you can see it is in this case a long lens for such a small camera body and it also makes the camera quite “front heavy”. Some don’t like this – I don’t mind, but as the X-T20 is quite a light camera, mounting fast FX glass will often give a dramatic weight increase to the total system. I have the Fujinon 27mm lens to the right, just to compare.
Shooting “blind”
As the camera has no communication with the lens, you need to tell the camera it is OK to release the shutter with no lens mounted. It will look that way to the camera! Go find the tool menu and in that menu look for “button/dial settings” and select that menu:
“button/dial settings” menu
In that menu, find the item “shoot without lens” and make sure it is set to “on”:
“shoot without lens” set to “on”.
Now your shutter should work with a vintage lens mounted!
Focus aid
The next thing is to select how you want the Fuji to help you focus. I prefer the focus peak option, where the camera highlights the areas in the picture with strong contrast, which is often also where you will have the focal plane. In the “AF/MF” menu (the second from the top), select the “MF assist item” (MF is Manual Focus):
Manual focus assist in the shape of peaking highlights.
In the sub menu that appears, the manual focus assist settings can be chosen. I go for the focus peak and select the color to help me find the area of focus:
Manual focus assist in the shape of peaking highlights.
Now we should be ready to shoot!
Final hurdle
When shooting in this setup, there is however no focus peak assistance! It is possible to shoot and focus, but you get no help with the manual focus! How come?
The solution to the problem is on the front left of the camera. Here you select drive mode by turning a little dial, i.e. if the camera is in (S)ingle frame mode, (C)ontinuous or (M)anual mode. Hence the letters S, C and M:
Dial on the front left of the camera
You need to turn this dial to “M” in order for the focus peak to start working. Then the high contrast areas area highlighted in the viewfinder and LCD screen. Enjoy! (Remember to flick the switch back to C or M when you mount a Fujinon lens – otherwise you will continue with manual focus…!)
Further aid
When you shoot, in addition to the focus peak, you have the focus magnification that helps you zoom in on details in the frame to see if they are sharp. Press the rear command dial (yes, it feels strange – you are used to turning it! But press as in push!):
Zooming in using the rear command dial
and the camera will show you a magnified area of the picture:
Zooming in using the rear command dial
If you then turn the rear command dial, you will see that the camera flicks between two levels of magnification. In the first example you can see the entire cow, but if you turn the rear command dial the zoom gets extended:
Zooming in using the rear command dial
Now you can only see parts of the cows head! Notice how the graphics (the two boxes – one white and one green (blue?)) show you the zoom level. When you turn the command dial again, the camera jumps back to first level of zoom. So turn the rear command dial to select between the two zoom levels. Press (push) the rear command dial go leave zoom again. And press it once more to get back in, etc.
You will notice that with a long lens and the extended zoom peek switched on as shown above, the picture gets very nervous if the camera is hand held! This is a good reminder to shot with a fast shutter speed to avoid camera shake and hence blurry pictures.
Finally
The Fuji X-T30 offers 3 different manual focus aids:
Standard (basically no aid!)
Digital split image
Focus peak highlight
In the examples in the previous sections, I have only used the focus peak highlight, as I find it to be the best aid for manual focus. However, some like no aid and some like digital split image (where you have to align two pictures so that the vertical lines in the intersection are exactly on top of each other).
If you want to switch fast between the 3 modes mentioned above, you can push the rear command dial for a few seconds (not a brief push – you need to push the button in for a few seconds) to change to the next mode (the button is hiding behind my thumb top right):
Fast switch between focus modes.
When you have kept the button in for a few seconds, the mode the camera is about to switch to will be shown in a bar in the lower part of the screen. If the camera is in standard mode, it will switch to split, if in split then it will shift to focus peak, if in focus peak back to standard and so on. So it is like a wheel turning: standard -> split -> focus peak -> back to standard. Remember to keep the button pushed in until you see the bar on the screen.
A panorama is typically a photo stitched together of a series of photos, either purely horizontally or vertically to produce a picture with dimensions out of the ordinary. Below is an example of a very wide photo created using the panorama function in the Sony RX100M3:
Lightroom panorama function
Lightroom enables you to stitch together a photo from a puzzle of photos provided that sufficient overlap is secured. Good news is that the photos can be combined horizontally and vertically at the same time, i.e. in the same photo, which enables you to increase both width and height in the same photo, much like you would see with a wide lens. Hereby the panorama function in Lightroom is more advanced than the panorama function you would typically find in a smartphone or the in camera function of the Sony RX100.
As far as I can tell, there is not requirement to have the photos in a certain order, but of course for your own administration it is probably useful to have some system in the order of the photos. In the example below, in total 8 photos have been stitched together via two columns of photos: The left hand side is built up of pictures moving the camera from bottom to top, and the right hand column follows the same logic but with a solid overlap to the left hand column. This is illustrated in the light blue graphics to the left where the darker areas are the overlap. You probably need more overlap than what the graphics indicate (1/3rd is a safe margin), but it also depends if there is some easily identifiable objects in the overlap zones:
The resulting photo looks like this:
Ease your administrative work
When you are in the field and shooting the photos, you can help your work back at the desktop stitching pictures together by following a few tips. When you are out and about it may seem very uncomplicated and straightforward when you shoot the photos, but not so much when you look a them in the Lightroom grid view. It can be difficult to figure out when your series start and stop and which pictures are “normal” pictures and which ones are part of a series. Therefore I recommend that you find a hand signal to start and stop the series, so that you via a scrap photo can easily identify the start and the top of the series. I usually point to the direction I will move the camera to open the series, and to end the series, I simply hold up an open hand:
These photos are of course not to be used as input to the combined picture but are simply for the benefit of easing your administration of the pictures in Lightroom. Here you an see the overwhelming view in Lightroom and how these pictures help you getting an overview – I think the two “handsignal” pictures gives some guidance:
In the field
In my experience you get the best results using a tripod. I know, they are a nuisance in terms of weight and size to carry around. But a tripod gives you the least variance between pictures – you want the height to be the same between photos and you want the pictures to be without camera shake. And a tripod is the most save route to those objectives. You can also give it a try to kneel down and use your knee to support your elbow and that way get a very solid foundation for the camera if the tripod is at home. In terms of camera settings, my recommendation is that you shoot in manual mode ideally, because you then have the least variance between shots in terms of ISO, Aperture and shutter speed. In automated modes, the camera will change the settings based on changing light conditions and any variance will complicate the merging process. Also, unless you have a specific plan with varying the focus across the shots, my recommendation is that you disengage the auto focus with the shutter half pressed and go for back-button focus, or instead that you shoot with a manual lens where you actively have to change the focus. You can, however, re-focus every photo and create some amazing pictures with a depth of field a single shot cannot deliver, but you may find that Lightroom is struggling to merge the pictures if the overlapping parts of the pictures are not sufficient similar. A varying focus may be a complicating factor that could make the picture merge process fail.
Post processing – how to
In lightroom, in the grid view (press “G”), simply select the photos to be stitched together by holding down the shift key and marking the photos in scope. You can either mark them individually or point to the first and the last photo – Lightroom will know you want to include all in between.
After selecting the pictures, right click, and a small window with a menu appears, select “Photo merge” and then menu item “Panorama”. You can also simply press ctrl-M to achieve the same effect, and a picture with a preview and some options appear:
You can try the different projection options, but I find that for landscapes the “perspective” option works best. If you remove the “auto crop” check mark, then you can see the full picture including the parts without coverage:
If you use the “boundary warp” slider, you can get Lightroom to stretch the existing pixels into the areas not covered, so you get a picture with no bare spots, but of course the dimensions may be seriously skewed.
After playing with the parameters, simply press the “merge” button at the bottom right of the screen and Lightroom starts a batch process to merge the pictures. You can follow the progress via the little bar in the screen top left. Unless you have a VERY powerful PC, I recommend that you leave the PC alone while this process is running, as it is demanding, both in terms of memory and CPU capacity. If you press Ctrl-Shift-Esc (Windows), you can monitor the “stress level” of your PC while the process is running.
Once the process is complete, Lightroom will add the picture to the current folder and name the file the same as the last photo in the merged series, with the addition of “-pano” to the file name for easy identification.
Pros and cons of this approach
Pros
More wide and tall pictures simulating a wide angle lens
Two dimensional stitching beats traditional panorama function
Great fun when the result surfaces in the panorama preview – more rewarding?
More resolution – I think…
Cons
Cannot be used for moving subjects or changing light conditions
More work, more pictures, more disk space, post processing, etc
No in-camera result
Best result requires a tripod
Straight lines may be ”fisheyed”, i.e. look strange
Very demanding on your PC if shooting in RAW
Access to picture processing in Lightroom or the like is a prerequisite
A few tips
As shown above, mark the start and end of a panorama series with scrap pictures to easily be identified in grid view
Keep all settings the same for all pictures
Ideally shoot manual mode, or try to keep the setting the same across all pictures
Use back button focus so your focus is the same (again, to keep settings the same)
Use a tripod and ideally also a L-bracket if shooting in portrait mode
Make sure you have solid overlap between pictures – best to have some easily identifiable objects in the areas that overlap.
Keep the number of pictures low if shooting in RAW – maybe start with JPG to see how your PC is dealing with the task
Questions and comments
Questions and comments are more than welcome – please post below. Hope you found this blog useful. Thank you for reading!
When I first started to read the manual for the Sony RX100 M3 regarding shooting stills, I could not believe the amount of intelligence and options they have packed into this little camera! The mode dial has 10 positions, and behind two of them are 3 and 12 options respectively, giving more than 20 mode options of which some are auto modes that combines underlying features in a new way! This may seem quite intimidating of you are new to photography or new to this camera, but let me see if I can give you an overview so that you quickly can zoom in on the options that are best for you.
If you want automation
Professional photographers want control of their camera because they want control of the process and hence the outcome. Us more humble amateurs may want to turn to some of the automatic modes, either because we are lazy or because we have other things to attend to (like hosting the party where we are also taking pictures). Now, there are 2 fully automatic modes for shooting stills named Intelligent Auto (green) and Superior auto (yellow/orange), but the text is not written on the dial, instead a little camera is depicted in yellow and green, with an “i” in front of it (i for intelligent presumably):
In these modes, the camera takes care of everything – ISO, aperture and shutter speed. You “just” have to point and shoot. The difference between Intelligent auto (green) and the Superior Auto (yellow) is that the camera in the latter mode takes several pictures and combines them into one. You may have come across a feature named HDR on your smartphone (or bracketing on a DSLR), this is a bit of the same. The camera takes several pictures and combines them so that the low light parts are “boosted” so they become more bright and the high light parts are scaled back a bit so they are not blown out. This improves the dynamic range, i.e. how bright and dark parts that the camera can handle in one shot.
If you want automation with a twist
In the automatic modes, the camera tries to guess what it is you are shooting, and adjust the camera settings to optimize what you shoot. Sony call this scenes, i.e. types of photographs that you do. It is very kind and in the top left corner shows you what scene it has arrived at, based on what the electronics find on the sensor. In this example where I am taking a picture of a plastic cow, the camera figures that it is flower photography! It is not as bad as it sounds – it is an object full of colors and close up, so a flower is not a bad guess. Notice the graphics top left gives the scene mode:
In the two fully automatic modes described above, the camera constantly guesses what we are trying to shoot and it arrives a for example: Pet, Gourmet, Macro, Baby (!), Sports, Portrait, Landscape, Sunset. Night scene, Night portrait, Fireworks, etc. It also has some scenes where it just concludes that the light is very limited or that you are trying to shoot hand-held. In the fully automatic modes, the camera informs you of what it has concluded in the top left corner.
The point putting the camera in Scene mode (SCN on the dial) is that you can now tell the camera what it is you are shooting. Of course only from the list of options given by Sony, but they cover many situations. In this way, you can control that the camera optimizes for the right scene, so that it does not think you are shooting fireworks, when you actually take a picture of a flower (he he). Such mistake is very unlikely I have to add, but there are some scenes where the camera has troubles finding the right scene (gourmet and macro are very similar to give a better example).
So choose scenes mode when you want to still rely on the cameras ability to optimize the settings based on what you are shooting, but you take control and tell the camera what it is you are shooting, so it selects the right shelf to meter from.
Semi automatic modes and manual mode
The RX100 of course also gives the option to select the classic semi automatic modes: Aperture priority mode, Shutter priority mode and Program mode:
(A)perture priority: You control the aperture, the camera selects the shutter speed.
(S)hutter priority: You control the shutter speed, the camera selects the aperture.
(P)rogram mode: You select both the Aperture and the Shutter speed but in pre-set tandems, so the
exposure is still correct.
The ISO is set according to the value selected in the menu system. Press the Fn button top left of the rear command wheel, and the menu appears. Bottom left gives the ISO setting. You can control if you want to set the ISO yourself, if you want to have the camera do so – with or without limitations to upper and lower values:
The RX100 also lets you control it all in manual mode where you can set each of the parameters in the exposure triangle as you see fit. This is probably the mode you want to use of absolute control of the camera is vital to you, for example if you do long exposures.
Memory recall (MR)
In the memory recall mode, you have 3 modes to choose from of previously stored mode information. So you are not only selecting the priority mode, but also the exposure compensation, just to name one. There are 3 pages of information with what the camera stores!
I find that the confusing part is to store this information (not the recall), but the process is simple: set-up the camera exactly the way you like it to, and then go into the menu system and select item 7 in the shooting menu, and hereafter select “memory”. You can the store then information in bank 1, 2 or 3 by moving left and right with the command wheel and pressing the center for storing.
Panorama
I have done an entire video on how to shoot in panorama mode with the RX100 and you may have come across this feature on your smartphone. But it is a nice way to “get it all in” when you have a wide subject to capture. Notice that you can shoot both in portrait and landscape mode – you select the direction on the front dial (the one at the root of the lens).
The Helios 44 is one of the most debated lenses in photography forums and youtube videos and I imagine the reason probably being:
You can get a copy for 50 USD or maybe even lower with a bit of luck
There were literally millions of copies made, so the supply is endless and gives a low price (I know some complaint the price has gone up, but really: 50 USD for a fairly good 58mm prime lens?)
Its bokeh is know to be swirly or at least different from what you see with other lenses
The lens is OK sharp if you you are so lucky to get a decent copy
Mirror less cameras have given a revival to vintage lenses with the focus aids like focus peak and focus highlight, making the vintage lenses in general more attractive than in the DSLR days
So in short, it is so cheap that there is a copy for everyone, and this in combination with the myth around the bokeh probably makes this lens both realistic and attractive for a large crowd.
Helios 44-2 58mm f/2
History
The Helios lens was made from sometime in the 1960s to the early 1990s in Russia, and rumors has it that it was an attempt to copy a zeiss lens from that time. Although the ambition to make an “as good as zeiss copy” was not fulfilled, the Helios is still a good lens even with the standards of 2019. There were MANY copies made, some for export, others for the local market, so you can get a copy from Russia or Ukraine where the “helios” is written with Russian letters – pretty cool!
The Helios comes in many different versions, 44 were the first ones produced, then followed 44-2 and up to 44-7. The improvements were minor, probably improvements in coating, but I understand there is no dramatic improvement in the later models compared to the early ones. I have no complaints regarding my 44-2 copy.
Price
As stated above, the lens can be found used on e-bay and amazon. Always used, as they are not produced anymore. The price is typically around 50 USD, but many report that they have got copies down to 20 USD and at flea markets it should be possible to find them even cheaper. Often they served as kit lens for a zenith camera, and many get the lens for almost nothing, pretending to be more interested in the zenith camera than the lens as such.
If you buy this lens in Russia or Ukraine via the net, be aware that postage costs to e.g. Europe can be quite significant relative to the price of the lens. Remember also to set off some money for a adapter for this lens (M42). They come cheap and quality is usually ok, also for the cheapest ones, but if you are on a budget, both postage costs and adapter should be included in the total price before making a purchase decision.
Copy variation is an issue. I do not know why, but my guess is that quality control varied back in the days when it was produced, or the quality was dependent on individuals performance in the production line. Whatever the reason, quality varies and it is a bit of a lottery, so if at all possible, see if you can test your copy before making the purchase decision.
Characteristics
First and foremost this is a manual lens – no auto focus, no CPU contact, no metering, nothing. Just glass. So if you are not comfortable with manual focus or EXIF information in very important to you, then this lens is not for you. Secondly, it is a prime lens, so if zoom is important to you, you probably want to look elsewhere.
The lens is well built, all metal and surprisingly light IMO (warning: I am used to Nikon vintage glas!). The focus throw is long (270 dgrs) and reminds me of the Samyang 14mm lens – you turn and turn and turn, and then some more!
At 58mm and with full frame coverage, this ens is excellent for portraits, flowers, still life, product shoots or basically any stable subject that is not too far away. Maybe even street photography if you are a manual focus shark! But the classic use for this lens is portrait as far as I can tell from the blog posts. I use it mainly for flowers and product shoots.
At f/2 it is a reasonably fast lens, and it has a dual aperture control system, so that you can limit the upper limit of the variable aperture. I am not a video shooter, but supposedly this feature is valued by video shooters. The aperture does not move in clicks but is completely step-less, another feature that video shooters appreciate. The aperture ring on my copy is wobbly to say the least – if fear it will fall off any day soon! Aperture range is form f/2 to f/16. The focus ring has a loooong throw – around 270 degrees.
Distortion, vignetting and CA is seldom an issue for me, so I have not really looked into this in details, but I understand from others that the lens does OK here.
Color rendering I find to be quite natural, maybe at bit more warm than what I am used to from my Nikon lenses, but very pleasant (others report the opposite, so opinions are a mixed bag here).
Notice the bokeh!
Flare control in my experience is non-existing! Maybe this is a bit harsh, but it is not super well controlled, and some video shooters actually use the as a creative feature rather than trying to suppress it. I find as a stills shooter that the flare can be reduced surprisingly much by closing down the aperture just a little bit, so you may give that a try if flare with this lens bothers you. A lens hood should also help mitigate the flaring.
Sharpness is excellent, especially center sharpness. All the way from f/2. When you stop down, the corner sharpness improves a lot, and at f/8 I dare to call this a very sharp lens edge to edge, even compared to modern lenses of 2019. Contrast is good, but only when you are in the clear when it comes to flaring or you have some bright light in the frame.
Bokeh
The bokeh is what most talk about when it comes to this lens, and it is special. Probably due to a construction error, the bokeh balls of this lens gets oval towards the corners, which is probably the reason for the swirly reputation. Take a look at these two picture, taken 20 seconds apart with a slight variation in composition.
Notice the bokeh ball in the top right corner – here it is nice and round:
But moving the camera just a little bit so the bokeh ball now is closer to the corner, you see that the ball now is more oval than round:
All lenses probably has this characteristic, but the Helios simply enhances or exaggerates making the out of focus areas oval. In order to make the best use of this (swirly) effect, you ideally need either a lot of small lights surrounding your subject, or some sort of structure that will reveal the bokeh distortion.
See this example of an ordinary hedgerow, nothing special going on here, other than maybe a foreground out of focus:
But if you zoom in on the foreground, the notice what happens to especially the background to the right – all of a sudden circles appear:
The bokeh almost forms circles!
The same subject with my beloved Nikkor 50 mm 1.4D at f/1.4 gives this where the bokeh balls do not have this swirly effect:
So with a subject right in the middle of the frame, you can get this swirly effect of circles encompassing the subject, giving a dreamy effect:
In conclusion
So who is this oddball of a lens for? If you fall into one of these categories, I think this lens is for you:
You find the bokeh effect great fun and want to see what you can do with it
You think it is good sport to find a lens at a bargain, that performs well
You are new to photography and want to try something more than the kit lens on your camera without breaking the bank
You are a on a very tight budget
This lens is definitely not for you if:
You are not comfortable with manual focus
EXIF information is vital for you
Good flare control is a must
Corner sharpness fully open is important
You are not comfortable with the lottery of getting a good copy
Anyone who spends 2 minutes studying global sales of photo cameras will quickly notice 2 trends:
The total sale of camera systems with interchangeable lenses is dropping like a stone
The sale of camera systems is switching from DSLR to mirrorless
So is this important to you and what you decide to buy as a consumer here in 2020? Well, yes and no.
The dramatic drop in sales of camera systems is mirrored by a equally dramatic increase in the sale of smartphones with better and better cameras. Some smartphones today come with sensors that have more megapixels than entry level system cameras, and with added clip on lenses from Ollo-clip and Moments, the smartphones pose a serious alternative to many entry level system cameras. And I guess that no-one wants to invest in yesterdays technology unless it is done very deliberately – like buying a LP player these days. My guess is that within a few years, the DSLRs will be viewed somewhat like the same way a LP record and a film camera is seen today – there is definitely a market, but more niche than mainstream. But, please remember, that the stock of DSLRs out there is huge, and that the mirror-less only have 1-2% of the total stock of cameras out there. That is also why you continue to see companies like Nikon pushing out new DSLRs like the D780, simply because it still has some advantages over mirror-less (battery life, ruggedness, OVF).
Why is your smartphone your camera?
There are probably a number of reasons why so many of us have the smartphone as the main camera:
Most consumers do not have a need for a better camera than what the smartphone offers
The cameras in smartphones get better and better, not only in terms of specs like megapixels, but also low light performance, electronic zoom, stabilization, panorama, SOME integration, etc
The camera is always with you as your smartphone is also your:
newspaper,
game machine,
alarm clock,
watch,
wallet,
notebook,
bank, etc. In other words, you do not leave home without your smartphone
Your smartphone is small and compact
It is difficult to get a smartphone without a camera these days; it is part of the package deal
So even if you are consider to go very serious with your photography and you are willing to invest in your hobby, you may find that a very good starting point is your smartphone – especially in combination with click on lenses. However, be aware that the lenses may not be transferable should you later upgrade your phone. I switched from iPhone 7 to X, and my Ollo-clip lenses could not follow.
What if you want to go further?
If you decide that you want to go for a system camera, then there are two main paths you can follow: DSLR or mirror-less.
A DSLR camera has a mechanical viewfinder, where a mirror shows you what will be in the frame when you hit the shutter release, and when you do, the mirror flicks away to lead the light to the sensor. A mirror-less camera has no mirror, and is typically much more compact than a DSLR as the room for the mirror is no longer necessary. The DSLR to a large extend works the same way as the old film cameras, where the light hit a roll of film rather than a sensor. So first when the mirror-less camera came around, the moving parts in the inside of the camera were no longer necessary.
Camera manufacturers have spotted that the market is moving away from DSLRs to mirror less, so they try to get the best out of the DSLR lineup they have without investing too much. Recently the two big old players Nikon and Cannon have released mirror-less cameras, and it is difficult to assess how much they will continue to invest in the DSLR product lineup. However, this means that you today can get a DSLR camera for a fraction of what it was some years back. In other words, you can make a great deal if you are willing to invest in a receding technology. A good DSLR will give you 500t actuation’s or more, and that will cover most consumers needs for a considerable number of years.
The mirror-less camera has some advantages over DSLRs, as it can give you much more precise feedback in the viewfinder as to what the picture will look like, i.e. exposed correctly, in level, etc. It also gives you some aid for manual focus lenses (focus peak) that the DSLR cannot offer unless you shoot using the back screen LCD only. So if you use lenses with manual focus on a mirror-less, then it is much easier to get sharp pictures than with a DSLR.
Why should you care for manual focus? Well, wise men say that the quality of the pictures first and foremost is dictated by the quality of the glass in the lens. The large players like Nikon, Pentax and Canon have produced lenses for 60+ years, so there is plenty of vintage lenses to choose from. These vintage lenses can often be found at a fraction of the cost of a new lens. But of course without the comfort of auto focus and good coating to keep flare at bay. But if you shoot subjects where auto focus is not an issue, then you can get super glass at a bargain. And you are no longer tied to a specific producer – you can put Nikon glass on a Sony body, etc. It now gives you a lot of freedom, where you previously were locked in – Nikon body = Nikon glass. This is no longer the case.
So what should you do?
I would suggest that you first and foremost try to see how you like photography, using your smartphone only. If you find you don’t care for photography, then all you have wasted is your time and not your budget. If you still insist to invest, I would give a clip on lens a try and see how that works for you.
Should you still have appetite for a system camera, I would serious consider starting with a mirror-less. Only if you don’t mind the more bulky, loud and heavy DSLRs, then this could be right for you in order to save money. Buy used if you don’t mind – even if you buy from your local photo shop you can save a lot of money. Further, the advantage of an “authorized” dealer is that you know where to go back and complaint if not all is to your liking. That is more cumbersome if bought on the net.
Finally, irrespective of your choice of DSLR or mirror-less, the next question that comes up is the size of the sensor: APS-C or Full frame (FF). That is a good question. In my own experience, the APS-C cameras have come very close to the FF cameras so I would not put too much emphasis on this part. However, if you have always wanted to go for full frame, give it a try with a borrowed camera and see if you notice the difference. It would be silly to go for a FF camera and invest in heavier glass etc, only to find that the difference is negligible. My own experience is that only for landscape photography I have noticed a difference between APS-C and FF – for product shoots and portraits I see no difference at all. But don’t take my words for it – I recommend that you try to borrow or rent a FF and see what you make of it.
Questions and comments
Hope you found this useful. Please don’t hesitate to leave a comment below. All the best.
