the Interceptor
I LUV MY PRIUS!!!
Since this has consumed a lot of my spare time in the last days and is one of the big discussions coming up in photography sooner or later, I thought a thread could be useful - a thread on "primes versus zooms".
What the hell is a "prime"?
A prime is a lens with a fixed focal length."Prime" can also point towards the lens being the main part in a system where other lenses are added, so technically, the term "fixed focal length" of "FFL" is better. Still, the usage of the word "prime" usually points towards the FFL lens. Before the technology was advanced enough for zoom lenses, primes were the only choice in photography. But since the absolute majority of cameras nowadays comes with a zoom lens of some sort which offers a range of focal lengths, the usage of primes has been reduced to a handful of specific purposes, such as macro work.
So why choose a prime over a zoom?
Compared to a zoom lens, primes with their simpler construction often are more compact and offer a faster aperture. Also, they usually cost less and might be optically superior to a zoom as well. As always, there are exceptions to these rules on both sides, but this is the general idea. A zoom has to do much more than a prime, so in order to produce better image quality, the manufacturer will have to make an effort. That on the other hand will make a zoom complicated, large and thus expensive.
And what are my choices?
Since primes came before the zooms, there is a range of primes still in production accompanied by a lot of older primes that went out of production years ago. Surprisingly, even the latest and best zooms can not surpass even the oldest primes in every respect. Of course, there are a lot of bad primes, just like there are a lot of bad zooms. But if you sample your individual possibilities for the respective focal lengths, you will find a handful of optical gems for surprisingly little money.
Note that since crop frames are a modern invention of the world of digital photography, all older primes were made to work with 35mm film and therefore are capable of covering the whole frame on full frame cameras. Thus, they work on crop cameras as well, only with the respective difference in magnification. Since all focal lengths on all lenses are in reference to a full frame though, a classic 35mm lens will give you the same field of view as a 35mm crop lens when used on a crop camera. The only difference is that the crop lens will not cover the whole frame on a full frame camera.
But there have to be drawbacks, right?
Yes, there are. For starters, when buying a used lens you of course get no warranty and a lens that might have gone through many hands. Also, a prime offers you that one focal length: when a zoom might give you the composition you just need in this moment, you have no options with a prime - and a shot you missed might be gone forever. A lot of the excellent older primes will not come with a mount for your current camera and thus will need an adaptor or even a mod to fit your camera body. At the same time, you mostly lose comfort like in-camera aperture selection and autofocus.
Most of the currently-made primes offer all the modern creature comforts like electronic aperture selection, autofocus and sometimes even vibration reduction, but you're still stuck with the one focal length, so you will have to think in advance which focal length might be most useful when you go out shooting.
Ummmm ... why am I considering primes again?
Because there are some really good primes out there only waiting for you to be picked up. Ever heard of those guys who go great lengths to use glass made by Leica, Carl Zeiss, Contax or Olympus on their cameras? Well, there is a reason. To this day, even some of the oldest primes are known to offer the best possible picture quality you can get for your camera. There are some classic primes made by camera manufacturers like Canon and Nikon as well, but the really crazy guys tend to go for the German glass.
Also, many primes offer a lot more light than even the best zooms. Taking the classical "normal" focal range of 50mm, you will find loads of primes with an aperture of f/1.4, some even f/1.2 and better, when zooms usually end at f/2.8. Considering that a f/1.4 opening has four times the area as a f/2.8 opening, you can imagine that this is a significant advantage when gathering light.
And you're telling me this because?
... I have started to consider this alternative to zoom lenses and was surprised to learn of the possibilities. In the specific case of my Nikon full frame camera, there is a range of current Nikon zooms which has quickly earned the name "the magic three":
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 wide angle zoom
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 standard zoom
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 telephoto zoom
Those three zooms cover the focal length considered to be the most important range for normal photography. They offer an absolutely excellent picture quality all the way, which is why everone owning a Nikon FX body is very likely to consider to buy one or more of them at some point. But there's a problem. These are pro lenses, and the price tag reflects that. The fact that they are quite bulky and heavy aside (uncompromised image quality needs good glass, and lots of it), this trio will set you short almost 5,000 Euros (around 6,700 $US), which is almost thrice of what you pay for a D700 body. Sure, if you want the best of the best, you won't get it for free. Yet, this somehow didn't feel right to me. The money aside, this is the Veyron approach: throw loads of technology at it, and it'll sort itself out. But photography is more than that.
Therefore, I went into a huddle with a workmate who knows everything about old lenses and cameras since he collects them. And by browsing lists of camera dealers and eBay, I was able to cobble together a list of primes that should do the job the "magic three" achieve just as good, maybe better. There still are some question marks, but the range in general has been set:
ultrawide: Nikkor 20mm/3.5 Ai-S or Olympus Zuiko 21mm/3.5 or Zeiss Distagon 21mm/2.8
wide: Leica Summicron-R 35mm/2.0
normal: Nikkor 50mm/1.2 or Zeiss Planar 50mm/1.7
portrait: Leica Summicron-R 90mm/2.0 or Elmarit-R 90/2.8 or Zeiss Sonnar 85mm/2.8
tele: Sigma 150mm/2.8 macro, possibly with 1.4 teleconverter for more reach
supertele: Nikkor 300mm/4.5
Some of these decisions were/will be met on availability and price of the respective models. And the Sigma 150mm I already own, and I very much intend to keep it. Also, you will notice that there are a lot of lenses that will not fit Nikon's F-mount by default. But there is a nice solution in form of Leitax, a website offering advice as well as materials to convert a variety of classic lenses to fit current cameras. Of course, that includes some additional cost and some work on the lenses. Yet, if you browse the internet for these lenses, you will discover that a lot of them are considered to be absolutely excellent glass ... and I am surely looking forward to trying this out.
Thanks for reading, and don't forget to add your thoughts and experiences to this thread!
TL;DR version:
Forget the convenience of autofocus and zooming for a second and do some research on classic prime lenses. Also, check the prices they go for. You might be in for a surprise here and there...
What the hell is a "prime"?
A prime is a lens with a fixed focal length."Prime" can also point towards the lens being the main part in a system where other lenses are added, so technically, the term "fixed focal length" of "FFL" is better. Still, the usage of the word "prime" usually points towards the FFL lens. Before the technology was advanced enough for zoom lenses, primes were the only choice in photography. But since the absolute majority of cameras nowadays comes with a zoom lens of some sort which offers a range of focal lengths, the usage of primes has been reduced to a handful of specific purposes, such as macro work.
So why choose a prime over a zoom?
Compared to a zoom lens, primes with their simpler construction often are more compact and offer a faster aperture. Also, they usually cost less and might be optically superior to a zoom as well. As always, there are exceptions to these rules on both sides, but this is the general idea. A zoom has to do much more than a prime, so in order to produce better image quality, the manufacturer will have to make an effort. That on the other hand will make a zoom complicated, large and thus expensive.
And what are my choices?
Since primes came before the zooms, there is a range of primes still in production accompanied by a lot of older primes that went out of production years ago. Surprisingly, even the latest and best zooms can not surpass even the oldest primes in every respect. Of course, there are a lot of bad primes, just like there are a lot of bad zooms. But if you sample your individual possibilities for the respective focal lengths, you will find a handful of optical gems for surprisingly little money.
Note that since crop frames are a modern invention of the world of digital photography, all older primes were made to work with 35mm film and therefore are capable of covering the whole frame on full frame cameras. Thus, they work on crop cameras as well, only with the respective difference in magnification. Since all focal lengths on all lenses are in reference to a full frame though, a classic 35mm lens will give you the same field of view as a 35mm crop lens when used on a crop camera. The only difference is that the crop lens will not cover the whole frame on a full frame camera.
But there have to be drawbacks, right?
Yes, there are. For starters, when buying a used lens you of course get no warranty and a lens that might have gone through many hands. Also, a prime offers you that one focal length: when a zoom might give you the composition you just need in this moment, you have no options with a prime - and a shot you missed might be gone forever. A lot of the excellent older primes will not come with a mount for your current camera and thus will need an adaptor or even a mod to fit your camera body. At the same time, you mostly lose comfort like in-camera aperture selection and autofocus.
Most of the currently-made primes offer all the modern creature comforts like electronic aperture selection, autofocus and sometimes even vibration reduction, but you're still stuck with the one focal length, so you will have to think in advance which focal length might be most useful when you go out shooting.
Ummmm ... why am I considering primes again?
Because there are some really good primes out there only waiting for you to be picked up. Ever heard of those guys who go great lengths to use glass made by Leica, Carl Zeiss, Contax or Olympus on their cameras? Well, there is a reason. To this day, even some of the oldest primes are known to offer the best possible picture quality you can get for your camera. There are some classic primes made by camera manufacturers like Canon and Nikon as well, but the really crazy guys tend to go for the German glass.
Also, many primes offer a lot more light than even the best zooms. Taking the classical "normal" focal range of 50mm, you will find loads of primes with an aperture of f/1.4, some even f/1.2 and better, when zooms usually end at f/2.8. Considering that a f/1.4 opening has four times the area as a f/2.8 opening, you can imagine that this is a significant advantage when gathering light.
And you're telling me this because?
... I have started to consider this alternative to zoom lenses and was surprised to learn of the possibilities. In the specific case of my Nikon full frame camera, there is a range of current Nikon zooms which has quickly earned the name "the magic three":
Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 wide angle zoom
Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 standard zoom
Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 telephoto zoom
Those three zooms cover the focal length considered to be the most important range for normal photography. They offer an absolutely excellent picture quality all the way, which is why everone owning a Nikon FX body is very likely to consider to buy one or more of them at some point. But there's a problem. These are pro lenses, and the price tag reflects that. The fact that they are quite bulky and heavy aside (uncompromised image quality needs good glass, and lots of it), this trio will set you short almost 5,000 Euros (around 6,700 $US), which is almost thrice of what you pay for a D700 body. Sure, if you want the best of the best, you won't get it for free. Yet, this somehow didn't feel right to me. The money aside, this is the Veyron approach: throw loads of technology at it, and it'll sort itself out. But photography is more than that.
Therefore, I went into a huddle with a workmate who knows everything about old lenses and cameras since he collects them. And by browsing lists of camera dealers and eBay, I was able to cobble together a list of primes that should do the job the "magic three" achieve just as good, maybe better. There still are some question marks, but the range in general has been set:
ultrawide: Nikkor 20mm/3.5 Ai-S or Olympus Zuiko 21mm/3.5 or Zeiss Distagon 21mm/2.8
wide: Leica Summicron-R 35mm/2.0
normal: Nikkor 50mm/1.2 or Zeiss Planar 50mm/1.7
portrait: Leica Summicron-R 90mm/2.0 or Elmarit-R 90/2.8 or Zeiss Sonnar 85mm/2.8
tele: Sigma 150mm/2.8 macro, possibly with 1.4 teleconverter for more reach
supertele: Nikkor 300mm/4.5
Some of these decisions were/will be met on availability and price of the respective models. And the Sigma 150mm I already own, and I very much intend to keep it. Also, you will notice that there are a lot of lenses that will not fit Nikon's F-mount by default. But there is a nice solution in form of Leitax, a website offering advice as well as materials to convert a variety of classic lenses to fit current cameras. Of course, that includes some additional cost and some work on the lenses. Yet, if you browse the internet for these lenses, you will discover that a lot of them are considered to be absolutely excellent glass ... and I am surely looking forward to trying this out.
Thanks for reading, and don't forget to add your thoughts and experiences to this thread!
TL;DR version:
Forget the convenience of autofocus and zooming for a second and do some research on classic prime lenses. Also, check the prices they go for. You might be in for a surprise here and there...
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