torrilin replied to your post
Sep. 3rd, 2016 01:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7via http://ift.tt/2bWXp4E:torrilin replied to your post “sugarspiceandcursewords replied to your post “torrilin: …”
I do know why. The 35mm on DX works out to 50mm full frame, and 50mm was the default lens for nearly forever. Like until zooms became common. So people will just know where to stand for 50mm on full frame if they’ve got any exposure to SLR cameras.
I thought about saying that, because I’ve definitely told customers that before (I used to work on the sales floor)– and I certainly started off with a manual SLR with a nifty fifty on it!
But I think actually the truth is that 50mm, or 35 on a DX sensor, is exactly in the middle, neither wide-angle nor telephoto, no magnification. It’s closest to what the eye sees– although, of course, without any peripheral vision, which is what your wide angles give you.
So it’s the distance away to be the size a person is in a photo, without any lens distortion. And that’s why I sold so many 35mm primes to new photographers, when I was out on that sales floor. (Now there are so many full-frame rigs they’re trying to pitch to beginners, and i just don’t know what’s cool anymore.)
When I started out in photography class in high school we used to have these little cards, I think the teacher would make them, that were just rectangles cut out of a card, and you’d hold it up to your eye, I think a few inches in front of it, to give you an idea what the view would look like through a camera viewfinder, and you’d use it to frame pictures, and then when you finally had film for your camera, you were used to what kind of framing your lens would give you so you knew before you raised your camera whether you’d be able to get the shot or not.
Back when that was a thing!!! Although they still use exactly the same equipment to teach photography. I know because now’s the season and nobody makes those manual SLRs anymore so we’re constantly scraping up vintage ones to sell to students.
I do know why. The 35mm on DX works out to 50mm full frame, and 50mm was the default lens for nearly forever. Like until zooms became common. So people will just know where to stand for 50mm on full frame if they’ve got any exposure to SLR cameras.
I thought about saying that, because I’ve definitely told customers that before (I used to work on the sales floor)– and I certainly started off with a manual SLR with a nifty fifty on it!
But I think actually the truth is that 50mm, or 35 on a DX sensor, is exactly in the middle, neither wide-angle nor telephoto, no magnification. It’s closest to what the eye sees– although, of course, without any peripheral vision, which is what your wide angles give you.
So it’s the distance away to be the size a person is in a photo, without any lens distortion. And that’s why I sold so many 35mm primes to new photographers, when I was out on that sales floor. (Now there are so many full-frame rigs they’re trying to pitch to beginners, and i just don’t know what’s cool anymore.)
When I started out in photography class in high school we used to have these little cards, I think the teacher would make them, that were just rectangles cut out of a card, and you’d hold it up to your eye, I think a few inches in front of it, to give you an idea what the view would look like through a camera viewfinder, and you’d use it to frame pictures, and then when you finally had film for your camera, you were used to what kind of framing your lens would give you so you knew before you raised your camera whether you’d be able to get the shot or not.
Back when that was a thing!!! Although they still use exactly the same equipment to teach photography. I know because now’s the season and nobody makes those manual SLRs anymore so we’re constantly scraping up vintage ones to sell to students.
