Author: Richard

When one thinks about a portrait lens you tend to think of a fast sharp 85mm f/1.4. Its certainly one focal length that many manufactures have a good version off.

Its a focal length that I have been considering purchasing for sometime but as I own a 70-200mm f/2.8 zoom and a 105mm I have been managing quite happily.

For fun and personal work I often shoot portraits with my little Leica M. I find the Leica fun to use and is useful when working with less professional models as the camera is less intimidating.

For full length portraits a 50mm works well, but going wider you run a risk of distorting the figure and care is needed.

In my work when the working conditions are tight I have gone as wide as 24mm. With wider lens you can use to with care to make the legs look longer, shooting from a low angle.

If you have a search on the web for well know photographers you can see some portrait photographers have produced some amazing images with lens as wide as 21mm.

So is any lens a portrait lens?

In the past many portrait lens were designed for low contrast and certainly less sharp then modern lens, a more forgiving lens for the human face.

Its posible now to buy lens that wide open are soft and dreaming but then stopped down a couple of stops are as sharp as any top lens.

Now the look of a lens is often forgotten as Photoshop is used to give the effect one wants, but its nice to get as much done in camera and just leave some basic editing for post production.

But in answer to the question, yes any lens is a portrait lens, generally 55mm to 135mm traditionally but I have seen great portraits from 21mm lens to 300mm and even the 500mm mirror lens.

When Leica release a new M a couple of years later they release the P version. In general its the same camera with stronger rear glass screen, no red dot and occasionally a bigger buffer.

Back when the original M8; the first digital M was released they released the M8.2 to address its short comings. Since the M9 the P has not needed to address any short comings just bring a few enhancements.

This year we see the release of the M10P and this time Leica have made some real improvements, a new shutter and now with a touch screen. Yes you heard right, a Leica M with a touch screen.

There are also some rumours of a new Leica M mount camera that will have a EVF. Many have asked Leica for EVF; it would not be an M but would be a useful addition to the family.

So the SL2 from Leica is now available. The erganomics have been tweaked to make it feel better in the hand and its now definitely got a Leica R series look. It seems to have the same killer sensor as in the Leica Q2. At 47 MP its a rival to many medium format cameras, and with the micro-lens to allow Leica M lens, this is a camera that will take with adapters just about any lens you can buy.

Leica kept the same battery and it works with all the original accessories.

If I wanted a studio / portrait camera, this and the Hasselblad X1D II would be at the top of my list.

I try at least twice a week to have a wander around Lincoln while carrying my camera. Lately its been a struggle to find a dry day with at least a touch of sun, but this last couple of weeks between the cold and heavy rain there has been a few opportunities.

So I said I would be looking out for a new laptop and I am. Its really a difficult choose. Previously I have always bought close to the top of the range and this has seen me through quite well.

For the type of work I do editing in Lightroom and Photoshop with a powerful machine is ideal. But can I bring myself to have a lower powered laptop and use my desktop machine for the power work.

Its a difficult ask as buying a less powerful laptop seems like throwing money away.

I generally process 24 and 36 Mega Pixel photographs, while the thought of using a smaller lighter machine is tempting, Adobe have updated Lightroom recently to make better use and off load cpu intensive tasks to the graphics card. This makes buying the 15 inch laptop with the better graphics card an easier choice, but you looking at a grand (£1000) more for the purchase.

While I have to admit that buying high end in the past has worked well, my previous laptop is over eleven years old and has lasted well; the high end for Apple is relatively good value, its there low end machines are not good value. Her in the UK with BREXIT on the way the pound is devaluing fast and I can justify purchasing high end again.

Its a tough choice and one I will be making in the next few weeks.

13 inch or 15 inch MacBook Pro? Or go super light with an air, which is still more capable then my current machine.

Keeping up to date with the editing is getting to be a struggle. Locking myself away in the office every night is hardly being social with the family and while my MacPro Desktop is more then capable, for light organisation work and sorting my picks and selects a laptop is more useful to me.

My old laptop as I often mention is now eleven years old and is not really up to the job of running Lightroom for even light importing and sorting work, so a new laptop is now definitely on the cards.

For a long time I have liked the MacBook Air, and this years 2019 model is more then capable enough for light work, but I would upgrade it to 1 Tb SSD storage and 16 Gb of RAM. Once thats done there is not much difference in price to the new 2019 Macbook Pro; at least the low end version which would still beat in performance every machine we have at home with the exception to my desktop and this model give significant multicore performance gains over the air.

I’ll be visiting the local Storm Front shop and getting my hands on both. I still have a question over screen size, I do like my 15 inch screen but for a MacBook Pro of that size your talking serious money.