What do you photograph with your 150mm lens?

[enrico scotece]

Is there anything in particular you use your 150mm lens for? portraiture? landscape?

[Walter Calahan]

Anything I like. But since I'm now shooting 10-8, the 5-4 gear is getting less use.

[Ralph Barker]

Depends on the 150. On 4x5, my use of a 150 is varied - just about anything other than portraits, where I prefer a longer lens (300+). On 8x10, the right 150 is nice for wide landscapes.

[Walter Calahan]

Whoops - sorry everyone

editing error

"since I'm now shooting 10-8, the 5-4 gear is getting less use."

Should have read "since I'm now shooting 10-8, the 5-4 gear IT getting less use.

Don't own a 150mm for my 10-8 - I use a Nikkor 120mm and a Fujinon 180mm. Fab for landscapes.

The Schneider 150mm for 5-4 is simply a great all around lens that's SO sharp.

[Ron Marshall]

Mostly near far compositions.

[tim atherton]

jeepers - almost everything. Landscapes, landscape details, architecture +details, artwork, artifacts, people...

[Alan Davenport]

Whatever's in front of the camera, when the middle knot produces the desired composition...



Oh, and stuff that's really close. My camera doesn't have enough bellows to focus real close with the 10 inch lens.

[Jerry Fusselman]

Is there anything in particular you use your 150mm lens for? portraiture? landscape?

Obviously, head-and-shoulders portraits on an Olympus Pen 35mm half-frame camera. Perfect perspective!

[Gregory Gomez]

Enrico,

I like your images posted on your web site.

You have a talent for adding mystery to your photographs, which require the viewer, in many cases, to project possible missing elements, either perceived or real, onto the picture in order to derive a complete interpretation. Nice.

Generally, I like to use the 210mm and 120mm focal lengths for the 4x5. However, there are many instances in which using a 210mm lens is not possible. In situations in which I need more depth of field, the 150mm is useful, which is often the case with close-up pictures of reasonably small objects. I also like the 150mm for full-length portraits, not head-and-shoulder shots. The 150mm is also handy in shooting forest sciences in which, once again, greater depth of field is needed over the 210mm lens. In such cases, there may be vertical elements in a largely horizontal plane that require a small lens aperture. The 150mm handles these situations quite well while providing a reasonably normal angle of view without adding any wide-angle distortion. The 120mm lens could be used, but sometimes it does not give me the desired image size for my primary subject (i.e., too much extraneous detail is included in the picture), and I am not able to compensate with camera placement.

It's also important to point out that the 135mm lens is also very popular among many 4x5 shooters, so you may want to consider that lens as well; however, the standard 135mm focal length usually does not provide an image circle as large as the one produced by the 150mm lens.

I hope this helps.

[Jerry Fusselman]

Generally, I like to use the 210mm and 120mm focal lengths for the 4x5. However, there are many instances in which using a 210mm lens is not possible. In situations in which I need more depth of field, the 150mm is useful, which is often the case with close-up pictures of reasonably small objects.

More depth of field with 150mm over 210mm yes, if shooting at infinity. Otherwise, you will not see more depth of field with a 150mm lens if you keep image magnification and f/stop the same---at least not with rectilinear symmetrical prime lenses. Check it out.

One way to see it is that you get less working distance with the 150mm lens. Another way is by similar triangles.