today we're going to look at in my opinion one of the best lenses for dog
photography in the world
hi everybody welcome or welcome back thanks so much for joining me today
we're going to look at like i've just said one of my favorite
lenses in the world this is a new addition and
we will get to that in a sec but if you haven't already please do press the
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you are new here we do all things dog photography
and um yeah hi i'm jess if you have been with us a while you may
have remembered that i said this "and i will never buy
third-party glass again" now i don't really think i was lying then
because i firmly believed what i was saying however
i have tried a number of new lenses and it became very clear
that one of them was the right one for me so
i just kind of want to cover that off in this video as well as showing you guys a
few examples showing you guys the lens and
um also just kind of going into a little bit more detail
you guys know that i shoot with the 70 to 200
2.8 gm lens from sony and this lens is pretty damn incredible
it is just a really good piece of kit it's big it's very heavy
and you know when you've got a lens that can just do the job well this
lens this lens does the job what can we say about that and what i have found is
in some of my recent images i either use this at 200mm
or at or around 100 to 110mm that's kind of the given i will add
some examples of images that i mean i have been keeping
an eye on where i've been going because i did want to add a prime lens
to my little lens line up bear with so basically i love this lens i still
will always love this lens it's incredibly fast
but it's heavy not that i really care about that because to me the image
quality is more important than the convenience
but it does have its restrictions so for example if you remember in the stops
video which i will link above we went through
that i needed to get an extra stop of light and i was pushing this
and the camera to its absolute limits to get that
because i tend to shoot in the woods and what i've found is essentially i'm
continually having to push it to its limits in terms of the
image quality that i expect from the camera and i'm having to
increase it by one stop usually a stop every time
now from that stops video we knew that to get a
stop realistically i couldn't do anything about my aperture because it
was already at 2.8 which is this wide open but if we did get a stop from
aperture 2.8 divided by 2 is 1.4 so i was looking
in the region of a f1 f1.2 f1.4
or an f1.8 that would give me closer to that stop
hold that thought so i asked a friend who is a fantastic photographer
if i could borrow her sony 135 1.8 gm
lens which is incredible the speed that that lens has
even with action at 1.8 wide open and the sharpness is just
divine i can't lie about that it's an incredible incredible lens
however when i tested it i tested it in the meadow behind our paddock and i
just felt that it was too narrow for what i would want it for
so if i'm shooting at 200mm i'm quite happy with the
the 70-200 2.8 because sony don't do a 200mm
f2 like nikon does so i was happy with that but the 135 just
felt too narrow too restrictive and like i said i've gone through images
and the focal length if i'm not at 200mm that i always use is
100 to 110 so i knew the sony 135 was too narrow and i knew the 85 was
going to be too wide well guys i did go back on what i
said in the video the other month - i needed to get hold of one of these
lenses and i needed it for Tuesday of the week
that this video is going to go out because i had a
specific purpose in mind for it and that left me with a bit of a
problem because all of the uk stockists were completely
out of stock and none of the hire providers
had it in stock either so i did what i had to do and ordered one from
Panamoz and so this came meet my new friend
the sigma 105 1.4 now this lens is
weighty it weighs a lot it takes up a lot of space because this
is not small here guys this is not small at all
and in comparison realistically they are quite similar
in terms of the height here so obviously the 70 to 200 does have some height on
the 105 but they are very very similar the
width of them is quite different it has a very very large front element
which is enormous and if you pick them up
actually they feel like they weigh exactly
the same the actual stats i will put up on the screen
now in terms of the weight this lens is for a specific purpose this is a
portrait lens it is called the bokeh master and it's called the
bokeh master for a reason this lens
is unlike anything i've ever shot with before it creates
images and the effects within the image and the image quality unlike anything
i've ever seen before it is not super cheap but it's not
outside of the realms of normal professional glass again
i will put the stats up on the screen now in terms of uk
recommended retail prices and to be honest with you i think i'm in
love with it so this lens came very excited obviously by the way it
came in in 34 hours 34 hours from the time that it was
collected from the collection point in china it
arrived at my doorstep in very rural east yorkshire so that was
quite impressive if we're gonna be honest
the downsides of this lens are the weight and
also the fact that it is actually really quite slow when focusing on a
moving subject and by moving i mean a dog running at full pelt straight
towards you with the sony now i'm still going to
test this so if that changes i will update the blog post in the description
below
however where this really comes into its own is with stills
and i shot with it wide open for a first test shoot which i will include some of
the straight out of the camera images
into the video now so you can see the bokeh rendition at
f1.4 and so i was really impressed i just wanted to test you know is the focus
working okay is everything okay um yes it was
so at uh a hundred percent zoom it is crystal clear
the depth of field is absolutely minute but the bokeh is just to die for
to die for so then the next thing that i did
was we went for a little bit of a explore into a new woodland location and
i didn't do hair and makeup or anything important like that i didn't
even put on proper clothes because it was melting so i just wore my summer
items and what we ended up doing was
photographing Pippi in this woodland and what can i say guys the IQ
is amazing that's the image quality the IQ is amazing the bokeh is amazing the
focus on a stationary subject is absolutely
incredible it works perfectly with the sony's eye-af and
i didn't really have any issues with it the only time that i did have an issue
was like i said moving subjects and i've not mastered
this yet i don't know what it is but it seems to
really be quite sluggish it is a big lens it'll take up a lot of space in
your camera bag it is an expensive lens kind of in comparison to entry-level
glass or a 50mm for example but it gives you so much
more and for me completely justifies it it justifies the weight it justifies the
price it justifies the size it is just awesome and so these two guys
will come with me on most sessions that i will do
in the future anything that is a stationary portrait that i want
either additional bokeh from or a slightly wider field of view i will use
this anything that i want to be further closer more zoomed in then it
will be this also action will be this because this is so
so fast so in terms of a end review
if you like to shoot slightly wider then an 85mm would be
perfect if you would like to shoot with an
absolutely incredible portrait lens which is good with moving subjects
then look at the 135 1.8 either the sigma or the sony gm if you shoot sony
and if you shoot any camera make and want
the most incredible portrait lens that i've
ever ever handled this is your guy that's it today guys
i'm not going to go into any further detail
if you want to see future images taken with this lens and also with this lens
and also with other lenses then do not forget to go
ahead and find us on instagram give us a follow if you
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also if you are not aware there is some very exciting training opportunities
coming up soon not least the workshops which
are in september and october september is completely rammed fully booked with a
big waiting list october still has some spaces on so if
you are interested in coming to yorkshire then that is the option
all of the information to that will be in the description below and i will see
you all again very very soon this is a reminder to you
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