More of a dog’s life – portraits with my 50mm f/1.8 prime lens

I recently got my hands on a beautiful Nikon 50mm f/1.8 prime lens (‘prime’ means of fixed focal length, i.e. 50mm, as opposed to a zoom lens), and I’ve had lots of fun playing with it over the past two days.  The brilliant thing about this lens, and others like it, is its wide maximum aperture (f/1.8), meanings it is brilliant in low light conditions (it allows sufficient exposure with a very fast shutter speed), and you can get really cool photos with a really shallow depth of field (check out some examples here).

I love this effect, especially in portraits, so getting this lens is exciting – and what’s more, it cost just over £100, which is cheap for a good lens.

Last night I shared a bottle of wine with a friend, hedgehog expert and photographer Hugh.  It was great to spend a few hours looking at each others’ photos, discussing kit and our various attempts make a living from photography, and it reminded me of why I love photography, and left me itching to play portraits with my 50mm prime (Hugh showed me some lovely portraits done with his 50mm f/1.4).  So, this afternoon, Ses the dog napped as usual on the sofa, and I took a set of portraits – from time to time, she opened one eye to see if I was still bothering her, sighed and closed it again.  Below are some Sesi pics – I’m really pleased with how they came out – and the lens allowed me to do exactly what I wanted to do.  I also took a set of portraits of Maya, as well as a bizarre set of photos of moss at sunset, and will share these shortly.  Thanks for the chat, Hugh :).



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