Portrait Photography: You’ll Fall In Love With These 85mm Primes Instantly
85mm primes are an essential tool for portrait photographers.
Portrait photographers need a lot from the lenses they use. Lenses have to be sharp, reliable, produce great bokeh and beautiful natural skin tones. Another quality they need to have is great build quality. Like many other things in life, not all 85mm primes are created equal. However, we’re sure that you’ll love the 85mm primes we have listed after the break. If you’re in the market for a new go-to portrait lens, the five we have listed after the break will offer you everything a modern portrait photographer needs.
Canon RF 85mm F1.2 L USM
In our review, we said:
“The Canon RF 85mm f1.2 L USM produces truly beautiful bokeh, excellent sharpness, plenty of micro-contrast, and overall exceptional image quality. Its performance is quite snappy as well, and it’s capable of focusing and tracking fast-moving subjects quickly and accurately. True to Canon’s heritage, this lens is built like a tank and features some of the best weather sealing we’ve seen.”
Buy now: $2,699
Sony 85mm f1.4 G Master
In our review, we said:
“This lens has fantastic sharpness, class leading bokeh, good construction, weather sealing, fast autofocus performance, and lots to offer the high end Sony shooter. You couldn’t honestly ask for anything more.”
Chris Gampat – Editor In Chief
Buy now: $1,798
Fujifilm 56mm f1.2 (85mm Equivalent)
In our review, we said:
“Fujifilm’s 56mm f1.2 is the sharpest mirrorless camera lens that we’ve tested. Not only that, but it exhibits beautiful bokeh, pretty good color rendition, almost no distortion, focuses quickly, and is built well.”
Chris Gampat – Editor In Chief
Buy now: $999
These 85mm primes will certainly help you create fantastic images, but having great gear is only half the story. If you truly want to create a gorgeous portrait, you need to know the secrets of posing. Try this: have your subject relax, and ask them to just be themselves. Give them a basic pose to build upon. If you control every aspect of their pose, you’ll end up with an unnatural-looking image. Communicate your idea, and have your subject play around with it. You’ll find that you’ll get much more natural, organic captures this way.
Nikon Z 85mm F1.8
In our review, we said:
“There isn’t a single bad thing to be said about the Nikon Z 85mm f1.8. It has exceptional image quality, build quality, it’s priced right, and it’s portable. This is everything that mirrorless is supposed to be.”
Chris Gampat – Editor In Chief
Buy now: $796.95
Rokinon 85mm F1.4 AF FE
In our review, we said:
“The Rokinon 85mm f1.4 AF FE really excels in terms of image quality. Where Sony has very saturated looks to their lenses, the Rokinon 85mm f1.4 AF FE somehow or another is muted but still gorgeous. It’s an odd one for Rokinon to me; their lenses have always provided what I’d describe as crunchy and saturated images. But this time around, the images are nice and muted. Combine this with the versatility of the Sony RAW files, and you’ve got yourself a winner.”
Chris Gampat – Editor In Chief
Buy now Sony E: $599