In both of those scenarios, you want to be able to focus on what’s going on in front of your camera rather than trying to figure out what focal length is best. This is very beneficial with street photography and portrait work. This allows you to frame a shot and compose it much more cleanly with less manipulation, cropping, etc., than you might if you aren’t so in tune with that particular focal length. You begin to grasp more clearly what a specific focal length looks like, what will be included in the frame, and what won’t be included. What do I mean by predictability? I mean that when you have a prime lens that you use consistently, you can quickly get an idea of the view through your camera. While this is a bit more focused on those just getting into photography, there’s something that is comforting about a prime lens even if you’ve spent a good deal of time behind the camera. For example, instead of stopping down to f4-5 to avoid any degradation in quality due to the aperture, you can achieve the same thing at f2.8 or so. (Granted, this can be very slight, but it does exist.) With a prime lens that is rocking a super wide aperture, you can stop down (close your aperture) a bit and get the increased sharpness without having to get into the mid-range apertures. Unfortunately, most lenses experience a bit of image quality degradation when they are wide open. In an effort to achieve the much-ballyhooed bokeh, combat poor lighting when flash isn’t an option, and avoid the noise associated with high ISO, photographers tend to lean more toward the wide end of the aperture spectrum. And, let’s admit it, that’s just fun! Sharpness As a result, they are a bit easier to achieve a “bokeh’d” look and render your backgrounds into beautiful, blurry colors. Prime lenses tend to be much faster than their zoom counterparts due to a larger aperture. This is one reason that I like my prime lenses so much. Because of this, I’ve heard it referred to as a fad or in nearly derogatory terms, however, it is still a valuable tool and is something that is frequently used to enhance the quality and beauty of a photograph. Sometimes it is overdone, and often it is the precursor to someone saying that they are a “pro” photographer. The primary factors for my love affair with prime lenses are bokeh, image quality, and predictability. (I have two non-prime lenses that I keep hidden away and use from time to time, but don’t tell anyone.) As this occurred, a few aspects quickly moved to the forefront and became deciding factors that have lead to my packing up my tent and moving over to the prime lens camp. As I progressed and became more aware of the factors that were most important to me, my views began to shift.
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