I had planned on publishing this video tomorrow morning, but I managed to get it finished and uploaded earlier than I expected, so let's go! Hope you guys are having a good week. ❤️
Hey Matt, Thanks for your awesome content. Can you share with us your thoughts on colour correction for your digital files? What do you think of Mastin labs presets, or The Archetype Process profiles?
Arnold Newman, who might arguably be the greatest environmental portrait photographer of all time, has a lot of amazing examples of using wider focal lengths to capture the true essence of the subject. Great video as always, Matt!
Environmental portraiture has to be my favorite type of portrait. You can tell so much more by the placement of someone within their surroundings. Great stuff 🤙🏻
I've been doing photography for a looong time and I never really thought about the orientation of the photo depending on the focal length.... Now that you mention it, I think most of my portraits shot with a wider lens is landscape and with a longer lens portrait orientation. ✌️🙏👍
I've always loved a 28mm for portraits as well. It creates a much more dynamic feeling to the shots. Some of my fav portraits I've taken are right on a Ricoh GR II using its native 28mm equivalent lens. Give it a try sometime! Especially for documenting quick moving children and dogs, the wide field of view works wonderfully and sometimes the distortion adds to it
I love 35mm for environmental portraits, but also find myself using it in landscape more often than vertical. If I'm shooting vertical, I usually find the 3:2 ratio of 35mm film/DLSR/mirrorless to be too vertical and crop to 5:7 or tighter depending on the subject. Love all the different shots you got, especially the backlit shot of him with the bike!
You're so good at telling a good story. Love the calmness your videos have - no cuts all the time. Simple storytelling and relaxing. Keep it up. Greets from Denmark
Great video Matt! I've been a huge follower of your channel from a while and I love all your videos but this one in particular I really enjoyed. I love the way you address "environmental photography" and "storytelling". Great video. Hope to see more of this in this new "season" of the Matt Day Channel!
This video is truly educational. The approach, the choice of the lens, the correct use of it. I miss this kind of video on other channels. And your pictures are really inspiring to take the camera in the hand and document one' s environment! Thanks a lot for that!
Really great video (and photos) Matt. I've always been a fan of wide angle portraits, even the ones with a bit of distortion. I feel it adds a really unique characteristic to the photo and the mood. I definitely think 35 mm is the sweet spot for this. I actually picked up the X100V partly because this focal length is just perfect.
Hey Matt, I just wanted to say that these kinds of videos are really inspiring to me. I love hearing how you think through composing photographs and critiquing your photos makes me want to go out and make something. Great shots as always, :)
Be honest, You did this whole Only leica thing to distract us from the pile of developed film behind you, didnt you? jk, glad to see you enjoying your new cam
The photos look so punchy but not overly contrasty, yet sharp but not specifically sharpened. Cant decide whether this is the Leica magic, the edit or the work with natural light and correct camera settings haha.
So glad I bought a 35mm lens now! Great photographs man. Its a great video about use of a 35mm lens regardless of which camera if goes on. Awesome. Love the story behind the chair. Inspiring video on many levels Matt.
I tend to lean towards 50mm for other portrait styles but I love the scope of 35mm for environmental portraits. Also really enjoyed the walkthrough of the images, hearing the decisions behind your creative decisions
I love 35mm as a focal length. It is versatile and champions structure, context and dimension as qualities in an image. I have several 35mm lenses and they all speak to me differently in terms of rendering. I completely chimed with your image making drive here. I use APSC for digital and I guess 20, 24mm and 28mm glass are about the sweet spot but 35mm is still in with a shout. The pop of critical focus with a perfectly readable but softened background is really the story telling heart of images with moderate wide-angles. Great stuff!
Really enjoyed your video Matt. This style of video is really informative and hearing how you approached your shoot and the reasons for your choices is super useful and engaging. I think you’ll be back at that place more than once.
Excellent video Matt, thank you for sharing your thoughts and ideas with us. Very helpful for those who love the 35mm focal length. I am currently saving to upgrade my Fuji X100F to the V so videos like this helps reaffirm that 35mm is still a great focal length for portraits. Cheers
I just started a class on Skillshare about environmental portraits, and I actually went out with my husband yesterday to try and have a go at taking environmental portraits (literally, as we went out to the backyard where there's plenty of trees and land and a creek) of him. It's something that I very much want to learn more about and be more skillful at at the moment, so this video came at a great time for me! Love your videos as always and thanks for sharing this one! Dope shots in a very nice location.
Thanks for the video Matt. Two questions for you. How do you balance the highlights and the shadows in a backlit photo like your work light photo of Branson? Also, for a new photographer with no money, what is your advice for learning technique?
I actually exclusively used a 35mm lens for portraits for about 3 years. I found myself getting shots in tighter spaces that I usually wouldn't attempt w/ a 50 or 85.
Great edition Matt! I love my 35mm as well for almost everything! Love what you got of your friend's shop, a great memory to have!! Love the red chair!
Really informative video - many thanks. I use my Leica Q (not nearly enough!) for environmental type shots, including portraits, and thats at 28mm - possibly slightly too wide so a 35mm would work for me! The bokeh in the photo of your wife at around 2 minutes is insane. The combination of manual 35mm lens and the digital sensor have worked wonders there! Love the advice on silver versus white reflector!
Here in D.C. we have a similar music house/cafe concept called Songbyrd. Definitely worth a visit if you're in the area! Great space to see performances, buy records, and drink coffee.
Something about he framing of the first set of shots really works (4:11). Are you putting the front of the lens about chest height of your subject and shooting 'upwards'? I want to practice this angle with my 35mm lens but have no models due to the lockdown!
Excellent video! I am going to try to use my 35mm more for portraits. Just like most other people I tend to go with the 50, 85, or my 70-200. Going to switch it up.
Hi Matt, we definitly can tell that you have another camera. I am not a colorist by any means and also at the end it doesn't matter as long as the content is great, what it is!!! But i see a slight shift from the highlights and Skintones towards Red. This is not a critique maybe it's intentional but i just wanted to make you aware about it. Love your Work and i am excited for the upcoming stuff !!!
Really good photos! I’m thrilled you got an SL2 as well, I’ve been loving mine for both M lenses and L lenses. Those Leica reds really pop in your photos here.
thanks for the effort and the sharing. your vids always adds to the conversation. i often work in m43rds. panasonic has a much loved 20mm/1.7. but for me the 40mm fov is just not quite wide enough. olympus has a 17mm/1.8 and the resulting 34mm fov i find i'm more interesting especially for an environmental portrait. i thought the image at 2:06 really worked well. good luck to branson. thumbs up.
These types of videos are great. I wish there were more like this RU-vid! Really enjoyed your analysis of shooting with a 35. I usually do portrait sessions with a 35mm and 85mm depending on the location. Thanks and happy shooting!
did you ever try Leica glass on the EOS R? I've got an adapter but anything wider than 50mm [and even bits at 50mm] gets fringing. I'm assuming that's just a sensor/distance issue that wasn't optimized like it was on the SL for M mount glass, but figured I'd ask in case buying a different adapter would work.
It is the sensor design, not the distance between lens and sensor. The Leica SL(2) has a sensor specifically optimized for M lenses! There is already a huge difference for wide-angle lenses between the SL2 and Panasonic’s similar S1R which is not optimized for Leica M lenses.
Great video! looking forward to more videos and experiences with the Leica SL2 and Leica M lenses. Hopefully some street samples using M glass too eh? I'm in a similar boat with my M lenses and a M10. My eyes aren't what they used to be so the EVF is a real draw. Spoke to my Leica dealer this morning and asked him to run the numbers on trading in my M10 for the SL2. Waiting game now!
I like the color of the seated, backlit portrait too. The color is very subtle and muted/filmic. Is that done in post or straight outta camera? Leica colors are more saturated, right, I recall. Great post Matt!
I love the smaller, older prime lenses for my Nikon cameras. I can't see the difference the new large multi element lenses made recently are that much "better" than the older lenses. I guess the higher resolution of some of the sensors require more elements, but the photos lose their character. Too much sharpness ruins some portraits.
I feel 35 is good when you have interesting background or surrounding. I try it few times not success but always feeling want to play with it more. I know one day I will get to work.
The 35mm is my bread and butter for portraits. 50, 75, 85 are just way too long and way too much compression. I think 35 has started to be used more for portraits, at least here in the PNW
