I think the look you are looking for is achieved more by shooting with the lens more wide open. Any lens is capable of that type of result, when you start to get into the shallower depths of field. Also, it might have to do with where you are focusing...

I am sure that others here can explain much better...but here are some examples with a couple of lenses that shouldn't break the bank. There is always the Zeiss 85mm, 135mm, but I don't have them - yet...

Just a few from the old and still pretty available Minolta 50mm/1.7 and Minolta 70-210/4 the one and only "Beercan"

Hope this helps - Hapster

The Minolta 50/1.7 @ f/1.7

Same @ f/5

The Minolta 70-210/4 aka Beercan @ f/4

Same @ f/4 (not a family member btw)

Some questions:

Do I understand you correctly when you say you want some blur, vs. sharpness.. from a lens? If so can you explain that a bit more, are you talking about a soft "haze" or halo around a subject?

What is your budget?

Carl

I think I missed that first shot unless it is new, that is my favorite yet of your daughter. Its excellent. Has much vibrancy and energy to it, outstanding shot.

Carl

I interpreted Daniel's inquiry to be about how to get an out-of-focus background, as Hapster has demonstrated so well.

Hapster, I agree with Carl on that first shot of your daughter. Terrific shot!

Andy

I think the first response got what I was looking for. As a newbie to dslr I don't have the lingo, but I'm trying. Unfortunately, I think I confused things a bit more by trying to self educate. You see, I purchased the camera about 2 weeks ago (a month late for the baby) and got several extras, like an extra battery and bag. We have had a lot of fun with it so far, but most of the shots have been on "auto" setting. I just read several discussions about photography and learned a little about blur (I know there is a Japanese name but I can't remember while I type this) so a read the manual, front to back, and learned a bit more about the effect, and also about appature. Then to make matters worse my wife, the baby and I ventured to Boarders for ice coffee and to read anything and everything between feedings on digital photography, with a focus on bluring. I thought I got pretty far, but came home and did everything as the books and manual said. I set the camera to "A" and roled the apparature all the way down, and zoomed in. Wierd thing is that the apparature keeps increasing as I zoom in on the subject. It starts good (3.5) but keeps going up as I zoom, which is what everyting says to do to increase the effect. I figured it most be the kit lense as I have read on these forums that they go as low as 1.8. And as the books say, "the lower the f the shallower the field" right? The photos posted above are exactly what I want, but I also know my skill is limited, so lens changes are out of the question as a regular event, so it would be helpful to get a combo solution, ie one that can do the photos above, and take regular home photos with everthing in focus. I know I will get the experience to grow in the photo world, but a good start is what I need now for confidence. As for cost, not an issue. weight would be more of a concern than cost, but the blur effect trumps all. Thanks for all the help and interest. Sorry for the spelling errors, I wanted to get this up before everyone goes to sleep.
Daniel

Japanese word describing the quality of out of focus areas :) no apologies necessary for anything, we all had to learn just like you.

If you want the king of Bokeh there is no better lens on the planet but the 135mm STF. It is heavier though, and not a zoom lens, a "prime" or fixed focal lens. It runs about 1200.00 :)

A better alternative and lighter and more versatile would be the 50mm 1.4 again a prime but only 350.00 and excellent bokeh and low light capability (a very wide open aperture of 1.4).

A more affordable version would be the 50mm 1.7 Minolta (have to buy used I recommend buying from Adorama not ebay in your case).
Get as good of condition as you can.

A very good wide angle prime is the 28mm 2.8 (on the home page as our recent review), a great choice for a first timers prime :)

Lets see what others have to say on zooms, personally the 17-50 2.8 Tamron comes to mind first.

Carl

I know this is not part of my question, but I have to ask, "how do you get your subjects eyes so blue and shiney" when we struggle with red eye, although the Mac does a good job blacking them out (o.k. my wife really asked, but I noticed it to)
Daniel

Following up on Carl's recommendations, Daniel, there are a few used Minolta 50mm F1.4 and F1.7 lenses available at www.keh.com right now, another reliable source. They are all rated EX for excellent condition and the prices seem fairly reasonable given what similar lenses have been selling for on ebay. This type of lens is also very good for low-light photography, allowing you to take more family photos without needing to use flash.

The Tamron 17-50/F2.8 lens Carl mentioned might be an excellent choice for a zoom. It's faster (wider aperture) than any of the Sony kit zooms and the aperture stays the same as you zoom out, unlike your kit lens. The only question is whether it has a long enough focal length, depending on what kind of "candid work" you like to do.

Eventually, you will want something longer, and the Tamron AF 70-300mm F/4-5.6 Di LD Macro offers pretty good performance at an affordable price.

Have fun photographing your baby. I never wanted to put my camera down when my kids were born. Hard to use it while changing diapers, however.

Andy

DSLRs normally don't suffer from red eye... Shooting in RAW format makes it easier also.... And to answer your question of an all round lens that can do portraits and normal shots you can try a 24-70 f2.8 Sigma or 28-75 f2.8 Tamron. Your kitlens aperture gets smaller when you zoom in because the kitlens has f3.5 as MAX APERTURE at 18mm, keep zooming in and you will see that the kitlens does not have a very wide aperture. an f2.8 constant lens can be used at f2.8 all the way through the zoom range, hence giving shallower DOF (depth of field). On how to make the eyes shiney..... focus on the eyes and try using a longer focal length to reduce DOF. Making the eyes in focus and mostly everything else out of focus giving you the nice backgrounds. 70-200 f2.8 lenses are much better to take portraits than wider zooms because of the shallower DOF and normally nicer bokeh. for portraits you should try waiting a bit for an 85 prime. You can also just get a 24-70 f2.8 Sigma (because it is much cheaper than the CZ version) and wait for 70-200 f2.8 Tamron/Sigma. Try www.photozone.de for lens reviews

I strongly recommend the 50mm f1.7. I have one I bought locally used for around $70 USD, and it is quite sufficient for portrait work as a learner. No reason IMO to buy a more expensive lens. It seems by "blur" you mean Bokeh (out of focus background), in which case I can assure you the 50 f1.7 at f2 or f1.7 is a fantastic lens...others may be better for more dollars but this should certainly do what you want.

To avoid red-eye I have a very simple solution, again if you have the 50 f1.7 or other fast lens: turn off the flash. I tend to shoot in Program Auto (P) most of the time with creative style set to Portrait...this gives you full auto functionality but the critical ability to have the camera (A350 for me) remember a few things when switched off, such as white balance, etc. In P mode, the flash won't fire unless you press the littel button on the side to activate it - with a fast lens, just don't. Red eye is the flash bouncing back to the camera from the subject and happens because the flash is essentially in line with the subjects eye and the lens.

If you need to use flash, a pop-up flash on a cord will also fix the issue, but will cost more than the 50 1.7! Studio guys (who are laughing at me now for saying not to use flash) will use many lights and reflectors, all under careful control, but none will be directly on the camera (say, within 3-4" of the lens).

There is another kind of blur where the subject's face is somewhat "hazy" too...pros use this to make a sentimental-looking shot or mask acne, etc. There are special lenses for our system that can do this, but it can also be done in post-processing. (I don't have any such lenses, so someone else can recommend one.) This is a completely different technical problem than bokeh, which is what I think you want (face sharp, background out of focus).

Enjoy! You have a great portrait camera and should have a good time learning.

Oh, yeah - at the bottom of the options for White Balance off of the function menu is the fantastic ability to set white balance by spot-metering a white object. (Check your manual). This is your friend. It will significantly improve available light portraits.

I don't do much portraiture, but here is my take... The Minolta 50mm F1.7 most likely offers the best combination of speed, reach, cost, low light abilities, and image quality. It's a tad soft wide open but sharpens up nicely between F2.2-F2.8. It's also a small and discreet lens. It would be a good lens to start with and it's a lens that everyone should have in their camera bag anyways :P . I will be evil and further complicate things by tossing in the Minolta 35-70mm F4 w/macro. I can testify that the Minolta 35-70mm F4 is sharp and it can maintain F4 throughout the zoom range. The Tamron 17-50mm F2.8 is more expensive and lacks the reach of the aforementioned lenses. You're going to have to get closer to your subject with this lens than you would have to with the 50mm F1.X, 35-70mm, or 135mm lens. It is sharp, fast, and versatile, though. It's a better lens to keep on your camera all the time in my opinion.

Minolta 35-70mm F4 sample.

Tamron 17-50mm F2.8 sample.

Danny,

While using a lens such as the Minolta 50mm F1.4 or F1.7 will allow you to take photos without flash in lower-light situations, there will be times --at the risk of alienating thousand of flash haters--when you will want to use flash when photographing your family and friends. The popup flash on your A350 is good for emergency situations and for outdoor fill flash. It is not ideal for indoor flash, however. For one thing, it is too close to the camera lens, which contributes to red eye--something that kids and pets are particularly susceptible to. It also causes shadows with certain large-diameter lenses or when using lens hoods.

Therefore, at some point in time (buy the 50mm lens first!), I'd suggest that you consider buying a Sony HVL-F42AM flash unit (or an even larger unit--but they cost more) to use in your A350's hot shoe. The HVL-F42AM currently sells for about $299. (The smaller, discontinued HVL-F36AM sells for about a hundred dollars less.) Besides sitting farther away from the lens to help reduce red eye, it is more powerful and versatile than the popup flash. For example, you can angle the flash unit upwards to bounce light off the ceiling, which will soften the harsh lighting that direct flash tends to produce--and definitely eliminate red eye. Bounce lighting can cause shadows under the subject's eyes, however. There are a variety of flash diffusion accessories on the market to help with this. For example, I use the LumiQuest ProMax System, which includes an 80/20 bounce diffuser that directs 80% of the flash's light toward the ceiling and the other 20% directly toward the subject, minimimizing the facial shadows that bounce flash normally creates.

An even better option, as Frances mentioned, is to use the flash unit off the camera, which can be done handheld or with a flash bracket, using an accessory cord to connect the flash unit to the camera. There are a variety of flash brackets available that position the flash either above and to the left of the camera or directly above it. Ask your local camera dealer about them. But don't feel you need to do everything all at once. Just using the HVL-F42AM in your hot shoe instead of the A350's popup flash is likely to improve your flash results.

Andy

Clearly everyone responding is a pro, and has been very helpful, so as Newbie,let me explain what you have taught me thus far and confuse some more issues. So far it is clear to me that the recommendationis to have two lens. First, a fixed lens with a low f#, and second, a short zoom lens (I haves lot of questions on this topic) brand loyalty (Sony for me) is not as important as the unique lens in the brand range. Thanks to this forum, I now understand "in theory" how to get the shot. I will admit that I tested it out on some flowers tonight. I do think I had pretty good sucess, as the flowers are extremely sharp and our sliding doors and outside are bokeh! But the good news is short lived, because as I type this on my wires iPhone, I was told a did a macro shot because I was so close to the vase. More on that later. So I'm convinced I need a 50mm low f# (I need to clear up which is the best) but the zoom is confusing me more. Especially after learning from the advise that the f# changes on my kit (bad) but there are zooms that can stay low f# all the way! This was news to me, don't forget the newbie part. But there's more. Before doing this response and learning the above I went to Sony Style web site, but found nothing on f# lens that can stay the same through the entire zoom, why? I'm not saying I'm loyal, but am I missing something. Also, I need to clear this up, I have an A300 and not the A350. I know everyone on this site says who Cares! But just in case. Also, Carl, I said price was not an issue and now I know better. I had no idea, wow! This is a thought on zoom, all the recommendations are great, but to help narrow my options does the range between 16-26 matter for anything but taking pictures of mountains. Why I ask is that for close ups I can zoom and for normal I can step back. The seems to be two directions on non super zooms from around 16-50 (ball park example) and 28-75 (ballpark) with good f#'s like 2.8. But if you move into 18-70 (ballpark) the f#'s get worse. Also this brings back the issue of the f#'s being constant. I would like to know if this is normal and my kit is the problem or if getting the constant is a sign of quality and hard to find and expensive. Finally, since I'm on a phone I can't post any pictures and embarrass myself, but if want to see my skill level you can look at our homepage at danielandirene.com, but please keep in mind it is not a commerial site, but rather a family page. Thanks

Daniel

First spend $20.00 and download Gary Friedmans book “A Complete Guide to the a350” from Friedman Archives www.FriedmanArchives.com.

Second, stay out of automatic mode. I like P Mode. Automatic mode just gusses at aperature and shutter.

Third, practice like mad … and continue reading these forums.

Anyway, what you are interested in is depth of field (DOF). The lower the f/# the less the depth of field. The less depth of field the greater the background blur (and foreground blur for that matter).

The closer you are to an object the less depth of field, the greater the background blur.

The longer the lens the (just like being closer), the less depth of field, the greater the background blur.

Bokah is a subjective term, like beauty in the eye of the beholder. Now to be technical bokah doesn’t refer to the background blur, but the quality of the background blur. When bokah is good sometimes it is referred to as “creamy”, I think that is as good description as any. So when you are looking for a lens with good bokah, you aren’t looking necessarily looking for a lens that can blur the background, but one that can blur the background in a pleasing manner. Like sharpness, some lenses do it better than others.

A lens with a small f# helps blur the background more, being closer to an objects helps blur the background more, but a good lens will give you better bokah.

My history:

I was eying an a300, but then I caught the a700 body only on sale at Best Buy.

I had some cheap glass from my old Minolta film SLR so getting body only didn’t hurt as I could still take pictures right away.

Anyway, the first thing I did is I bought two lenses for it off ebay.

$119.00 Minolta 50mm f1.7, this is a very good lens. Minolta probably sold more of this lens than any other lens, Sony doesn’t have an exact equivalent. $119.00 was on the high end of the price range for that lens, when I bought it but I needed it fast (Buy It Now) for a dance recital. That would be a fair price now.

$189.00 Minolta 70-210 f/4, affectionately known as the legendary “Beercan” as its physical size is the same as, you guessed it, a can of beer. $189.00 is currently a good price for this lens, expect to pay $225+ now. This lens is constant f4 and is known of its portrait ability and bokah. Minolta stopped producing the Beercan in 1990 it was replaced by the 70-210 /3.5-4.5 and 70-210 /4.5-5.6, (these are NOT Beercans) neither of these lenses have the build quality or reported image quality of the Beercan.

So for both of these Minolta lenses I paid a little over $300.00.

Sony does not make an exact equivalent of either lens. The Sony 50mm f1.4 is a rebadged of the Minolta 50mm 1.4, this is an excellent lens, but I didn’t want to shell out $350.00 for only marginal performance increase. As I got both the 50mm f1.7 AND Beercan, for $50.00 LESS than this lens alone.

Some “old timers” will tell you the Minolta 50mm f1.7 used to sell of $50.00 and the beer can for over $100.00, don’t hold out for those prices as those days are long gone.

Hope this helps. Anyone else, I am a newbie, so feel free to correct any mistakes.

If budget is a concern, it's hard to beat the first generation Minolta lenses. As already mentioned, the 50/1.7, 35-70/4 and the 70-210/4 are hard to beat for color, sharpness and a nice quality to out of focus backgrounds or bokeh.

The cheapest of these (I'm talking price, remember) is the 35-70/4. It's a good lens. It's sharp across it's range, which is admittedly small. It's the lens that gets no respect at all. *chuckle* Often times the least expensive way to buy it is to search eBay for Maxxum film cameras and see which lens comes along. It's often found included in auctions for vintage 1985 Minolta Maxxum 7000's. (this camera, btw, was just listed by Shutterbug magazine as #8 of the 20 most significant cameras in history . . . it's the original Minolta autofocus) It's been a while and prices have gone up somwhat, but my copy of a Max 7000 w/ 35-70 was about 20 bucks.

The constant aperture of the lens does not really matter. Although is is better to have, a lens with say f3.5-4.5 compared to a constant f5.6 lens..... the f4.5 aperture of the non-constant aperture lens will give you less DOF and better bokeh. If you really want to take good portraits, then you should try to get a 24-70 f2.8, it's a very good low light lens, can zoom, much cheaper than the CZ version, F2.8 constant (shallow DOF, good bokeh). You might also wanna pick up a F42 flash to reduce redeye when shooting ( the further away the source is from the lens the better for redeye). I stongly recommend 24-70 f2.8. If you are into candids wait awhile for a cheap 70-200 f2.8 also.

I agree you cross, CZ24-70/2.8 is best lens for portrait, but its too expensive/1800$/,