Shooting Portraits with the Leica Macro-Elmarit 45mm f/2.8

Today’s Post by Joe Farace

Panasonic ‘s Leica DG Macro-Elmarit 45mm f/2.8 ASPH. MEGA O.I.S. lens lets you to capture subjects in their actual size with a true macro 1:1 ratio with a minimum focus distance six inches. The lens, which has a built-in image stabilizer, consists of 14 elements in 10 groups (one Aspherical element, one ED element.) It even comes with a nice lens pouch and lens hood but then again, at $897.99, it ain’t cheap but is amazingly versatile.

The 45mm f/2.8 Macro-Elmarit lens has a Micro Four-thirds mount that fits both Panasonic and Olympus mirrorless cameras. Since both systems have a 2X multiplication factor, the lens has an effective focal length of 90mm, which to me, the perfect focal length for portraiture. At 4.8-inches the lens is compact and weighs just 0.7 lbs.

As can be seen in the portrait at left, the subject is a young model that has great skin and can easily handle the DG Macro-Elmarit 45mm f/2.8 macro lens’ unflinching optics. This lens renders the texture on her skin in perfect sharpness. The image was shot with a Panasonic Lumix GH4 in my in-home studio with an exposure of 1/125 sec at f/8 and ISO 200.

While I prefer lenses in the 85-90mm range for portraits, you can use longer focal lengths for headshots or close-ups of your subject and they’re useful when you want to separate your model from the background by using shallow depth-of-field.

For indoor photographs where space is limited and you may have to work closer to the subject, you may need to use shorter focal lenses, especially to capture full length poses but I still tend to shoot at the longer end of the zoom lens range to minimize and possibility of even a hint of distortion.

To learn more about studio lighting techniques, please pick up a copy of my book, “Studio Lighting Anywhere” which is available from your favorite book or camera stores as well as including Amazon.com.