Unique Selling Points 2 – The 80% Lens
Last Sunday, I started a series about unique selling points. Important to any business. My first USP was that I’m a documentary photographer.
My second unique selling point is this:
I use a 24mm lens for 80% of my work
One Sunday morning after a shoot I noticed something in my post-production software. I could organize the photographs I had taken the day before by the lens they were taken on. So I did.
To my astonishment, easily 80% of the pictures were taken with one lens: a 24mm wide angle.
The remaining 20% were taken mostly with a 50mm standard lens, with a slack handful using a 135mm short telephoto.
I’d always known that I favoured the 24mm, but never realized the extent. We’re talking borderline addiction.
Wide angle lenses suit documentary photographer very well. Context is important to proper storytelling, and wide angle lenses allow photographers to include plenty of that.
Wide angles also make me more unobtrusive.
That may sound counter-intuitive. After all, isn’t it more unobtrusive to stand well away and use a big telephoto lens?
Oddly enough, no.
If I stand amidst or very near people as if I belong, they soon forget about me.
My wedding clients are often asked why they didn’t hire a photographer, even though I was openly walking among their guests all day.
Same with my corporate shoots. After 15 minutes, people don’t see me any more.
If I were to stand well away with a big lens, people would feel spied on. That would inhibit them and change their behaviour.
Another reason I like my 24mm is that it allows me often to tell two stories at once. Often things happen concurrently that make for a really interesting photograph.
One of my favourite photographs from last year, and a typical example of a wide angle shot. There are two stories that combine to make one. The first story is the bride being readied to enter the church, made more powerful by the smaller second element of the reverend looking on. I was standing right next to the clergyman when I took the picture, but he had long forgotten about me. (c) Roger Overall 2009
Interesting exercise Roger, just checking a couple of weddings I found I used a 24mm lens 14.2 % and an 85mm for 21.6 % of shots.
Robert Mullan
Robert Mullan
31 Jan 10 at 3:38 pm
Hi Robert,
Interesting analysis, especially as it helps define you as a photographer and your style. Already, you have a USP that sets you apart from me (for one).
Each USP you can identify gives you clarity as to who you are as a photographer.
What to you shoot the other 65% of your images on?
Roger Overall
31 Jan 10 at 10:46 pm
Roger, I unconditionally love the f1.8 Nikon 85mm – it renders close(ish) shots of the human face as my eye sees them. You on the other hand tend to capture your subject’s relationship with their sourroundings or what’s going on around them. I must say hallmarks your work enviably – I can look through dozens of prize-wining pictures but it’s rare to be able to identify the photographer without a by line – but now I feel I’d know an ‘Overall’ if I saw one!. Gordon McGowan and Jeff Ascough are two exceptions; I love Ascough’s images and hate most of McGowan’s but I’d defiantly be able to pick them out!
Robert Mullan
10 Feb 10 at 3:41 pm
Hi Robert,
Thank you for your kind words.
By the way, I love the picture on your home page. Says so much.
I’m a big fan of Jeff Ascough, which’ll come as no surprise.
In my weaker moments, I go all gooey over Canon’s 85mm f/1.2. Then I see the price tag and pull myself together.
Roger Overall
10 Feb 10 at 4:50 pm