Same Subject, Different Lenses (Traveling Burnside Project)

About a week ago a friend of mine asked me if I could demonstrate the different looks various lenses can create of the same subject – including the Burnside. I picked a rose in my brother’s garden for my subject, and used four different lenses: Nikon 35mm, Lensbaby Burnside 35, LB Velvet 56, and LB Sweet 35. Please don’t expect this post to be a complete test of the 4 lenses; my goal was to give a good indication about the various looks you can achieve. I haven’t done any post processing on the following images. I will show a few images from each of the four lenses, then later in the post I’l put them next to each other for an easier comparison.

First, I’d like to show you three images I took with the Nikon 35mm lens, which is an automatic focus, prime lens. I got as close to the subject as I could, which was about 10″ (click to enlarge).

Next up is the Burnside 35. The images were taken at the closest possible distance, at 6″. The top left image of each set is with no vignette, the bottom right has the most vignette. The top set is at F5.6, then F4, and finally at F2.8.

Set 1 (click to enlarge):

Set 2:

Set 3:

Next, I switched to the Velvet 56, which is my go to lens when it comes to flower photography. I got closer to the rose, since the minimum distance from the subject with the Velvet is 5″. The following images were taken at F5.6, F4, F2.8 and F1.6 (click to enlarge).

Lastly, I tried the Sweet 35, but only with the center focusing. The minimum focusing distance is 7.5″ with this optic. The apertures I used were F5.6, F4, F2.8 and F.2.5 (click to enlarge).

Now, let’s look at a few slideshows. In each there are 4 images taken with the 4 lenses at the same aperture, from the minimal focusing distance (hover and press play):

Aperture F5.6

Sweet 35, at 7.5", F5.6.
Nikon 35mm, at 10", F5.6
Burnside, F5.6, at 6", with Vignette 3.
Velvet 56, 5", F5.6.

Aperture F4

Sweet 35, F4
Nikon 35, F4
Burnside 35, F4
Velvet 56, F4

Aperture F2.8

Sweet 35, F2.8
Nikon 35, F2.8
Burnside 35, F2.8
Velvet 56, F2.8

What did I learn from this test? Everybody should experiment with different lenses and settings, and choose the image(s) they prefer the most. It doesn’t have to be the same image for everybody, in fact, that would be very boring. Out of the mentioned lenses I preferred the Velvet 56 and the Burnside with the highest vignette. If I only used the Velvet, I would have tried a few more distances and focusing points.

Let me finish this mostly technical post with something more artistic… I picked two of my favorite images and post processed them. Out of these two the winning image for me is the one taken with the Velvet 56 (last one). How about you?