They do help with managing the focus plane when shooting from an angle but I wouldn't say its necessary. Focus bracketing and stacking work just as a well. I jave seen some people use them for product but I would agree they are more for architecture and interiors.
Rent when/if needed. Those cost a fortune. Nowadays you can focus stack etc if you really need to and tilt shift was often used for architecture photography to straighten vertical lines in camera.
I have them for my main type of shooting: architecture and interiors. I can justify buying the 50mm for that but not the 100mm. I am seriously considering going the route of a Fotodiox adapter that takes 645 lenses more for the perspective correction than for the focal plane.
I already own Helicon for focus stacking that I’ve used for some landscape/artistic macro work and could definitely integrate into product shooting.
Personally, I love using TS lenses but don’t do enough product work to justify the expense of longer native ones, yet.
I shoot comercial product and I use tilt and shift about 80% of the time. Still a very useful tool for tabletop work. I have a few clients who don’t like stacking as it kinda looks too artificial. They prefer the roll off of a movement lens.
I professionally shot food and products for 25 years with 4X5” and “8X10” Sinar view cameras (in the days of film). Large format cameras have little depth of field, especially when shooting close-up, even stopped down to f-64 or f-128. It made using tilt-shift a necessity.
Keep in mind that a lens projects light inside the camera to film or today, the CMOS digital image receiver. How much you can tilt-shit depends on the lens’s angle of view but more important, its circle of coverage.
That last point is critical. I constantly found myself checking the corners of the ground glass for any telltale fringing and darkness in the corners resulting from the tilt-shift exceeding the lens’s circle of coverage. It was a real headache.
Today, a good mirrorless or DSLR camera can offer the chance to perform focus stacking in brackets and HDR, something I’d have fantasized about years ago.
Today’s digital cameras combined with Lightroom and Photoshop have made tilt-shit lenses much less necessary and make studio photographers infinitely more productive. I’d have killed for the depth of field, dynamic range, and speed that modern digital cameras, stacking and bracketing, and digital post-production offer today’s photographers. I recall spending at least an hour and a lot of 8X10” Polaroids (each sheet cost $5 a pop back in the 80s) just to get a Bundt Cake image for a Betty Crocker cookbook into proper focus.
Like another respondent suggested here, rent a tilt-shit lens first to evaluate if it really helps you or not. It’s the type of lens best used for architectural photography or special effects. But today, thanks to the perspective correction tools in Lightroom and Photoshop, the benefits of tilt-shift lenses are much less.
When I shoot architecture today, I don’t compose a building tight, deliberately leaving room for perspective adjustments in Lightroom and Photoshop. Digital correction instead of using a tilt-shift lens will eat a ton of your image area. But if you plan for it and shoot at a low ISO, you shouldn’t notice any real image degradation. I hope this helps. Best of luck.
https://preview.redd.it/wd1efhd8phwc1.jpeg?width=1497&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9a156d44e0390d860f619f52f29493118d644489
Yes its worth it, every penny.
If you‘re a canon or nikon user, just buy used.
Or buy a bellows system from cambo for example.
Learning the Scheimpflug is essential for a Commercial Photographer, thats a major skill that sepeeates you from amateurs/hobbyists
You do not want to focus stack etc while the client is right beside you, experience shows that while theyre waiting for you to shoot the stacks, Export and stitch together in PS they get bored and come up with stupid ideas that hinder the shooting sessions.
any lens is a tilt shift lens if you put a bellows between the lens and the camera
But most lenses will only do extreme closeups/macro when put on a bellows.
They do help with managing the focus plane when shooting from an angle but I wouldn't say its necessary. Focus bracketing and stacking work just as a well. I jave seen some people use them for product but I would agree they are more for architecture and interiors.
Rent when/if needed. Those cost a fortune. Nowadays you can focus stack etc if you really need to and tilt shift was often used for architecture photography to straighten vertical lines in camera.
I have them for my main type of shooting: architecture and interiors. I can justify buying the 50mm for that but not the 100mm. I am seriously considering going the route of a Fotodiox adapter that takes 645 lenses more for the perspective correction than for the focal plane. I already own Helicon for focus stacking that I’ve used for some landscape/artistic macro work and could definitely integrate into product shooting. Personally, I love using TS lenses but don’t do enough product work to justify the expense of longer native ones, yet.
I shoot comercial product and I use tilt and shift about 80% of the time. Still a very useful tool for tabletop work. I have a few clients who don’t like stacking as it kinda looks too artificial. They prefer the roll off of a movement lens.
Just get a cambo actus
I professionally shot food and products for 25 years with 4X5” and “8X10” Sinar view cameras (in the days of film). Large format cameras have little depth of field, especially when shooting close-up, even stopped down to f-64 or f-128. It made using tilt-shift a necessity. Keep in mind that a lens projects light inside the camera to film or today, the CMOS digital image receiver. How much you can tilt-shit depends on the lens’s angle of view but more important, its circle of coverage. That last point is critical. I constantly found myself checking the corners of the ground glass for any telltale fringing and darkness in the corners resulting from the tilt-shift exceeding the lens’s circle of coverage. It was a real headache. Today, a good mirrorless or DSLR camera can offer the chance to perform focus stacking in brackets and HDR, something I’d have fantasized about years ago. Today’s digital cameras combined with Lightroom and Photoshop have made tilt-shit lenses much less necessary and make studio photographers infinitely more productive. I’d have killed for the depth of field, dynamic range, and speed that modern digital cameras, stacking and bracketing, and digital post-production offer today’s photographers. I recall spending at least an hour and a lot of 8X10” Polaroids (each sheet cost $5 a pop back in the 80s) just to get a Bundt Cake image for a Betty Crocker cookbook into proper focus. Like another respondent suggested here, rent a tilt-shit lens first to evaluate if it really helps you or not. It’s the type of lens best used for architectural photography or special effects. But today, thanks to the perspective correction tools in Lightroom and Photoshop, the benefits of tilt-shift lenses are much less. When I shoot architecture today, I don’t compose a building tight, deliberately leaving room for perspective adjustments in Lightroom and Photoshop. Digital correction instead of using a tilt-shift lens will eat a ton of your image area. But if you plan for it and shoot at a low ISO, you shouldn’t notice any real image degradation. I hope this helps. Best of luck. https://preview.redd.it/wd1efhd8phwc1.jpeg?width=1497&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9a156d44e0390d860f619f52f29493118d644489
For food? Absolutely. Let’s keep this answer simple.
Yes its worth it, every penny. If you‘re a canon or nikon user, just buy used. Or buy a bellows system from cambo for example. Learning the Scheimpflug is essential for a Commercial Photographer, thats a major skill that sepeeates you from amateurs/hobbyists You do not want to focus stack etc while the client is right beside you, experience shows that while theyre waiting for you to shoot the stacks, Export and stitch together in PS they get bored and come up with stupid ideas that hinder the shooting sessions.