Best focal length for portrait in photography

[Matt K.]

It is also about distance from the person you shoot. With that length you are far enough away to have room for lights, flashes and such, but not too far so you have to shout for the portraitee to hear your instructions (tilt head to left .... nooo,. the other left ...). Any shorter focal length will put you almost "in their face" which is not good from several perspectives: bad breath, no room for lights, depth of field can become an issue.

[JAS_Photo]

True, if you are using a shorter focal length you can intrude into the subject's personal space but here is a case for using a shorter lens, a 50-60 mm in Craig Tanner's "The Mindful Eye" a very informative two part critique of a portrait taken with a shorter lens.

http://www.tmelive.com/index.php/articles/view/759.html

Hope you can see that without signing up but if not, it's worth the trouble to do so.

[thoughton]

Approx 85mm would have been the traditional portrait focal length on full frame cameras. For APS-C that translates to around 50-60mm. However you can shoot portraits at any focal length you like. Shorter FLs will give the subject a bigger nose Longer FLs make it easier to blur the background. Joe McNally seems to often use Nikon's 200mm f2 lens for his portraits.

[Mad Aussie]

I like using between 70 - 200 mm (1.6 crop factor) for mine but really it depends on the effect you are after. The little, cheap 50mm lenses do a surprising job too.