Phoenixliv
The traditional and most complimentary focal lengths (for portraits)are between 50 and 90 mm. The compression ratios allow the face to look most natural in that range 4laugh
As for, "you're going to end up getting a lot of crap in the background"
Walk closer to your subject, and yes, do use a small aperture for portraiture. Also remember to get the eyes in focus, if nothing else.
You should looks and see if anything with image stabilization is available in your price range if you're not shooting with a tripod. My Sony has it in the body and I absolutely love it!
As for, "you're going to end up getting a lot of crap in the background"
Walk closer to your subject, and yes, do use a small aperture for portraiture. Also remember to get the eyes in focus, if nothing else.
You should looks and see if anything with image stabilization is available in your price range if you're not shooting with a tripod. My Sony has it in the body and I absolutely love it!
Erm.. 50mm isn't actually that great of a focal length for portraits unless you're shooting at like 2.8, 1.4, etc. If you have your standard 18 - 55 lens and you shoot at 50mm at 5.6 you're not going to get a very pleasing portrait.
Also it depends on your camera.. 50mm on a Canon Rebel is going to be a different focal length than if you were to put that same lens at the same focal length on a 5d since it's a full frame sensor..
And don't use a "small aperture" that's only going to kill your shutter speed and ruin anything that a portrait is supposed to be unless you're shooting in a studio in which case, f11, f16 is alright if you have the equipment necessary to produce a well exposed image at those apertures. I know some friends of mine who shoot children portraits and they'll shoot at f16 because if the kid moves or jumps around a little you don't have to worry about focus that much but you need the equipment to dish out that amount of light... Which you (No offense) don't have, so don't do that. Shoot with larger apertures, f1.8, f2.8, etc. if you can, the larger the better. Until you get down to like 1.4 and 1.2 then it gets tricky wink
