Nikkor 35mm vs 50mm?

Which one is better for night low light, time lapes and portrait? I'm going to use it with my Nikon d5100.

They are about the same for low light and time lapse. For portraits you will be a little closer to the model with a 35mm. To get the same frame you will have to back up with the 50mm, which will lessen distortion.

If you're going full frame in the future, lean towards the 50mm. But you'll be unable to get a wide angle with the 50mm. Keep that in mind.

Both are fast lenses, so your exposures in low light will be nearly identical

If you want to know which focal length to buy, do this

* tape your 18-55 mm lens at 35 mm and walk around for a week just using the lens at that focal length
* tape your 18-55 mm lens at 50 mm and do the same.

This above any other way will show you which one you need to shoot your subjects, however, the 50 mm lens is the lens used for shooting portrait (being a medium telephoto lens on your D5100)

I use both a 35mm 1.4 and a 50mm 1.4 lens on my various Nikon bodies.

Nikon currently and has always made both 35mm and 50mm lenses with different maximum apertures. So particularly when you want to discuss what lens is "better" in low light, you really need to tell us what VERSION of each lens you're talking about, right? Because if you look at the cost, a Nikkor 35mm 1.4 (aprox $700 to $1700) costs a lot more than a 50mm 1.4 (aprox $200 to $500). However if you compare a 35mm 1.8 to a 50mm 1.4 or 50mm 1.8, you are on a much lower price point. And if you're talking about manual focus or auto focus or whatever, all this plays a role, so I think you need to specify more/do more reading on the different 35 and 50mm lenses Nikon currently has available.

Now, all that being said, if you compare a 35mm 1.4 and 50mm 1.4, or a 35mm 1.8 to a 50mm 1.8, the 35mm is the faster lens. Faster is a term photographers use to describe a lens that is more low light capable. The reason the 35mm is faster than the 50 with the same maximum aperture is that you can hold the the lens at a lower shutter speed without blur. So you can affectively use a 35mm in about 1 stop lower light than a 50mm with the same maximum aperture. This additional speed of the 35mm is totally irrelevant if you are doing something like time lapse, as you mention, or simply slow shutter shots (which is much different from time lapse and you might potentially be confusing the two) wherein, the camera is mounted to a tripod for fairly long periods.

Also, if shooting non-moving objects on a tripod, the maximum aperture matters much less because what you lack in wideness of aperture you can make up for in slowness of shutter.

So the speed difference only matters if you are talking about handheld photography.

Of course 35mm lenses cost more than 50mm lenses. So a faster 50mm (one with a wider maximum aperture such as a 50mm 1.4 or even 50mm 1.2) is going to cost less than the 35mm. So that is important, right?

On full frame cameras, the 35mm is a normal/wide lens and the 50mm is a normal lens.

On crop sensor cameras like yours, 35mm is normal an 50mm is a short tele photo.

If you are passionate about photography and expect to be doing it years from now, it makes zero sense to buy DX lenses which can't effectively be used on full frame cameras but cost less than FX lenses. However, many a buck can be saved if you go with a DX 35mm 1.8 for example.

For time laps photos, people generally use wider lenses and for portraits people generally use short tele photos. So you are really talking about two different lenses here. If you want one lens that can do both on a crop sensor camera, I would recommend the 35mm. It's not a great portrait lens but will do fine. And it's not a great time lapse lens but will do fine. If you want a great portrait lens on a crop sensor camera, the 50mm would be it. If you want a great time lapse lens a 28 or 24mm would be better on a crop sensor camera.

It may be worth buying a good full frame 50mm 1.4 (aprox $500) for your portraits and a cheap 35mm 1.8 DX (aprox $100) for your time lapse.

I hope that my comments give you some more things to consider when choosing a lens and that I've helped you choose the right one(s).

Please don't forget to choose a best answer! Take care!

35mm and 50mm are focal lengths. They have different purposes. With your camera, 35mm is general purpose for shooting most anything while 50mm is good for shooting portraits.

Low light shooting improves with a larger maximum aperture size. Since you did not mention that in both the lenses you are looking at, all I can say is that you simply get the lowest f/numbered lens you can afford.

It won't be a difficult choice. Promise!

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