{"id":13967,"date":"2018-06-05T11:18:50","date_gmt":"2018-06-05T10:18:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phillipreeve.net\/blog\/?p=13967"},"modified":"2026-03-24T13:28:34","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T12:28:34","slug":"the-best-lenses-for-brenizer-bokehpanoramas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phillipreeve.net\/blog\/the-best-lenses-for-brenizer-bokehpanoramas\/","title":{"rendered":"The best lenses for Brenizer \/ Bokehpanoramas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introduction<\/h2>\n
\"bokeh
Sony A7s | Canon EF 135mm 2.0L | 55m f\/0.81 equivalent<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Brenizer or Bokehpanorama is a panorama technique to get a wide angle shot with the much better bokeh of a longer tele lens. In this article I will show you what it is all about and which lenses work best.<\/p>\n

What is a Brenizer\/Bokehpanorama?<\/h2>\n
\"bokeh
4×9 single shots before stitching in Microsoft Image Composite Editor<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By using longer lenses and taking a panorama you can simulate the look of fictional, wider, very fast lenses that are not even technically possible to build.<\/p>\n


\nWith a 200mm 2.0 and taking a multirow panorama of 6×6 frames with 50% overlap you can create the look of a fictional 50mm f\/0.5 lens. If that is not enough you will vastly increase the image quality compared to a single shot.<\/p>\n

The name “Brenizer” is related to NYC based wedding photographer Ryan Brenizer<\/a>, who was one of the first to use and promote this technique. For the calculations of what fictional lenses my panoramas are equivalent to I was using this brenizer calculator<\/a>.<\/p>\n

What lenses work best?<\/h2>\n
\"bokeh
Nikon D800 | Nikon AF-S 200mm 2.0 VRI | 78mm f\/0.78 equivalent<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The quotient of focal length divided by maximum aperture is generally the best indicator for the blur potential and how useful a lens is for brenizer work.If you have two lenses with the same quotient, for example a 200mm f\/2.0 (“100”) and a 400mm f\/4.0 (“100”) the look these lenses are giving is somewhat interchangeable:
\nYou can imitate the look of the 400mm f\/4.0 by adding a 2x teleconverter to the 200mm f\/2.0 (or by simply cropping) and you can also imitate the look of the 200mm f\/2.0 by taking a panorama with the 400mm f\/4.0.<\/p>\n

To keep the panorama work to a reasonable degree you should try to stay away from super long tele lenses (300 to 800mm) though. As, for example, to get the look of a 100mm f\/1.0 lens you would need 3×3=9 images when using a 200mm f\/2.0 lens. You could also use a 400mm f\/4.0 lens, but you will need 6×6 images, so it would be 4 times the work (50% overlap in both cases).<\/p>\n

A list of noteworthy lenses, the higher the number the better:<\/p>\n