Understanding PHOTOGRAPHY LENS

Lens is the eye of the camera. It brings light to the camera, to the image sensor. The image sensor captures only what the lens brings in. The quality of photograph will depend on the quality of the light brought in by the lens. A good lens and a good knowledge of the lens are important to arrive at good photography. Lenses come in varied sizes, prices and, of course, in varied brands. Lets try to understand photographic lenses before we begin to operate it.

Understanding Lenses

Study the PDF below

(to be used for educational purposes only)

Understanding Photography lenses PDF

Focal length is the most important and prominent number mentioned on a lens. A lens is called by its focal length. Focal length is the distance from image sensor to the lens. It is stated in millimeter. The practical outcome of varied focal length is that a shorter focal length generates a wider angle of vision. A longer focal length generates a narrower angle of vision, but has the capacity to see farther clearly.

Kinds of Lenses: Lenses are broadly categorised into two:

Prime Lenses (also called as Fixed/Block lens)

Zoom Lenses

Prime lenses are lenses with a single focal length, therefore no possibility of zooming in and zooming out.

Zoom lenses are lenses with multiple focal lengths. It has a range of focal lengths, which provides the provision of zooming in and zooming out.

Taking into account the focal length of the lenses, they could be divided into three just for identifying the right lens for varied kinds of photography.

1. Wide angle lens

Wide angle lenses are lenses with smaller focal length, that is below 24mm, 18mm etc. They have wider vision. Wider than the human eye. The lenses with a huge angle of vision is called a super wide angle lens, 14mm and less. Wide angle lenses are used for architecture, panoramic sceneries etc.

2. Standard lens

Standard lenses are lenses those that cover human angle of vision. Therefore lenses with 24-70,80 mm focal length could come under standard lens. The most mentioned example of a standard lens is 18-55 mm lens, also called kit lens. It is fit for normal life situation photography. It has sufficient amount of wide and some amount of zoom for covering a small party, a picnic, an event, a group photo etc.

3. Telephoto lens

Telephoto lenses are lenses with longer focal length. We could consider lenses with 80+, 100+ focal length as telephoto lenses. When the focal length gets really bigger, we call it a super telephoto lens, for example 400+ mm. Telephoto lenses are used for wildlife, sports etc.

There are also special lenses like,

Fisheye lens

Macro lens

Tilt shift lens

Etc.

Most brands have ordinary lenses and high-end quality lenses. Lenses also differ according to their mounts. Mounts depend on whether a camera sensor is full frame or cropped frame.

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