Camera Basics Focal Length
Saturday, July 16th, 2011Camera Basics Focal Length
Choosing Camera Lenses
Choosing Camera Lenses
R. Dodge Woodson
The lenses you use with camera are critical components in your imaging system. Cheap lenses are never a good deal. Inexpensive lenses produce inferior images. You do not have to pay thousands of dollars an anti-distortion lens to get good pictures but do not expect much from a $ 89.95 lens that you buy on some sales. Photography is an inexpensive hobby. If you want to play, you have to pay.
Fisheye Lenses
Fisheye lenses can be fun to work with. They allow you to create great special effects. However, they are not many practical purposes. Of all the lenses available to you, fisheye lenses are one of the least important.
Lenses are rated of focal length. This is measured in millimeters. The lower the rating, the wider the view is through a lens. For example, a 16 mm lens a much broader view than a 50mm lens. When you drop down to fisheye status, your images will have a rounded perspective. They will no longer resemble typical pictures. You can use this creative aspect to your advantage.
People are often fascinated by pictures made with a fisheye lens. The reason for this is simple. Fisheye photographs are different. Every item you shoot with a fisheye lens will attract attention. The downside to this is that a portion of the subject will be distorted. This is both the appeal and the drawback of fisheye lenses.
Wide Angle Lenses
Wide angle lenses are very useful for a range of photographic situations. If you like to take scenic photos, a 24mm lens is an excellent choice. This lens gives you to include a large coverage in your images. Unlike a fisheye lens produces a wide angle lens pictures that are basically normal. Perspective can go lost in the super wide angle shots, but the overall effect is pleasing.
You do not have to chase after landscapes to obtain benefits from a wide angle lens. If you've ever wanted to have a great group of people in a single image, a wide angle lens to help you do it. Any time you want to take pictures of an expansive topic will be a good time to use a wide angle lens.
A 24mm lens is just about as much of a wide angle lens which you can use without distracting distortion. It's my favorite wide angle lens, but some people prefer a 28mm lens. You will not catch as much of a scene with this lens, but distortion will be less than that seen with a 24mm lens. Many photographers choose a 35mm lens to meet their wide angle needs. This is a useful lens and it is not a bad compromise, but it can not include nearly what a 24mm lens can.
The best way for you to decide which type of wide-angle lens is right for you is to go to a camera store and try some out. With a single lens reflex system, which is what we talk about what you see is what you get. Try different focal lengths to see which suits you best. There is no better way to compare lenses than to try them, one after another on the same topic.
Normal Lenses
A 50mm lens is considered normal. This lens is meant to depict the world in the same perspective as the human eye sees it, photographically speaking. There are very few occasions where a 50mm lens is the ideal one to use. Its focal length is too long for wide angle work and too short telephoto work.
One good thing about a 50mm lens is that it is cheap compared with other lenses. According to mailorder ads, you can buy an auto-focus, 50mm lens for a larger fire on camera for less than $ 75 To get an objective that is rarely cheap, especially when the brand new and offers auto-focus capability.
If you buy a 35mm camera that is sold without a lens, you can buy a 50mm lens to keep your cost down while you get your feet wet in photography hobby. Personally, I think you should invest more money and get a zoom lens that can give you more features and benefits. There is nothing wrong with owning a 50mm lens, but when you zoom lenses or a choice of fixed-focal-length lenses, I doubt if you'd have much use for your "normal" lens.
Super telephoto lenses
Can you imagine spending more for a lens that what some people pay for a car? Well, there are lenses with price tags, competing with some cars. The last time I looked, a 600mm, 4.0 lens for my type of camera was selling for more than $ 7,600. A 300mm 2.8 lens went for about $ 4,100. In both cases, the price of these lenses steep, and some lenses cost significantly more.
You can buy a long lens at a reasonable price if you are willing to sacrifice a fast aperture. In other words, if you're willing to work with slow shutter speeds when lighting is poor, you can get a much more objective for the money. For example, I could with a 100-300mm no-name brand for less than $ 130th A Canon ® 100-300 zoom lens is just under $ 300. What is the difference between a 300mm zoom lens at $ 130 and a 300 mm lens with fixed focal distance of $ 4,100? Approximately $ 3,970! The big difference in the field is the smallest aperture. The expensive lens operating at 2.8 and cheaper lens operates with a sliding aperture rating of 5.7 to 6.7. For common conditions, need for cheap lens a lot more light than it expensive to take the same image under the same lighting conditions. You can set a faster speed on your camera, but this can create "noise" that degrades an image looks. And the expensive lens has much better glass elements in for clearer images. It may not seem like a big difference, but it can be to some photographers.
If you need a lens that will allow fast shutter speeds in low light, you have to pay handsomely for it. Why would you need a fast aperture? If you were a sports photographer, your items move quickly. To catch them without to have their pictures blur caused by motion, you need a fast shutter speed. On a bright, sunny day, this would not be an issue with most lenses. However, an overcast day makes lenses with slow openings useless. If you make your living in fast-moving subjects or in low light images, you must be prepared to pay steep prices for your equipment.
How long
How long of a lens do you need? It depends on what you will do with it. A 200mm lens is very effective for many types of teleworking. Using a 300mm lens allows you to take the same picture as you can with a 200mm lens without being so close motif. Few amateur photographers wear lenses longer than 300mm.
If you want to take pictures of volatile wildlife or similar items is difficult approaching, a longer lens is called for. Some wildlife photographers use very long lenses. Lenses in 400mm, 500mm and 600mm intervals are all common equipment with professional nature photographers. But you can accomplish much with a 300mm lens if you learn habits of animals well enough to anticipate them and to hide from them.
Experiments
Know what you want or need may require some testing. You can buy used equipment or cheap lenses to get a feel for what there doing. Hitting a in specific lenses that you know you want, sell the cheap and old lenses and buy the best lenses you can afford to fill your desires.
About the Author
R. Dodge Woodson is a full-time internationally-known, best-selling author and photographer. Dodge recently entered semi-retirement and created the World Photographers Organization (WPO). Photographers of all skill levels come to WPO to learn, to increase their sales, and to take advantage of the extensive resources offered to the general public and members. He also created an e-commerce site, www.ccionlinesales.com to showcase his brainchild. the Book Buster e-books. The site offers a full selection of Book Busters, e-books, used bound books, new bound books, stock photography, and much more. Having been a pro photographer for more than 30 years and a full-time writer for 17 years, Dodge now feels it is time to share his tricks of the trade with up-and-coming freelancers.
Telescopes: What to look for?
I know this is asked all the time but I have trouble finding an answer to my specific questions. I want a top end telescopic. Goto, peak magnification, best lighting, camera ready, ect. Can someone give me the specs on all the fundamental principles for what to look for? (Which reflects vs wrestler, best brand, aperture, focal length, ect.). Let me ask it this way, what would you buy if you could lose a few big ones on any telescope you would? Thanks! Thanks everyone, great answers
Well, what I ended up buying (after the first owner 24 other telescopes over a 50 year period) is a Celestron CPC 1100, a 11 "Schmidt-Cassegrain. This suit exact purpose perfectly, allows me to comfortably sit-down observation of variable stars and planets, especially Jupiter. Its GOTO is extremely accurate, so I can observe my variable stars with minimal fuss and bother, and it is housed in a cloud POD observatory, so it is ready for use at a moment's notice. But it is probably completely wrong for you because your interests will be quite different from mine. In particular, it is not terribly well suited to photography that does not interest me much. In fact, there are _no_ perfect telescope, no matter how much you spend, that's why I own nine other telescopes. So you need to do your own research, and by trial and error, eventually reaching the best telescope for _you_. Here are a few Web pages with good information about telescopes. They are aimed at beginners, which I assume from the wording of your question, you can: http://www.gaherty.ca/tme/TME0702_Buying_a_Telescope.pdf http://www.scopereviews.com/begin.html http://observers. org / beginner / jrfbeginner.html For more advanced information, read Phil Harrington's Star Ware, 4th edition (Wiley). You get the greatest value for money with a Newtonian reflector on a Dobsonian mount, such as these: http://www.telescope.com/control/category/ ~ category_id = Dobsonian / ~ pcategory = telescopes / ~ VIEW_INDEX = 0 / ~ VIEW_SIZE = 1000000 http://www.skywatchertelescope.net/swtinc/product. php? Class 1 = 1 & class2 = 106 Buy from a store that specializes in telescopes and astronomy, either locally or online, do not buy from department stores, discount stores or eBay as mostly what they sell is junk. The best advice I can give you the ID to find your local astronomy club and try out different telescopes at one of their star parties: http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/organizations Then you'll begin to know what the telescope will be best for you. Cloudless sky!
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DescriptionThe EF-610 DG SUPER features a powerful Guide Number of 200ft / 61m and is designed to work with the latest TTL auto exposure systems of all popular digital and film SLR cameras. The autozoom function automatically sets the optimum illumination angle in accordance with the lens' focal length in a range from 24mm to 105mm... |
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DescriptionThe EF-610 DG SUPER features a powerful Guide Number of 200ft / 61m and is designed to work with the latest TTL auto exposure systems of all popular digital and film SLR cameras. The autozoom function automatically sets the optimum illumination angle in accordance with the lens' focal length in a range from 24mm to 105mm... |
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Sigma EF-610 DG ST Shoe Mount Flash for Pentax PA-TTL Digital SLR's, - Basic Outfit - with 4 NiMH Batteries, Charger, Adorama Mini SoftBox Diffuser Sale Price: $169.00 See Reviews For This Product |
DescriptionThe EF-610 DG ST features a powerful Guide Number of 200ft / 61m and is designed to work with the latest TTL auto exposure systems of all popular digital and film SLR cameras. It features TTL automatic flash exposure control for easy operation... |
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Sigma EF-610 DG ST Shoe Mount Flash for Nikon iTTL Digital SLR's, - Basic Outfit - with 4 NiMH Batteries, Charger, Adorama Mini SoftBox Diffuser Sale Price: $165.00 See Reviews For This Product |
DescriptionThe EF-610 DG ST features a powerful Guide Number of 200ft / 61m and is designed to work with the latest TTL auto exposure systems of all popular digital and film SLR cameras. It features TTL automatic flash exposure control for easy operation... |
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Sigma EF-610 DG Super Shoe Mount Flash for Canon EOS E-TTL-II Digital SLR's - Basic Outfit - with 4 NiMH Batteries, Charger, Adorama Mini SoftBox Diffuser Sale Price: $255.00 See Reviews For This Product |
DescriptionThe EF-610 DG SUPER features a powerful Guide Number of 200ft / 61m and is designed to work with the latest TTL auto exposure systems of all popular digital and film SLR cameras. The autozoom function automatically sets the optimum illumination angle in accordance with the lens' focal length in a range from 24mm to 105mm... |
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Board Security CCTV Camera Lens 6mm Focal Length F1.2 $11.49 Description:Board Security CCTV Camera Lens 6mm Focal Length F1.2 Low Illumination6mm Board Security CCTV Camera Lens for CCTV CameraThe F1.2 6mm Camera Lens provides a standard field of view which is ideally suited for most installations. A 6mm lens will bring you closer to the action than a wide angle lens, and when used with an IR Camera, it will not cause glare from the IR light, as a wide angle lens will. All IR Camera manufacturers recommend using a 6mm Security Camera Lens or higher for use with their IR Cameras.Easy to Install: Replacement lens easily threads in after removal of the previous lens is removedFocal Length (mm): 6mmAperture(F): F1.2Standard Replacement F1.2 CCTV LensWeight: 7.4gPackage included:1 x Low Illumination 6mm CCTV Lens |
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Fixed Board Lens for CCTV Camera w. 4mm Focal Length $11.49 Description:Fixed Board Lens for CCTV Camera w. 4mm Focal Length.The 4mm CCTV Camera provides a narrower (fixed) field of view, which will make objects appear closer. This gives you better definition on smaller features of the items in front of your camera.Easy to Install: Replacement Fixed Board Security Lens easily threads in after removal of the previous lens is removedCCTV Camera Lens Weight: 7.6gPackage included:1 x 4mm Fixed Board CCTV Lens |
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Focal Length $93.99 High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles The focal length of an optical system is a measure of how strongly it converges (focuses) or diverges (defocuses) light. For an optical system in air, it is the distance over which initially collimated rays are brought to a focus. A system with a shorter focal length has greater optical power than one with a long focal length; that is, it bends the rays more strongly, bringing them to a focus in a shorter distance. In telescopy and most photography, longer focal length or lower optical power is associated with larger magnification of distant objects, and a narrower angle of view. Conversely, shorter focal length or higher optical power is associated with a wider angle of view. In microscopy, on the other hand, a short objective lens focal length leads to higher magnification. Author: Miller, Frederic P./ Vandome, Agnes F./ McBrewster, John Binding Type: Paperback Number of Pages: 140 Publication Date: 2010/07/30 Language: English Dimensions: 5.98 x 9.01 x 0.32 inches |
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6mm Standard Board Security Camera Lens for CCTV Camera 6 MM Focal Length $5.49 Description:6mm Standard Board Security Camera Lens for CCTV CameraSuper-Wide Angle Lens: Board Lens, CCTV Camera Board Lens, 6mm Board Lens, Standard Board LensThe 6mm Board Lens provides a standard field of view (approximately 60 degrees) which is ideally suited for most installations. A 6mm lens will bring you closer to the action than a wide angle lens, and when used with an IR Camera, it will not cause glare from the IR light, as a wide angle lens will. All IR Camera manufacturers recommend using a 6mm Standard Board Lens or higher for use with their IR Cameras.Easy to Install: Replacement lens easily threads in after removal of the previous lens is removedFocal Length (mm): 6mmStandard Replacement Board Lens12mm x 0.5 Thread Board LensWeight: 5gPackage included:1 x CCTV Camera Board Lens |
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