MASTER YOUR LENSES

Explore advanced lens technology, and discover how understanding your optics can help you to improve your images in the field

Lenses are critical components in the photographer’s toolkit. While novice shooters often believe the camera to be the most important aspect of a gear system, those with more experience recognise that the type and quality of the glass in front of the sensor is the bigger factor in the success of the final image. Regardless of how many pixels a CMOS chip may be equipped with, or how effective the signal-to-noise ratio, if the optic used to focus light into the camera body is inferior, the fine-detail resolution will never be fully realised. Similarly, if a less-than-optimal focal length is utilised, it may result in an ineffective or inferior composition.

There’s more to focal-length choice than how ‘zoomed in’ the frame becomes: the choice of setting impacts foreground and background elements, altering the balance between them in the frame. Meanwhile, the choice of focal length within the zoom range of a lens can influence the maximum sharpness, as lens contrast and resolution can vary from setting to setting. Only with a good knowledge of their lenses, and of the common pitfalls of different lens types, can we make informed decisions.

In this guide to lens choice we’ll explore the world of optical science, and its practical applications in our day-to-day work.

UNDERSTAND YOUR LENSES

Get to grips with the most common lens features