Digital Camera World » telephoto lens

Free Cheat Sheet: what your camera captures at every lens’ focal length

jmeyer — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 15:01:04 +0000

Knowing how much of your scene you can capture at each lens’ focal length is a conundrum every photographer has come up against.

In our earlier post earlier answering the question, ‘What is Focal Length?,’ we looked at some of the differences and capabilities of using a telephoto vs wide-angle lens.

A wide-angle lens exaggerates perspective, while using a telephoto lens gives the effect of compressing perspective, bringing elements closer together in the frame.

In the latest of our ongoing photography cheat sheet series we aimed to illustrate some of the differences a different lens focal length can have both in terms of how your image looks and how much of your scene your camera is able to include.

In our infographic below you can see just how much of a scene your camera can capture at different focal lengths starting from an ultra-wide 10mm all the way up to 400mm.

To see the larger version of this photography cheat sheet simply click on the image below, or drag and drop it on to your desktop.

Pro Secrets: how to use a telephoto lens for awesome landscapes

jmeyer — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 10:30:19 +0000

When you’re shooting landscape photography, the temptation is to reach for a wide-angle lens and try to include everything that your eye can see. There’s nothing wrong with this approach, but for a more intimate view of the scenery you can add impact to your images by learning how to use a telephoto lens to pick out key features within the bigger picture.

Images by Mark Hamblin

By emphasising the most visually striking elements, you can add real impact to pictures and make them much stronger in terms of composition. When you use a telephoto lens for your landscapes, it’s a case of less is more. Keep it simple, cut the superfluous aspects and concentrate on what matters.

There are no hard and fast rules for when to shoot long rather than wide, and you’ll often do both during a shoot. Landscapes that work well with the telephoto approach are those that contain interesting compositional elements.

These could include a line of trees, a single isolated bough or building, dry-stone walls, meandering rivers, peaked mountains, interesting field patterns and colour contrasts, or simply a good play of light and shade.

The thing to look for is a strong feature that will form the focal point or primary visual impact of the picture. You can then use this to make an arresting composition.

So what equipment do you need? A telephoto zoom somewhere in the range of 70-300mm is ideal, and because the subject matter is static, the lens doesn’t need to be an expensive f/2.8 model.

You’ll need a sturdy tripod for good support (learn how to use a tripod the right way), and a remote release can be handy, although it isn’t essential. Now all you need is a suitable subject.

One advantage of using a telephoto lens to shoot landscapes is that the simplicity of the images makes it easy to find good subjects in almost any rural environment.

An oak in a wheat field shot with a 28mm may look awful with the clutter of farm buildings and a pasty sky behind it, but use a telephoto lens to zoom in and isolate the tree and suddenly you’ve made a great picture from almost nothing.

Keep this in mind when you’re travelling around locally, and make a note of anything that might work well. Then return when the weather or lighting conditions are at their best.

PAGE 1: Why you should use a telephoto lens to shoot landscapes
PAGE 2: Lighting your telephoto landscapes
PAGE 3: How to find and compose the perfect telephoto landscape
PAGE 4: 6 tips for using a telephoto lens to shoot landscapes

Nikon 800mm f/5.6 VR monster super-telephoto announced

jmeyer — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 13:30:55 +0000

New Nikon AF-S 800mm f/5.6 VR supertelephoto

Nikon is to unveil its a new monster to its lens line-up. The Nikon AF-S 800mm f/5.6 will be the longest focal length in its current range of optic – an honour currently held by its AF-S 600mm f/4G ED VR.

The longer FX full-frame-compatible lens will have an angle of view of around 3° and will be lusted after by wildlife, sports and paparazzi photographers the world over. It will provide a whopping crop-factor-enduced effective focal length of 1200mm when used on popular DX Nikon D-SLR models.

A prototype of the new lens will be shown at the British Open Golf Championships at Royal Lytham ST Annes next week, and again at the bi-annual Photokina trade show in Cologne this September.

The price, or availability, have not been announced yet – but we expect the recommended retail to be well over the £10,000 ($15,000) mark

It is not the first time that Nikon has had a 800mm f/5.6 lens in its range, however. The Nikkor 800mm f/5.6 IF-ED was introduced in 1986 and discontinued in around 2005. It won’t be light either, and will inevitably weigh in more than the 5kg (11lb) 600mm f/4.

Sigma already produce an 800mm f/5.6 EX DG HSM supertelephoto in Nikon AF mount.

The full press release for the lens can be read here.

9 things to know about using a super-telephoto lens

jmeyer — Tue, 03 Jul 2012 03:00:11 +0000

There’s a lot to think about when you’re shooting with a super-telephoto lens. Most of the lenses in this group are designed with one thing in mind – bringing serious telescopic power to your DSLR. As such, they’re weighty beasts, tipping the scales at anything up to 3kg. Many super-telephoto lenses are more than 20cm long even at their shortest zoom settings.

Below we round up 9 key points you should remember the next time you go out to shoot with super-telephoto lenses.

1. Mind your back
Super-telephoto lenses can be weighty beasts. A monopod can help take the load without imposing the restrictions of a tripod (find out how to use a monopod).

2. Hidden depths
While they’re long to start with, often a super-telephoto lens can almost double in length at its longest zoom settings. Others, however, such as the Nikon 70-200mm and Sigma 120-300mm, remain fixed thanks to internal zoom mechanisms.

3. Staying constant
Constant aperture lenses retain the same largest available aperture throughout the zoom range, enabling faster shutter speeds at longer focal lengths.

4. Take the weight
With a heavy super-telephoto lens, the image stabilisation system often makes all the difference between sharp and blurry handheld shots.

5. Slow it down
For tripod-mounted shots, it’s best to use the Exposure Delay or the Mirror Lock-up functions to avoid mirror-bounce blurring your results.

6. Small margin
Depth of field can be extremely small at longer zoom settings, especially when you use the largest available aperture.

7. Lights on
You’ll often need to increase your camera’s sensitivity setting to achieve fast shutter speeds in anything other than bright lighting conditions.

8. Keep up
A fast autofocus speed is essential for tracking quick-moving subjects. All the ring-type ultrasonic lenses on test perform well, while the Nikon 80-400mm is relatively slow.

9. Mirror, mirror
Mirror lenses offer massive cost-savings but the image quality they provide is comparatively poor. They also lack autofocus and adjustable apertures.

How different types of lenses ‘see’ the world

jmeyer — Fri, 29 Jun 2012 01:00:11 +0000

There are many different types of lenses available to photographers, as we all know, and the type of lens you choose to fit on your SLR will determine how your end results will look.

The main consideration is focal length. Focal length is the distance between the optical centre of a lens and the sensor, but it’s easier to think in terms of how this affects subject size when compared with a standard lens. For a camera with a full frame sensor, a standard lens is 50mm.

The types of lenses with focal lengths shorter than 50mm are known as wide-angles, while lenses with focal lengths longer than 50mm are referred to as telephotos.

Which type of lens you need will depend on the subject you are shooting, but most focal lengths offer creative potential with all subjects.

Below we’ve broken down the different types of lenses for you to choose from and explain what they’re typically used for and the effects you can expect from them.

We’ve also included images taken with each of these types of lenses to show you the many different effects they produce when shooting the same subject.

At the top left of this page we’ve also included an infographic combining the effects from all the types of lenses into one cheat sheet. The graphic shows the effects of shooting the same subject with different types of lenses. To download the larger version of this cheat sheet, simply drag and drop it on to your desktop.

And if you liked this, you can click here to find more from our photography cheat sheet series.

Shot with a fisheye lens

Fisheye lenses
Fisheye lenses (8-16mm) differ from conventional lenses in that they produce images with a slightly curved or bowed appearance, and a field of view that covers up to 180 degrees.

Shot with an ultra wide-angle lens

Ultra Wide-angle lenses
Ultra wide-angle lenses fall in the 10-24mm range and have a very wide angle of view, which allowsyou to work very close to your subject and stillinclude it all in the frame.

Shot with a wide-angle lens

Wide-angle lenses
A typical wide-angle lens falls between 24-35mm, and is often incorporated into a wide-angle kit lens in the 18-55mm range, or it can be a fixed focal length prime lens.

Shot with a standard lens

Standard lenses
A standard lens is 50mm for DSLRs with a full frame sensor. The equivalent focal length for crop-sensor cameras lies in the 28-35mm range, dependingon the camera model.

Shot with a short telephoto lens

Short telephoto lenses
Lenses in the 100-200mm range are known as short telephotos. They are used for isolating specific subjects within landscapes, and for portraits and close-up work.

Shot with a long telephoto lens

Long telephoto lenses
Long telephotos typically have a focal length of 300-600mm and have a very narrow angle of view, making them the lens of choice forwildlife and sports photography.

Make zoo photos that look like the wild

jmeyer — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 03:00:00 +0000

Animals make great subjects, but they’re not always easy to photograph, even in captivity. That said, zoos and wildlife parks are great places to hone your wildlife photography skills. They allow you to get closer to the animals than you would in the wild.

The first thing you’ll need is a telephoto lens. We used Nikon’s 55-300mm or 70-300mm zooms, which were ideal, as the maximum effective focal length they give on a DX-format camera is about 450mm. This should be adequate even for larger enclosures, where animals are further away.

Longer focal lengths take a little practice, which is why environments like zoos are ideal. They also increase the risk of camera-shake. As a quick guide, use the ‘reciprocal rule’, where you divide the effective focal length into ‘1’ to get the minimum ‘safe’ shutter speed.

For example, if you’re shooting at an effective focal length of 250mm, your minimum speed should be 1/250 sec. You’ll still need faster shutter speeds to capture moving animals.

We’d also recommend shooting raw files rather than JPEGs taking zoo photos. You won’t always have time to think about the perfect settings when you’re shooting, and raw files give you more flexibility to edit settings later on.

Below we offer our tips on the best camera settings to use when shooting zoo photos, but we’ve also got plenty of advice on how to get better animal shots in the artificial surroundings of a wildlife park.…

For more on photography animals, check out our free wildlife photography cheat sheet.

01 Use Aperture Priority
You might think that the obvious way to set a high shutter speed would be by using Shutter Priority (S) mode. In fact, Aperture Priority (A) is better. If you set the widest lens aperture (f/5.6 on the 300mm optic we’re using, for example) then you automatically get the fastest shutter speed available for the conditions.

02 Increase the ISO
For relatively static subjects, a shutter speed of 1/250 sec is a workable minimum, but 1/500 sec or 1/1000 sec is better, especially if the animal is moving. To get these shutter speeds, you might need to increase the ISO. On reasonably bright days, ISO200 or ISO400 should be enough when you’re shooting at f/5.6.

03 Autofocus options
You might also need to check autofocus settings. One of the problems with the standard Auto-area AF mode is that you can’t always be sure what the camera is going to focus on. Instead, try Single-point AF and select AF-C (continuous) so that the camera keeps refocusing as your subject moves. Then choose the focus point yourself.

04 Set up a monopod
Even with faster shutter speeds, keeping your camera steady can be tricky. A monopod is a sound investment if you use longer lenses a lot. The 300mm f/2.8 we’ve got here is a monster, but even a light lens can feel heavy after a day’s shooting. The extra steadiness a monopod provides makes it easier to frame long-range shots more accurately.

05 Hide fences
Where you’ve got animals in captivity, you also get cages. But if you get really close, the mesh of the fence will be so far out of focus that it disappears. You might lose a little contrast, but you can fix that in an image-editor. This also works with glass – just rest the lens against the surface.

06 Shooting indoors
Like many centres, the Cotswold Wildlife Park has indoor exhibits. The artificial light in this reptile house poses problems with brightness, but increasing the ISO to 1600 keeps the shutter speed at 1/30 sec or above, which is fine for slow subjects. Shoot raw files and fix White Balance later.

07 Check the exposure
Assessing exposure can be tricky indoors, because the LCD is so bright that even underexposed shots look fine. When you play back your shot, check the histogram to make sure the exposure is okay. Apply compensation and reshoot if you need to – bright lights can make the camera underexpose.

08 Review your shots
Finally, when you’re relaxing in the cafe after a long day’s shooting, take a proper look at your photos. Many DSLRs will let you convert raw files in-camera, saving new versions as JPEGs. Now’s your chance to experiment with exposure and White Balance settings for indoor and outdoor shots.

Land of the giants: the world’s largest lenses

samanthacliffe — Sat, 19 May 2012 06:00:41 +0000

Camera lenses come in many different sizes. We take a look at the unfathomably massive – the world’s largest consumer lenses.

Sigma 200-500mm f2.8 APO EX DG Telephoto Zoom

Weighing in at a hefty 34.6lbs and 726mm in length, this is not the easiest lens to carry around with you on holiday. As well as being meaty, the Sigma 200-500mm also wins some world firsts; it is the first large-aperture ultra telephoto lens to have an f/2.8 aperture at 500mm, and is the largest high-speed zoom lens available.

If you’re impressed by this and are looking for a lens that is excellent at tracking fast moving objects and you don’t mind parting with $32,000, this could be the lens for you!

Stats

Weight: 34.6lb/15.7kg
Width: 236.5mm
Length: 726mm
Focal Length: 200-500mm
Price: $32,000

Tokina introduces 300mm f/6.3 lens for Micro Four Thirds

jmeyer — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 10:03:10 +0000

Tokina has announced a new fixed-focal length telephoto lens for Micro Four Thirds cameras.

Weighing in just under 300g, the new Tokina 300mm lens measures 66mm in length, with a maximum diameter of 66m.

The manual focus Tokina lens for Micro Four Thirds cameras also features a fixed aperture of f/6.3, with a minimum focusing distance of 0.8m and a maximum reproduction of 1:2 in Macro mode. The Tokina lens also fits 55mm filters.

The Tokina 300mm was unveiled at Japan’s CP+ imaging show.