Lesson 2: Demystifying Camera Functions + Lenses

 Camera Functions
 Vision Vs Camera
 Lens Types

- Since I knew most of the functions I did not deem it necessary to write them down. One in
particular that escaped my notice though was the Zoom in/Zoom out (Playback) It is extremely
difficult to assess the sharpness of an image whilst you’re looking at it on the screen, for example,
if you shoot a landscape and the tiny little picture may be an inch and a half on the screen it’s
hard to tell if it is in focus. You must get in the habit of using this function.

Lens components

1) Front Lens Element: The front glass of the lens, the series of the especially shaped glass that
makes our images sharp.
2) Manual Focusing Ring: This allows you to focus manually; you can use this to focus your lens
rather than the camera using its auto focus mechanism. This is for people who want to take even
more control of their camera or when it struggles with its auto focus.
3) Distance Scale: This just tells you how far the subject you are focusing on is far from the camera.
If I am focusing on a subject that is a metre and a half away from my camera, this distance scale
will read 1.5m. It tells how far in the scene the subject you are focusing on is from the lens.
4) Zoom Ring: We also have a zoom ring if we have a zoom lens and this is for zooming in or out
to get close or further away from the subject.
5) Lens Mount: This part connects to the camera and very important part of your lens to keep clean
simply because there are a lot of electronic components there which feed all the information to
your camera.
6) Auto Focus/ Manual Focus Switch: It is exactly what the name suggests, a button for switching
between these two modes but most of the time we are using Auto Focus.
7) Bayonet for Lens Hood: It is a hood over our lens or around our lens to stop stray light coming
in, like those circles of light that you often get in a picture. We call that Lens Flair, that’s stray
light that is coming at the wrong angle and this stops the stray light from coming in.
8) Thread for Lens Filters: Some Lenses will have a thread to connect filters on to your camera for
different effects.
Angle of View – Human Vision

To understand how lenses differ from each other we first need to understand the angle of view or human
vision. This is essentially the view that we see when we look ahead and how wide our view is. Look
straight ahead without moving your head or your eyes. See how much you can focus on without moving
your head or your eyes and this is what we call our angle of view.

If we look ahead our angle of view is 130 degrees wide. It may seem pretty weird but there’s a difference
in the width you see and what is actually in focus. The extreme right and left of our vision is called
peripheral vision. This area of our vision is slightly blurry and whilst we have a sense of what is going
around in our peripheral vision it is not entirely in focus until we either move our head or eyes in that
direction. In reality, the area of focus in our vision is only 50 degrees wide.

As you change lenses on a camera, it changes the angle of view in width. It can get either wider or
narrower. The difference between the human angle of view and that of a lens is that a lens can keep
everything sharp unlike human vision it does not blur on the peripheries.

Lens Types

1) Normal/Standard Lenses: The lens that is attached to the camera captures roughly the same
view or angle that we see with our eyes in focus, that small 50 degree area. The focal length of a
normal or standard lens is of 50mm that is when it is attached to a full frame sensor. It can be a
lens with a zoom capability which allows you to go up to 50mm. Milimetres are the physical
distance between the glass inside your lens and your sensor and it is the piece of glass that
focuses.
2) Wide Angle Lenses: Wide Angle Lenses are lenses that can capture much wider than our
focused area or angle of view (50 degrees) Wide Angle Lenses have a focal range of 24 – 50 mm.
They can have an angle of view of 50 – 83 degrees wide. They are excellent for landscape,
architecture or interiors anywhere where you want a nice and wide shot of the environment.
3) Telephoto Lenses: Telephoto Lenses are lenses which have a field of view that is narrower than
the angle of focused human vision or standard lenses. Their focal length can be from 50mm up to
1000mm and even beyond. Their angle of view can be between 50 and 2.5 degrees wide. This is
for photography where you do not want to get close to the subject but you want a close shot
nevertheless so it is perfect for wildlife, sports and even wedding photography.
4) Zoom Lenses: Zoom Lenses have a variable focal length. They either allow you to get close or
further away from the subject by adjusting the focal length or the zoom of the lens (zooming in
and out) you can change from one focal length to another. Zoom lenses can be both wide-angled
zoom lenses and Telephoto Zoom lenses or they can adjust between both. You can have a lens
that comes from a wide lens to a telephoto lens. An example of that would be from 24 mm (wide)
to 70 (telephoto) mm. A wide-angled zoom lens could go from 14 – 24 mm or you can have a
telephoto zoom which could go from 100 – 400 mm. 4.1) External Zoom Mechanism: This is
for entry or cheaper lenses where the lens physically zooms in and out but it can pull dust in when
it expands so it is not a very weatherproof lens. 4.2) Internal Zoom Mechanism: This is when
 everything that makes the lens zoom happens internally; it does not physically change in size or
get larger or shorter. It is a pro series lens as it is much more costly to engineer and they are much
more weatherproof.
5) Prime Lens: Prime lenses have a fixed focal length and it cannot be changed, if it is a 17mm lens
that is all it can be. The Prime lenses are a very high quality and they tend to produce sharper
images with greater detail. They tend to have a bigger aperture and shallower depth of field and
shoot in darker situations.
6) Super Wide Angle Lenses: These are lenses that have a focal length that is wider than 24mm.
They can also be called Ultra Wide Angle Lenses. Some of them are 10, 14 or 16 mm.
7) Fisheye Lenses: Fisheye lenses give us an amazing view of the world and they are usually 180
degrees wide. That is much wider than what we can see with our eyes and it is similar to what we
would see if we turn our ahead from shoulder to shoulder. You sometimes have to sacrifice some
straight lines at the periphery which become distorted but if you are shooting for a fisheye lens it
means you want that fisheye effect. The name fisheye comes from how fish underwater see the
world above the water. This is known as hemispherical view.
8) Macro Lenses: Macro lens would be found combined with a prime lens. It would be a function
of a prime lens, like a 100mm lens but it has a switch that changes it to a macro lens. Most lenses
have a maximum distance you get to the subject till it struggles to focus. The special thing about
macro lenses is that they are designed to get super close to the subject, till you are only
milimetres away. That is why they are more expensive. Other lenses are limited to metres away
from a subject.