Danny Schweers

  • Home
  • Galleries & Essays
    • All Danny’s Posts
    • Places
    • Exhibits
    • Take Better Photos
    • Photo Prayers
    • Essays
  • Prints
  • Links
    • w2mw.com
    • Photo Prayer
    • Brandywine Photo Collective
    • Delaware Art Museum
    • Philly Photo Arts Center
    • Texas Photographic Society
    • Washington Printmakers Gallery
    • Arden Men’s Book Group
  • Recommended
  • Contact

What Is Best Lens?

What focal length lens is your favorite for your camera – digital SLR?

Horned Tomato Worm taken with a fixed 50mm lens at f/1.4 with a wide open aperture. The white area behind the worm is a shiny asphalt road but very blurred. This lens is one I've had for 40 years.
Horned Tomato Worm taken with a fixed 50mm lens at f/1.4 with a wide open aperture. The white area behind the worm is a shiny asphalt road but very blurred. This lens is one I’ve had for 40 years.

Fix-Length Lenses Are Best.

I like any fixed lens for four reasons.

(1) In general, fixed (a.k.a. prime) lenses have much simpler optics than zoom lenses. That means that images are generally sharper, with better contrast and fewer aberrations.

(2) Simpler optics also means that the apertures can be wider, letting in more light through the viewfinder in digital SLRs. A typical zoom lens can go to f/4.5 to f/5.6. Fixed lenses typically go to f/2.8 to f/1.4, letting in four times as much light. That makes seeing through the viewfinder much easier.

(3) Because larger apertures are possible, depths of field can be made very shallow. That is, backgrounds become much more blurred, often beautifully.

(4) Because optics are simpler, using fewer pieces of glass, lenses are small and lighter.

24mm & 50mm lenses
(for full 35-mm sensor cameras)
18mm & 35mm lenses
(for digital SLRs)

I like the 24mm lens when I want a wide angle lens that does not produce much distortion. I like the 50mm lens when I want tighter crops, or when I want to be further away from the subject. Again, cameras with digital sensors need 18mm and 35mm lenses to get the same photo as 24mm and 50mm lenses on full 35mm sensors.

If you want to do close-ups, get a macro-lens, a lens made to focus up close.

There are zoom lenses with good optics, but they are very expensive, usually a few thousand dollars each. They are often heavy, but they can have apertures of f/2.8.

Recent Posts

  • True Posterization Using Photoshop
  • Control Motion Blur by Varying Shutter Speed
  • Composition: Lines to Corners
  • Twenty-Six Hours in New York City, January, 2023
  • Rule Of Thirds
  • Explore Your Camera’s ISO Settings
  • Fog in the City Center, Wilmington, Delaware
  • Student Photos from Delaware Art Museum
  • Light Painting with Camera and Flashlight
  • Photo Classes and Workshops, Wilmington, Delaware
  • Outdoor Night Photography
  • Focus
  • July Images by Danny Schweers
  • Zion National Park, November, 2012
  • Portrait Photography, Delaware Art Museum

Blogroll

  • Brandywine Photo Collective
  • Delaware Art Museum
  • Photo Prayer
  • Photography Classes, Wilmington, DE
  • Welcome 2 My World

DannySchweers.com

Danny Schweers teaches photography lessons in and around Wilmington, Delaware. To learn more, click here to contact him.

Categories of Posts

Copyright © 2023 Danny N. Schweers. All rights reserved.