Lenses

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Focal length size guide

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4mm - 14mm Fisheye Abstract, creative

14mm - 35mm Wide angle Landscape, architecture

35mm - 85mm Standard Street, travel, portrait

85mm - 135mm Short telephoto Street photography and portraits

135mm+ Medium telephoto Sports, wildlife, action

300mm+ Super telephoto Sports from a distance, nature and astronomy

35mm - 200mm Macro Close-up shot

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Camera lenses can be broken down into two types, zoom lenses and prime lenses.

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Zoom lenses are incredibly variable, with the most popular being the 70-200 mm lens that you’ll see being used by wedding photographers. Zoom lenses have variable focal lengths, so with a 70-200mm lens for example, you can zoom from 70mm all the way up to 200mm. It also allows you to get in close to the action without disrupting the moment.

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A prime lens is a classic style lens. Prime lenses have a fixed focal range, which means that you can't zoom in or out. The main advantage of prime lenses is that they specialise in just one focal length. In other words, they are finely tuned to deliver on one specific type of photography, unlike a zoom lens which can be used in a multitude of cases. Because of this, prime lenses produce much higher quality images than a zoom lens in general.

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Wide-angle lenses are useful if your plans are to to take pictures of a landscape. Wide angles have a wider focal field, allowing you to essentially capture more of the scene in front of you than say a zoom lens.

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If you need to capture an even wider field of view, then you’ll need to invest in a fisheye lens. These create the unusual 'fisheye’ effect.

A fisheye lens is basically an ultra-wide-angle lens, offering an enormous field of view. They are useful if you are photographing indoors or using your camera for design work. An ultra-wide-angle lens can have a focal length as low as 8mm.