Less is more...

Wow – yet another week has been and gone – I think I blinked and missed it.

As usual there has been lots’ going on this last week. Not so much behind the camera; although I did do a couple of low key commercial shoots. But over-all, this week has been more in the office than in the studio. We have been discussing and planning some changes for our website – http://www.timography.net/ and in the interim I have uploaded some new images to the home page to give our little Perth based Portrait, Fashion and Glamour studio a fresh appearance. Also, after months of lying dormant – I managed to get our VoIP phone up and running; albeit after a little bit of bother because the NetComm VoIP connector and iinet didn’t want to play nicely together, but after a stern talking to they are now behaving nicely.

Anyway, down to tonight’s topic. For those of you who have seen our Video Blog Post #1 you would know that I like to use prime lenses. What’s a prime lens you ask? Well that’s a good question in today’s consumer based market that is ruled by zoom lenses. Well, a prime lens has a fixed focal length. They are commonly found in 24mm, 35mm, 50mm, 85mm and 105mm focal lengths, plus a few more, but those are the more popular ones.

So what’s the advantage of a prime lens I still hear you asking? Well, it’s distortion, or gross lack of it. You see, a prime lens has a lot fewer optical elements to make it work – and the more lens elements you put into a lens (e.g., a zoom lens) the more distortion and aberrations you have to deal with which need to be corrected. Prime lenses are also physically lighter than zoom lenses for this very reason. But the best bit is because there are less lens elements the light can pass through a lot easier so all of a sudden you find that without too much trouble you can get a relatively cheap lens with a minimum aperture of f/1.8! Cool.

There are 100 other reasons why a prime lens is optically superior to a zoom, but I’ll give you just one more. As I hinted to earlier, the best benefit other than a super-fast aperture is that your images are going to be a lot sharper. Let me explain. Every single lens ever made has a sweet spot. This is usually (at a given focal length) two or three stops from “wide open” or the largest aperture your lens is capable of. Now with most entry level kit lenses that come with your D-SLR this minimum f/stop is anywhere from f/3.5 to f/6.3 depending on the focal length of the zoom. So, in a worst case scenario you are looking at about an aperture of f/8 or even f/11 before you start to get really sharp (from edge to edge) images. This is fine if you are in a studio situation and have 1.21 gigawatts of flash power at your disposal to light the scene but pretty much useless for anything else except for outdoor photography in pretty decent sunlight. Also, the depth of field or “bokeh” at f/11 isn’t all that great and you will have a pretty hard time getting a pleasant blur from your background.

Now think of your prime lens with it’s minimum aperture of say, f/1.4. At the risk of complicating things a little more, because of the fewer optical elements within the lens it is already going to be a lot sharper wide open than a zoom, but by the time you stop the lens down to say f/2.8 or f/3.2 you are going to be able to cut yourself on the image – it’s that sharp! Not to mention the awesome depth of field and creamy bokeh that you will be getting. So this is a recipe for some fantastic natural light indoor photography that otherwise would be impossible with a zoom lens, as well as fantastic optical quality in just about every situation that you throw at it.

And to finish – the downside of using a prime lens. You have you get off your butt and move around, as your legs are now the zoom mechanism of the lens instead of those light-robbing and distorting extra elements in a zoom lens. You have to look for the right shot, the right composition, not just by twisting your left wrist. You have to make it happen. Sometimes it’s hard – but it’s always worthwhile when you see the end result.

I dare you, go out and get yourself a cheap little 50mm f/1.8 prime lens. Nikon, Canon and Sony – they all make one. They are light weight, small and totally awesome! You will not regret it. Unlock your potential!

PS - todays image was taken with my iPhone - another camera with a prime lens!