Types of Camera – Picture Squash

First of all we will understand the concept of focal length of a lens. Focal Length is the distance between the focal plane(Image Sensor) & focal point of lens.

Lower the focal length = more area captured by lens

Higher focal length = less area captured by lens

On the basis of viewing angle there are three types of lenses

Normal lens = 50mm (equivalent to normal human eye)

Wide Lens = any focal length less than 50mm. e.g. 14mm, 24mm, 35mm etc

Tele Lens = any focal length greater than 50mm. e.g. 85mm, 100mm, 135mm, 1200mm and more

On the basis of working of lens these are categorised into two types. Zoom Lens And Prime lens.

Zoom Lens

Zoom Lens are the lens which have a “range” of focal length. These lens covers a variety of focal length and image can be zoomed in or out before capturing. These lens gives freedom to the photographer to capture at any available focal length without moving from his place. These are further divided into three classes. Wide to Wide, Wide to Tele and Tele to Tele.

Wide to wide zoom lens cover both the focal length in wide angle segment only. These lens are best suitable for shooting Landscapes or wherever we need a wide angle view. e.g. Canon 17-40mm(Full Frame), Canon 10-18mm(Crop Frame), 18-55mm(Crop Frame), Nikon 16-35mm and many more.

Wide to Tele zoom lens are very useful and popular ones because they give complete ease to shoot daily life images or covers almost the need of all photographers genre(Wedding, Portraits, Landscapes, Journalism etc.). These lens have a range from wide to tele angle. eg. Nikon 18-200mm, Canon 24-105mm, Nikon 24-120mm etc.

Tele to Tele zoom lens are useful in wildlife photography and astronomical photography only. These are a bit expensive lens and are used by professionals usually. eg. Canon 100-400mm, Tamron 150-600mm, Nikon 70-300mm etc. Some with lower tele focal lengths are used for Portraits, Journalism, Event photography also. eg. 70-200mm is very popular lens from various brands. and other are 55-250mm, 55-200mm.

Prime lens

Prime lens are the lenses which have a fix focal length. the most commonly used prime lens is 50mm f1.8. This is the best lens to start with. This lens is available from most of the brands in the market. The cheapest one is available from a Camera brand is Canon 50mm 1.8 rest all the camera manufacturing brands provides the 50mm 1.8 of their brand is priced high than the later. Some more cheaper one are also available form third party lens brand. There is no compromise in the quality of these lens from several brands but the only thing make them low priced or high priced is the no. of consumers for a particular brand. There and wide and tele prime lenses are also available in the market. eg. nikon 20mm, 25mm, Canon 14mm, 24mm, 35mm, 100mm, 135mm, 800mm and 1200mm. Any of the prime lens does not have any zoom function. These lenses are fast focussing lens. Their result in terms of quality and depth are also better than the zoom lens.

There are two special type of prime lens which we will discuss about are Fish-Eye lens and Tilt-Shift lens.

Fish-eye lens named so because their front element look like a fish eye and these covers an angle of around 180 deg like a fish eye. These are also called the ultra-wide angle lens. eg. Canon 15mm. Most of these are prime lenses, but some brand have zoom function in these lens also. eg. Canon 8-15mm,

Tilt-shift lens are very useful in product photography, Archival Photography, Corporate Building Shoots etc. as they can avoid the reflections coming into/from the glossy surfaces of the products and can change the perspective of a monument or building. These lens changes the view of upto 8-9 degree angle which is sufficient enough to avoid the reflections and shoot the desired image. eg. Canon 17mm, 50mm, 90mm etc.

However, the things which make prime lens better than any other lens are fast focussing system, better photo quality, better depth of field control and mainly the Aperture. Wider the Aperture opening better the lens as it allow more light to come in, better for low light conditions. So, one before purchasing a Prime lens should go for the lowest f/no. lens fits into budget.

Looking forward for your queries…

There are various types of digital camera we found in the digital era. We tried to cover all the possible categories of the digital camera available in the market now.

Compact Digital Camera

This category consists a lot of camera forms. These are the cheapest camera available in the market. Digital compacts camera are very pocket friendly cameras and used widely by the hobbyists and amateurs. These camera have many other forms as well. Our Mobile phone Camera is an example of compact or point & shoot camera system. Although now a days the Mobile phones are having more advanced camera system than a digital compact camera. Moreover, all the small water proof and action camera are also an example of Compact Digital Camera System which are now having a lot of customized settings electronically not mechanically.

Bridge Camera is also a type of compact digital camera system with a lot more manual settings and a very high Optical zoom system. These camera look like a DSLR but do not have the capability of inter-changeable lens system.

All the tiny spy camera are also in the category of Digital Compact camera.

Mirror-less Interchangeable Lens Cameras

Basically these camera are the advanced form of point and shoot camera but with the professional interface and settings. These camera are Cost reductive forms of DSLR camera system. These are cost effective for Manufacturers only but are expensive for consumers having some pros and cons over DSLR system and are now trending the market for some more time. Because the DSLR system have more advantages over mirror-less system. These camera have less battery life as they consume battery for every function(electronic viewfinders – consume a lot of battery, a person can’t even see the optical view unlike DSLR’s view finder)whereas the DSLR are saving a lot of battery due to optical view finders, and DSLR gives more power to capture more on a single charge (Gives upto 1000 shot per charged battery).

DSLR – Digital Single Lens Reflex Camera

DSLR as their name suggests these are the camera like SLR system cameras, just addition of word “digital” is here. Unlike SLR camera, all other functions will remain same only the traditional film is replaced by Electronic sensor on which image is being captured and processed in camera to show a final result immediately on an LCD on the back of the camera. These are a bit expensive camera but having so many qualities also. DSLR gives freedom to change the Lenses as per need and a variety of lens are available in the market to suits an individuals requirements. DSLR gives High quality images. These shoot two forms of file system – JPEG (Compressed file) & RAW/.CR2 (A complete data file with maximum details possible – can be customised a lot in post processing like the traditional photography post processed in Dark room)

DSLR gave a revolution in the field of photography as the results can be seen on the spot of capturing an image, so these camera gave freedom of experimenting with the same frame and same composition in the field only. With all the benefits these camera gave birth to a huge data files which again results into more expenses of managing data files. But still this is the most accepted camera system by professionals and now a days by the hobbyists also as the Entry level DSLR are available in the market under US$ 400 or INR 30K with 2 lens combinations. The professional DSLR cost starting from 1.5 lakhs to upto 8 lakhs.

Medium Format Camera

Brands like Mamiya, Leica, Hasselblad, Horseman, Pentax, Fuji make these format camera and are totally used for commercial purpose only. Big ad agencies and corporates have these camera because of their work profile. Their working is still like the medium format negative cameras as the lens and the electronic plate chamber is still attached with a bellow in some models and rest have large electronic sensors and a interchangeable lens system. Some camera model are shown below to understand better.

Hasselblad X1D – 50C, Costing nearly 9000 US $ with a 35-70 lens (INR 7 lakh)

Medium Format Camera from Other Brands Pentax, Hasselblad, Fujifilm

Large Format

Hasselblad, Mamiya, LargeSense are the masters of Large Format Camera where a large electronic plate or sensor is present in place of large Negatives. The example of latest large format future ready camera is LargeSense LS911 having an electronic plate of 9×11 inches nearly 3 Gigapixel.

Looking Forward for your comments and queries…

Tag: Types of Camera