SO, PRIME (I LOVE THEM) IS A COMMON PART OF A PHOTOGRAPHER'S GEAR. I SEE THEM BEEN USED A LOT HERE IN GHANA BY BOTH AMATEURS AND PROS. IT MUST BE ALL CONFUSING IF YOU'RE VENTURING INTO AS A NOVICE AND YOU DON'T REALLY KNOW THE FUNCTION/ PURPOSE OF A PRIME LENS…

Compiled by Shika PRIME LENS-WHY DO YOU NEED Nornoo

ONE? Jbklutse.com

Greetings!

I have been away for a while now but it's all for good reason. Yours truly is studying more on the subject of photography at Shaw Academy so she can feed you with the right information. This is great news, isn’t it? Before we start on our topic for today, here’s a link (click here to register) so you too can earn an online diploma in photography for less than GHS50.00 to equip yourself with knowledge in your chosen field-photography. Oh! It's a giveaway and for a limited time only, so hurry!

So, Prime Lens (I love them) is a common part of a photographer's gear. I see them been used a lot here in Ghana by both amateurs and pros. It must be all confusing if you're venturing into photography as a novice and you don't really know the function/ purpose of a prime lens. When I decided to try out photography, I asked why I needed a prime lens and I was often fed this response,’ it is a primary part of any photographer’s lens collection, as it delivers high quality images and gives you a blur background. Just fix one on to your and start shooting and you will see the results for yourself', so without fully understanding what it was, I saved and bought one and although I have not regretted getting it, I find that it's essential you understand what you're buying before you do buy it.

In this guide, you will learn;

1. What a prime lens is.

2. What makes a lens PRIME?

3. Use(s) of a prime lens.

4. Why you should get it.

What a prime lens is.

A Prime lens is simply a lens without a zoom function. Prime have a fixed which cannot be changed by zooming in or out. This, of course limits their versatility.

So why the hype on prime lenses?

While they may be fixed, prime lenses typically offer a much wider . It’s much easier to find an f/1.8 lens in a prime than it is to find a zoom with that kind of speed. Those f/1.8 come in handy for creating , utilizing a shallow and shooting in limited lighting. And because they don't need the extra moving parts and bits of glass that zooms need, they can be smaller and lighter. Primes are quite dear especially if they have larger apertures but there are inexpensive options like CANON 85MM F/1.8, CANON 100MM F/2.8 MACRO LENS, CANON 50MM F/1.8 II.

What makes a lens PRIME?

Like any other lens that you can think of, a prime lens has its own characteristics. These factors make a prime lens stand out from the vast of lenses.

Fixed Focal length: The first thing that you will notice about this lens is that, unlike other lenses, which have a range of maximum and minimum focal length that you can vary, this one is fixed to one particular focal length.

The length of lens you buy will affect what sort of pictures you can take, and the choice is huge. From 800mm super-telephoto primes to 8mm ultra wide-angle fisheye primes, they’re available for all sorts of jobs. The most common, though, are in the 35mm-50mm range, which equate to what most photographers would consider 'normal'. That's because on a full-frame camera, a 50mm lens give you about the same field of view as regular human vision, and on an APS-C body, a 35mm lens would offer a similar field of view.

In technical terms, the distance between the lens and the point in front of the lens in space where the light converges is known as the focal point. This means all the points in front or beyond this point will not focus and will result in lens blur. This is also the reason for the shallow depth of field in images. Since prime lenses have a fixed focal length, you will not be able to zoom in and out. You will have to move and position yourself or your subject to get the composition right.

Different focal lengths are better suited to certain subjects or styles; this is why you will constantly see lenses like the 85mm referred to as a “portrait” lens, or the 35mm as a “street” lens.

Besides the obvious, different focal lengths have their own attributes and looks. For example, the longer the lens is, the shallower the depth of field will be, when they are compared at the same aperture setting.

Image from bhphotovideo showing clearly the variance in prime lenses and their fields of view.

A 100mm lens at f/2.8 will have much shallower depth of field than a 35mm at f/2.8. Also, telephoto lenses tend to flatten features and compress space, making the background elements appear much closer and larger than a wide-angle lens would. This is why an 85mm is a popular choice for portraiture; it has good background separation due to shallow depth of field, and will flatten a subject’s features slightly for a more flattering image. Wide angles will exaggerate perspective, and will make subjects appear distorted, but they can capture a larger area and are well-suited to architecture, landscapes, and other types of photography where dramatized elements are wanted.

Keep in mind that sensor size will affect the effective captured and that lenses are commonly given a 35mm equivalent focal length for use with different formats, such as a DSLR with an APS-C sensor. A 50mm lens mounted on such a camera, with a 1.5x crop factor, for example, will have an equivalent focal length of 75mm. This doesn’t mean that the specific qualities of the lens have changed, a 50mm is still a 50mm, just that the area captured is similar to that of a 75mm lens on a full-frame camera, as if you had cropped the image in post to capture the same angle of view.

Some manufacturers take the popularity of crop-sensor into account when making lenses. This means that some prime lenses work properly only on APS-C or smaller sensors and will not provide full coverage when using a full-frame camera. This does allow lenses to be much smaller than they would need to be or to achieve equivalent focal lengths that are desired. Fujifilm does this with their APS-C mirrorless camera series by releasing 23mm, 35mm, and 56mm lenses, which are equivalent to the popular, 35mm, 50mm, and 85mm lenses on full-frame cameras.

If you do own a crop-sensor camera and your brand offers full-frame options, you should consider whether you would like to eventually upgrade to the larger sensor later on. If you do, crop-sensor lenses will not work on your later camera, though full-frame lenses will work properly on crop-sensor cameras. Purchasing full-frame-compatible glass now can save you time and money later. Lenses like Nikon’s 50mm f/1.8G and Canon’s EF 50mm f/1.8 II are great budget options with wide maximum apertures that can dramatically expand a beginner’s capabilities compared to a kit .

Massive Aperture: Prime lenses can have very huge apertures compared to other lenses.

The fixed focal length makes do with the clunky zoom in and out mechanism. However, their huge aperture sizes do more than just compensate for having a fixed focal length.

The maximum aperture range starts at f/1.4 or even f/1.2. That means during a clear day light, you will be able to shoot at speeds beyond 1/1000th of a second at ISO 100 thus resulting in very sharp, very clear images. Even during twilight situations, you will be able to shoot at 1/125th of a second, which is still a safe range for hand-held shooting.

Depth of Field: With great aperture, comes great Bokeh.

Bokeh is a Japanese term that denotes the way the lens aesthetically renders the out of focus points in a frame.

You'll notice that all prime lenses have an F-number next to them (Canon 50mm f1.8, for example). The F-number refers to the aperture, which is the hole that lets the light into the camera. The lower the lower the F-number, the larger the hole, so the more light it can let in. The F-number F1.2 and F1.4 lenses are the largest aperture lenses available for most DSLRs and compact system cameras, and because they let in bags of light, they allow for fast shutter speeds and they create lovely Bokeh. As focal lengths increase, however, larger apertures require more complex engineering and weightier glass – which translates to higher prices.

Bokeh effect works great especially in portraits. Have you ever seen those fantastic portrait shots in magazines? The ones that have their subject in focus but the background appears to have disappeared into a pleasing blurry evanescence. With a prime lens, taking such shots will be as easy as shooting from a point and shoot camera. The massive 1.4 aperture makes it very easy to keep the object alone in focus and blur all the other background and foreground points thus creating a very tight and shallow depth of field. Even at f/1.8, this still works great.

Use(s) of a prime lens.

There is more to a prime lens than what meets the eye.

The use(s) of prime lens(es) are many but I’ve listed a few of the common uses to help you get a grasp of what’s it’s mainly used for.

To Freeze motion

Since the large apertures allow a lot of light, you have a lot of room to crank up the of the camera. Now that you will be able to shoot at 1/1000th of a second in the broad day light, it makes it a lot easier to freeze motion. This is especially handy while shooting outdoor events, , kids, babies, etc., where you cannot really have a control of people’s motion. Thank god for prime lens.

Macro photography

Shooting images of still tiny objects is very much possible with a prime lens. Flowers, coins, miniature models of cars, people, etc., are all very interesting objects that you can try to shoot with a prime lens. You might want to crop the image closer to get a better composition in post processing.

Portrait photography

Personally, I feel this is the number one use of a prime lens. The moment I have to shoot a portrait, the first thing I do is fix up a prime lens on my camera. is all about getting the model’s vision in focus and a prime does just that for you. Set the focus point on the eye of the model and let the auto focus do the rest of the work.

Still Life

Your subject isn’t going anywhere, so you’re not going to miss that perfect moment by swapping lenses. Plus, you can usually physically move closer to your subject. Besides, that wide maximum aperture comes in handy for creating that soft background in a still life photo.

Too much of a good thing

…is a bad thing, right? That applies to our prime lens too. If you want to get closer but can’t physically move closer, you’ll have to change the lens. In some scenarios, the time spent swapping out lenses can mean missing the money/best . Buying a set of prime lenses to cover different focal lengths also means you’ll have more gear to carry around.

The big aperture size can sometimes cause an overload in the output of our images; however, there are ways to tackle this.

While shooting portraits, keep your distance from your subjects. If you absolutely have to get close, make sure you turn down the aperture size to a 2.8 or 3. When you are focusing on the eye of your model, remember that the tip of the nose lies in the foreground and that may lead to a blurred nose tip in your image.

If you are shooting under bright sunlight, you might end up over exposing your images. To battle this, you will simply have to increase the shutter speed of the camera. You can safely increase the shutter speed up to 1/2000th of a second or even more to cut the amount of light coming in. Alternately, you can also try decreasing the aperture size a bit.

While trying out the macro possibilities of a prime lens, the camera might fail to auto focus when you get too close. For this, just position yourself a bit far from the subject and crop the image later in post processing to get the desired composition. If you must get close to the subject, use manual focus on the lens and adjust the focus ring. Prime lenses fail at taking macro shots of insects mostly because you will end up scaring them away at such a close distance with your camera.

Once you've got yourself a prime, put it to work in a variety of different situations and you'll find they're actually pretty versatile. A 70mm, 90mm or 100mm F2.8 macro prime lens, for instance, is primarily designed for taking incredibly detailed shots of subjects extremely close to the lens – insects, flowers and the like – but it will also work very well for portraits of people standing a few paces away, as it’ll keep the subject’s face in sharp focus while blurring the background. As with all camera kit, the best way to figure it out is to keep using it as much as possible.

If you’ve got any questions or submissions to make, we recommend you send us an email and we’ll be prompt in responding.

As always, enjoy your photographic journey and keep shooting!

Cheers, Shika.

Contributing photographers:

Melissa Bryant

Gerard Nartey,

Charles Pacque

George Ofei ,

Nana Yaw Wusu Afriyie

Joseph Caryle Amoateng

References: www.stuff.tv,

Bhphotovideo,

Shawacademy, twenty20.com

500px

Photo details in order of appearance:

Cover photo - taken from twenty20 (no details)

Girl on fence - sigma 35mm 1.4, Canon 6D, f/1.4, ISO 200,

Bokeh - f/2.2,1/200s/, ISO 100,50mm, Canon t5i

Freeze motion – (no details)

All legs -Canon t2i, 60mm, F/11, 1/200s, ISO 400

Portrait - 35mm, 1/640s, ISO 200, F/1.4 Vehicle -50mm. f/3.2, 1/4000s, ISO 500