A little confused about the numbers when talking about lenses. help!

[jarnld]

Hey there. I am just a bit confused when reading about different kinds of lenses. Could someone basically give me the anatomy of a lens' title???

Like this for example...

How does lens 1 compare to lens 2 in "real life terms"? What do the numbers represent???


2> Tamron 28-200 mm F/3.8-5.6 XR Di Aspherical IF Macro AF Lens F/Canon EF

2> Nikon 55-200 mm F/4-5.6G ED AF-S DX Nikkor Lens



Keep in mind I am just getting into photography and know nothing about lenses - at all. I just picked these two as examples off of a website.

Thanks for the help guys and gals!


Oh yeah...and I just got a Fuji S1 for next to nothing to start out on...anyone ever used one of these??



THANKS!

 

[Keith Gebhardt]

The 1st lense is a macro.. meaning rite on top of somthing for supurb detail. For example, a bug on a leaf.. you would use macro to make it blown up and extreme detail.

Basically in a lense you have the zoom range. In nikon lense case you have 55-200mm.

On every lense you have whats called an F Stop, which is read as F/#. in nikons case again, you have f/3.5.

Is called aperature.

The LOWER the F Stop the MORE LIGHT it allows in. The HIGHER the F Stop, the LESS LIGHT it allows in making it difficult for low light conditions.

For expample.. F/2.4 or 2.8 is good for low light, conditions. F/3.5-5.6 is alrite. not that good though. kinda difficult. F/6.3 would have to be pure sunlight. Anything above 5.6 would have to be a clear sunny day.

With that said, i would find a lense at least F/3.5 which most lens kits with cameras these days are f/3.5

Hope that helped clear some stuff up.

 

[Patrolman Pat]

Both lenses are zoom lenses. the first has a focal length from 28mm to a max of 200mm.

The F numbers are the maximum aperture sizes F3.8 will be at 28mm F5.6 will be at 200mm.

The lower the F number the better for most applications as lower numbers mean bigger apertures.

 

[itoncool]

2> Nikon 55-200 mm F/4-5.6G ED AF-S DX Nikkor Lens

Nikon = brand
55-200mm = focal length (this is zoom type)
f/4-5.6 = widest aperture (this is not the fix type)
G = doesn't have aperture ring, you can change it only from the body
ED = type of glass (different brand, different name)
AF(-S) = Autofocus (Silent)
DX = only for DX sensor (one of nikon digital sensor = smaller)

go to their website (tamron, nikon, etc) and you can find this information.