Hurray! Foot zoom!

[Innocence]

Heya all!

After a lot of questions at you guys and learning a lot (!), my 400D arrived hee hee. I have been reading the manual.
I bought it with an EF 50 1.8. It feels strange having to move to zoom.

Sorry just had to share my excitement with you all haha.
Bye!

 

[markc]

Very cool. I hope you enjoy it.

I personally think that the 50mm is a great lens to learn on. Focal length has a much bigger impact on an image than just having to move, so getting used to just one first can help with your composition. You generally should choose your focal length based on what it's going to do for the image and them move to frame.

http://www.ctlow.ca/Photo/FocalLength.html
http://www.hash.com/users/jsherwood/tutes/focal/focal.html

 

[fmw]

Very cool. I hope you enjoy it.

I personally think that the 50mm is a great lens to learn on. Focal length has a much bigger impact on an image than just having to move, so getting used to just one first can help with your composition. You generally should choose your focal length based on what it's going to do for the image and them move to frame.

http://www.ctlow.ca/Photo/FocalLength.html
http://www.hash.com/users/jsherwood/tutes/focal/focal.html

You bet. Marc makes an excellent point. Novice photographers tend to view zooms as framing tools. It is a natural misconception. They aren't. We should still frame with our feet. The zoom is a perspective changing tool. Making very small framing adjustments with the zoom is fine but it doesn't take much to change perspective - particularly with the zooms that go from wide angle to telephoto. Think of a zoom as a small collection of fixed focal length lenses in a single package. That's the way you should use them.

Congratulations on the new perspective tool, by the way.

 

[Arch]

congrats!.... and i completely argee with the above comments.... enjoy :thumbup:

 

[Iron Flatline]

Yeah, and having to foot zoom makes you interact with your subjects differently.

 

[Innocence]

haha thanks!

I have noticed a few things and I think it warrants a new topic, but on the subject of foot zoom, I am finding that sometimes I want to step back to get more into the frame but I hit a wall haha. I guess that's when the wide angles come in.

For me the isn't wide enough for general use haha (esp indoors where you can't step back futher!) But it's great for getting up close! (My mom thinks I'm nuts cos I've already taken about 100+ pics of her! haha)

Think of a zoom as a small collection of fixed focal length lenses in a single package.

haha hey that's smart I've never heard that before.

blurry ><

 

[Don Simon]

Think of a zoom as a small collection of fixed focal length lenses in a single package. That's the way you should use them.

Interesting comment. I've always tended to set my zooms to the focal lengths I like in prime lenses (whether on SLR primes or on point-&-shoots)... i.e. 24mm, 36mm, 50mm etc. I'm not really sure whether there's any logic to this, but I do it anyway

 

[markc]

Interesting comment. I've always tended to set my zooms to the focal lengths I like in prime lenses (whether on SLR primes or on point-&-shoots)... i.e. 24mm, 36mm, 50mm etc. I'm not really sure whether there's any logic to this, but I do it anyway

I do too, though I only have one zoom left and I rarely use it. But it's what I recommend, especially when learning and all you have is the kit lens. By shooting just certain focal lengths, it's easier to see the difference between them.