
The iris is used to narrow down the diameter. The diameter of the lens determines the maximum amount of light that can pass. Prime lenses have theirs fixed, and the elements only move for focusing. Zoom lenses change their point back and forth. Yet, wide-angle lenses can be surprisingly long. It’s practically impossible to design a lens with its point of convergence before the front element, but it can be behind that. This means that telephoto lenses must actually be longer (with the exception of mirror lenses). In technical terms, the focal length is the distance between the point of convergence of the lens and the sensor or film. A higher – “longer” – focal length gives a narrower crop of the scene.

A lower focal length gives a wider angle of view. In simple terms, focal length defines the amount of zoom.

The optical formula of a lens determines the image it can project onto a sensor. Some advanced and extreme camera lenses have formulas that weren’t possible until only recently. These are very similar throughout different manufacturers and have been developed long ago. There are some standard formulas, like the 50mm f/1.8 or f/1.4. The structure is the result of meticulous designing and testing. It’s made up of numerous single lenses and lens groups. Your camera lens is actually not one lens. It is one of your most powerful tools of expression – so it’s vital that you understand how it works. Through different optical formulas, it crafts the way the image is projected. The lens is the first encounter of the light with the camera. Photography is all that happens between these steps – and even before that.Īnd you, the photographer, have control over it. Then, through various ways of processing, you get your final image that is shaped to your taste. The camera lens collects light and projects it onto a light detector surface – film or digital sensor. Core Concept of CamerasĪside from the very first pinhole cameras (which don’t have glass), the two main parts of cameras are the lens and the light detector. The task for the photographer is to collect and capture the light in their own taste and form. It has very much the same properties as sound – it varies in wavelength, frequency, and amplitude. It gets reflected and absorbed.įor our eyes and cameras, light is a wave. It doesn’t take curves (at least practically for us, photographers). Without diving further into wild territories of physics, let’s make the basics clear. Photography would not exist without our understanding of light. Because these photographs are taken from different perspectives and at slightly different times, the result is work that has an affinity with Cubism, which was one of Hockney’s major aims – discussing the way human vision works.If we want to understand how does a camera work, we need to know how does light work. One of his first photomontages was of his mother. “Using varying numbers of Polaroid snaps or photolab-prints of a single subject, Hockney arranged a patchwork to make a composite image. He talks about his interest in photography and its effect on his paintings. The varied exposures of the individual photographs that make up each collage give each work a fluidity and movement that otherwise might not be found.” Juxtapoz Magazineįilmed at his Los Angeles home, Hockney is seen creating one of these photo-pieces, from the initial idea through to the finishing touches.

He then switched to photo lab-processed 35mm photographs and created collages that took on a shape of their own, creating abstract representations of the scenes he had photographed. His earlier collages consisted of grid-like compositions made up of polaroid photographs. “In the early 1980’s, English painter David Hockney began creating intricate photo collages that he called “joiners”.
