Weekly poll: which is the best focal length for telephoto cameras?
- V
- Vegetaholic
- mE0
- 01 Nov 2019
3x is perfect balance for zooming not to far not to close, 5x definitely too much
- f
- funkboy
- mZt
- 01 Nov 2019
uhm, as in so many things, "3x" etc doesn't mean much...
what's the base focal length?
In my case, as an amateur photographer for 20 years, I'd be very happy with an optical zoom that covers (in "classic" 24x36 terms) about
20-85mm
a.k.a. "~4x" if you must...
- H
- Hildr
- pnK
- 30 Oct 2019
Dolanescu, 30 Oct 2019a wide camera is only needed for a selfie...
for you a se... moreI just say that for selfy an wide angle is not good. I do all my selfies with the x2 camera for no distorted forehead or nose.
So no, even if people use wide camera for selfy, they are not good for. Selfy are self portrait, for which you apply the same rules than for portrait if you look for a good result. Selfies were not invented with smartphone you know and were done with camera withe long focal far before wide angle exist, with better result.
Wide angle for selfy are just good if you want to stick the maximum of people in it, but then, it's not a selfy anymore, but a group photo.
And wide angle have a lot of use, for macro, landscape, some portrait, when you want to emphasis on an object, and group photo =)
- Dolanescu
- qF@
- 30 Oct 2019
Hildr, 29 Oct 2019You especially don't want a wide camera for portrait, a tel... morea wide camera is only needed for a selfie...
for you a selfie = portrait?
- H
- Hildr
- pnK
- 29 Oct 2019
Dolanescu, 28 Oct 2019a wide camera is only needed for a selfie...You especially don't want a wide camera for portrait, a telephoto is far better to reduce distortion and increase bokeh. You use a wide camera on a portrait only to include it with other objects in special composition where you play with the distortion, but the classical portrait will be better done with a 80-100mm focal lens.
- Denis Thomas
- 3Ag
- 29 Oct 2019
Dolanescu, 28 Oct 2019a wide camera is only needed for a selfie...Landscapes disagree with you.
- Denis Thomas
- 3Ag
- 29 Oct 2019
I would say around 28mm but any camera will do with great background separation. Also you can always get closer to your subject if needed.
- Denis Thomas
- JbG
- 28 Oct 2019
Jon (SWE) , 28 Oct 20193x or perhaps rather somewhere between 3 and 3.5 would prov... moreBecause always, an optical zoomed photo has better details than the regular one on faraway objects.
That's hardly a cheat.
- J
- Jon (SWE)
- mhB
- 28 Oct 2019
3x or perhaps rather somewhere between 3 and 3.5 would provide a good focal length for portraits.
It would also help capturing details that the eyes can see but where the main camera might fall short.
Zooming in on faraway objects is in my perspective a cheat. Why would anyone need that for normal fotography. Why capture things the eye can't see? One might just as well google it.
For wild life study and some art fotography it makes sense. For normal fotography I would say it is quite pointless.
- P
- PookiePrancer
- j$3
- 28 Oct 2019
Here's the problem with 2X lenses though: as implemented by Samsung, the dedicated 2X lens is SELDOM used. In anything but bright light, the camera defaults to the main 1X sensor and digital cropping, as the digitally cropped image is still better than what the 2X lens produces natively. So you might as well step up to 5X for optical magnification; at that point, digital cropping can't keep up.
- P
- Perperek
- 0IQ
- 28 Oct 2019
5x optic zoom added with digital and hybrid software -actualı 5axis stabilization than a good sftware can exactly reach to 100x zoom ina 40-100mp sensor.
- R
- RealLifePhones
- gxp
- 28 Oct 2019
Props first: Great and really well thought article!
I don't get why people don't understand the folowing facts mentioned: «Thanks to “hybrid zoom”, you can make a 2x camera go to 5x. But there’s no way to make a 5x camera go to 2x.» & «That means you’re stuck at their designed focal length and everything else uses some form of digital zoom.»
Nowadays even midrangers use up to 48MP so 2x digital zoom has almost no quality loss. And 3x optical zoom enables hybrid zoom up to 10x which is enough for 99.999% of photos taken. Plus 5x hybrid looks a lot better with 3x instead of 2x optical support.
But people only seem to care about higher numbers on the spec sheet, smh.
- H
- Hildr
- pnK
- 28 Oct 2019
80mm, so x3 or around is best for portrait! Would love to have it instead of the x2 on my Xperia 1.
In the article, it is said you can go x5 with digital zoom from a x2, but not digital x2 from a x5. Yet you can digital x2 from main camera and voila... that was not a really smart sentence.
- Whackcar
- syr
- 28 Oct 2019
Mikey, 27 Oct 2019Name one 3x or 5x that captures even decent 4K videos. I'll... moreMost of them can take good 1080p videos, which is fine for most people. When it comes to zooming, range is far more important than resolution.
- M
- Mikey
- 6jq
- 27 Oct 2019
Name one 3x or 5x that captures even decent 4K videos. I'll wait.
- S
- Simon
- 7AH
- 27 Oct 2019
The purpose of zoom for me is to capture distant objects with decent clarity. I don't see absolutely any point in 2x zoom, and barely any point in 3x zoom - for such small close-ups you might as well use digital zoom, as it's barely doing anything to help you capture distant objects.
5x is where zoom begins to make a point to me, and might also be the sweet spot for smartphone photography, as something like 8x would probably require adjustable focal length already.
- ?
- Anonymous
- 3Jn
- 27 Oct 2019
I voted x2 because i thought the others were overkill on a phone. After reading comments i wish i had voted x5 now as there is a logic in using digital zoom under x5 as there is little to no quality loss and then if you need more you have the option to go x5 without loss of quality. so yeah x5 zoom makes sence.
- B
- B0B
- dNg
- 27 Oct 2019
5x and a 108MP main shooter would be perfect. The digital zoom of that one gives good enough results for up to 5x zoom.