Zoom Photography - There Is A Right Way And A Wrong Way!

Here is a quick photo tip about zooming... A zoom lens can be a valuable addition to your photo arsenal.

There is an old saying that says, "If your photography isn't good enough, get closer!"

But, there are dozens - or more likely hundreds of reasons why you may not be able to get closer! Enter the zoom lens.

It allows you to get closer to your subject, without changing position. In many situations, this is vital.

We all know that. But, now with digital cameras, you now have two ways to zoom! The bad news is, they are not both of equal value.

The way you zoom can dramatically alter your photos! With most digital cameras you have two choices.

First, you can zoom optically. By that I mean actually put a zoom lens on the camera.

Zooming optically actually lengthens and shortens the distance between the lens elements and the sensor. This in turn will magnify or decrease the size of the image as it enters the camera - before it gets to the sensor.

The downside is that we need a zoom lens and they can be expensive. Particularly if you want to get a quality zoom lens. And you should, cheap zoom lenses have aberrations that can ruin an otherwise good photo.

If we don't have a zoom lens, we go for the second option which is the digital zoom.

Many digital cameras will allow you the choice to zoom optically with your lens... or zoom digitally with a function built into the camera.

While zooming digitally is a function available on some digital cameras, in reality it doesn't zoom at all. It shoots the photo in normal size, then crops it and magnifies the smaller image. This creates an artificial close-up.

All of this is done in the camera, so it appears that it zoomed in on the subject. But it didn't.

While the final image may be larger, and possibly even look OK in the viewfinder; it is a VERY substandard image and should be avoided. If you try to blow it up to put on the wall, it completely falls apart.

There is a better option and surprisingly, it uses a very similar tactic.

The best option is to have a zoom lens, (actually, the ultimate best option would be to have a fixed lens designed for that distance) but if you don't have one, you would be better off taking the photo normally and later cropping it with photo editing software such as Photoshop or Gimp.

While the technique is similar to digital zooming, the quality is much higher.

So the bottom line would be, when zooming, use a zoom lens, not a digital function. Or, take the shot normally and them crop and enlarge in your photo editing program. This photo tip will make you zoomed images much better, try it! For more information, check out the resource box!