Lens News

If there’s one sure way to capture “dirty pictures,” it’s to shoot them with a filthy lens. And as you’ll see in the video below, there’s more to cleaning your expensive glass than simply wiping off the front and rear elements.

Another year has come and gone, which means it’s time for Shutterbug to once again pick our favorite cameras and lenses of the past 12 months. With so much great photo gear to choose from in 2017, it was a difficult task. The below list though is a good summation of the cameras and lenses Shutterbug’s editors and writers most enjoyed shooting with last year.

We’re all familiar with the notion that lenses in the 85-105mm range are the best choices for portrait photography, supposedly because of the “natural” way they render a subject’s facial features. But in the video below, you’ll see why one pro prefers to use a longer telephoto zoom for portraiture. 

There’s been a growing trend among digital photographers to use vintage lenses on modern mirrorless cameras. Why would you want to do that? Among other reasons is that old manual focus lenses often sell for a fraction of the cost of their current autofocus counterparts, and the necessary adapters are both abundant and affordable.

High-performance zoom lenses with fast maximum apertures are powerful tools for everyday shooting, and in this battle of the mid-range zooms, you’ll see a comparison between two of the best: The Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM, and Sigma’s 24-70mm f/2.8 DG OS HSM Art.

The term “bokeh” is a common buzzword among photographers these days, used to describe the subjective quality of defocused areas in an scene—either behind or in front of the main subject. A popular misconception is that it’s all as simple as “a faster aperture or a longer lens gives you better bokeh.” But as you’ll see in the video below, there’s a bit more to pleasing bokeh than that.