A wonderful world of inte rchangea ble camera lenses

01 Long range A telephoto lens is often the first additional lens new camera owners buy. It’ll give you more ‘reach’ than the camera’s bundled lens to capture distant subjects, but that’s not all. Shoot something closer using a large lens aperture and bit of zoom, and it’ll produce a silky blurred background, making you look like a portrait pro. 02 Low light A lens with a large aperture will let more light flow to the camera sensor, so you get sharper and less grainy photos at night. Maximum aperture sizes are measured on a counter-intuitive scale where lower numbers are better. f/2.8 is good, but an f/1.4 lens would make the ultimate low-light choice. More light also means you can use a faster shutter speed and still get bright shots, so they’re good for action. 03 Get close The lenses that come with these cameras will focus at fairly close range, but a dedicated macro – or close-up – lens can get you nearer still, while also magnifying your subject so it looks even larger in the final image. If your budget can’t stretch to a proper macro lens, an inexpensive adapter can enable many standard lenses to focus just as close. 04 Widening horizons The estate agent’s best friend, a wide-angle lens is great for shooting interiors and cityscapes, while a fisheye lens can often give a 180-degree field of view, though it does come with a distinctive bulging distortion effect. 05 The superzom If one lens could rule them all, this would be it. A superzoom lens will let you shoot wideangle scenes and far away subjects with a single lens, all at the twist of a zoom ring. But there are compromises for such versatility. Sharpness can often be low, and optical distortion relatively high.