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The Complete Beginners Guide to the Zoom Lens

Chris Gampat
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09/08/2022
3 Mins read
Chris Gampat The Phoblographer Nikon z30 first impressions product images 2.81-1250s160

If you’re buying your first camera, congratulations! Welcome to the world of interchangeable lens cameras. You’re getting a zoom lens because it’s doing something your phone can’t do as well. Zoom lenses can be pretty awesome, but also keep in mind that they come with a host of things you need to learn. So we’re going into a few things every beginner getting a zoom lens should know.

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This guide will try to tackle almost everything there is to know about using and understanding a zoom lens. I’m reaching deep within myself and going far back to share info you need to know. 

Benefits of a Zoom Lens

Let’s first break down some of the benefits of a zoom lens:

  • Better framing: You can compose a scene a lot easier with various focal lengths vs what you can do with a single lens on your phone. New photographers do this by literally zooming in or out.
  • Optical zoom: Optical zoom gives you far better image quality than the digital zoom on your phone will do.
  • Better blurry out of focus areas: This is one of the best reasons to get a zoom lens.
  • You can capture moments further away: Ever wanted to get in on the baseball game that you’re at? Or have you ever seen a beautiful snowy owl and wanted a better photo of it? Well, a zoom lens helps you do that when you combine it with actually moving yourself.
  • Candid moments are easy: Capture candid moments of your family and friends without them even knowing that you’re there. This way you’re capturing the moment just as you see it instead of influencing what it looks like.
  • Pretty good ones are fairly affordable: The quality of zoom lenses have gone up over the years, and they’ve become very affordable because the quality has increased so much. Standard lenses that come as a kit with a camera can perform very well.

Drawbacks of a Zoom Lens

Let’s break down some of the drawbacks of your zoom lens so you know what you can and can’t do. For those of you at home reading that are more advanced, we’re focusing on really affordable, variable aperture zoom lenses:

  • Photography at night isn’t all that simple: Autofocus in low light and night can suffer. So too can the shutter speed. Shutter speeds are calculated in fractions of sections. The longer the duration, the more shaky your camera and hands can be. You’ve got to practice good handholding techniques in this case. 
  • Generally speaking, the image quality isn’t that good: Compared to a prime lens with a single focal length, you’re not going to get as good image quality. Those blurry out of focus areas also won’t be as creamy.
  • They can be big: one of the reasons why people forget about using interchangeable lens cameras in the first place is because of how big they are.
  • They encourage you to take photos carelessly: On the back of your camera, your photos might look really nice. But once you put them on a screen or a phone, you’ll see that you probably screwed up in some way or another. Always be careful. Years ago, this is why photographers often made people use prime lenses instead of zooms.

Best Practices on Getting Better Photos With a Zoom Lens

Now that you’ve got your new zoom lens, here are some of the best practices:

  • You should take a look at our free guide with essential terms in photography.
  • On the wider end, your lens will let more light in. On the longer (telephoto, zoomed in) end, it will let in less light.
  • A camera’s pop-up flash can be fun to use. But it’s not effective anywhere beyond 5 feet away.
  • Chances are that your camera and lens aren’t weather-resistant or waterproof. So be careful.
  • Always have the body of the camera covered. Think of the taking the lens off a bit like open heart surgery. Cover it up whenever you can.
  • The zoom lens is connected to your camera. It’s not a mind reader and your camera will only do what you tell it to. With that said, zoom lenses often have settings on them for things like image stabilization. Make sure that they’re activated. 

Stay tuned and stay subscribed to the Phoblographer as we’ll have more tips for you here on our website.

aperture beginners beginners guide Cameras image stabilization photographers Zoom Lens Zoom Lenses
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Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.
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