What does the "wideness" of the lens mean on a camera?

Question

I apologize in advance I don't know the correct terminology for anything... but I want a camera with the capacity to make a landscape / architectural shot "bend" so to speak. Does this have to do with the "wideness" of the lens? For example most higher end Kodak's have a 35 mm lens as opposed to the Nikon one I'm looking at which has 27 mm. What difference will this make?

Answer 1

wide refers to the angle of view of a lens.  A lower focal length (the figures in mm you mentioned) will indicate a wider angle of view.  As such the nikon with the 27mm lens will be wider than the kodak with the 35mm.

Be careful to make sure that the focual length is expressed in a universal standard, I suspect that the two cameras refer to the focal length as would be equivalent on a 35mm type camera.

If you want to bend the shot, you need a fisheye lens which will distort the edges more and more as you move out from the centre to the edge.  This is a nice novelty effect, but can be overused, and if you are looking for technically correct landscapes or architectural photos then you probably want an extreme wide angle lens (such as 24mm equivalent or even wider)

I use a technical lens called a tilt shift (aka perspective control) which allows you to bend lines to counteract perspective or increase, decrease sharpness over a vast plane.   These are pretty expensive and are only really made for SLR or medium format cameras, some large format cameras have the required movements built in to the camera body rather than the lens.

It really all comes down to how much you have to spend, and how much kit you want to carry.

Compacts such as the Ricoh Capilo GX100 offer a very wide angle lens (24mm equivalent)

If you want something more extreme, or with fisheye or tilt/shift then you need an SLR.

Answer 2

Wideness can mean the wide angle view.  It can also refer to a big lens opening or aperture, as in, "He has a wide aperture lens" or "I shot wide open."

But in dis case, U want a wide angle lens to get a bit of distortion that bends, and yes that has to do with a wide angle lens or the "wideness" of da lens.

U appear 2 B looking a point and shoots cameras with zoom lenses.  The Nikon at 27mm will be wider then the Kodak, much wider.  Note though that these companies try to correct the lenses to avoid the bend.

U should be lookin' at an SLR with a wide angle lens around 10-15mm if U want the bend effect, possibly even a fisheye lens.

But since U R lookin' at a point and shoot, I say, get the one that will take a lens adapter on da front, like a .45x wide angle adapter.  The cheap adapter will give U the bend U are looking for.  I know because I have a cheap lens adapter for my camcorder and it makes the bend like U describe.

Answer 3

Here you go. I hope it is helpful.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/little_pook...

Note: taken with Canon 5D, which is a full frame model.