- Do you feel like your lens is inadequate?
Do you see other people's lenses and think,
I wish mine was just bigger?
If so, you might be suffering from Lens Envy.
In a study that I just made up, four out of three
filmmakers all are suffering.
Don't worry, we've got the cure for you. (beep)
So let's talk about the difference between a
cheap lens and an expensive lens.
On a cheap lens, you're gonna get a lower build quality.
This is gonna be cheaper plastic
and the lens part might not even be actual glass.
It might just be a nice piece of plastic,
whereas when you get an expensive lens,
you're going to be getting heavy duty,
sometimes weather-sealed lenses that have
heavy glass that's really really good for optics
and makes your image just look better.
That better glass is going to be much heavier
so depending on what you're doing,
you might want a more inexpensive lens
for travelling but if you want to get the best
image quality possible, you're gonna want
to get a more expensive lens with better glass.
The more you spend on a lens and the better
quality it is, is also going to
give you a better focus ring.
On cheaper, inexpensive lenses, that focus ring
can be really touchy, can't really let you do
more fine tuned focus adjustments and it might
even be noisy but the more you spend on a lens,
the quieter it's going to get, the smoother it's
going to get, and usually the bigger it's going to be
to allow you to move it fairly easily.
Another thing you get when you get a more
expensive lens is usually a lower aperture,
which is a bigger opening to shoot through
which lets more light in and gives you
a smaller depth of field and will blur that background
to get the bokeh effect that you want
so typically the cheaper lenses don't go down
really low in aperture, and the more you spend,
you're gonna get a lower aperture.
If you get a zoom lens, a cheap one will have
the aperture change as you zoom so
when you're all the way wide, you might be able
to shoot an aperture of 3.5 but when you're
all the way zoomed in, maybe you can only
go down to 5.6.
When you get a more expensive lens, usually
that aperture is constant so whatever the lowest
aperture is, you can shoot at, on the wide angle,
you can also shoot at that when you're fully zoomed in.
Next, the more you spend on the lens,
meaning, the better glass that's in it,
so you're going to get better color and optics
through that lens.
You're going to get better results when you have
a more professional grade set of glass
in that lens that you're using.
Next, using a more expensive lens can also
make you have a sharper image.
No, not that store in the mall that has all the
weird gadgets and the helicopters, but a sharper
image that you're looking at either in a photo or a video.
So, when you look at a side by side of a cheap lens
and a more expensive lens at the same focal length,
the one that's more expensive is usually
going to have a sharper crisper look to it.
Higher end lenses like the L Series lenses
from Canon also have some weather proofing,
so if you're going to be out shooting in the rain
or in some other kind of element like sand,
you're probably gonna want to spend more
on a lens so that water and sand and other debris
don't get into your lens, into the gears,
into the focus ring and mess it up.
The more you spend on a lens, you might also get
image stabilization which is a little IS switch on it
that will stabilize your lens either for
photography or for video.
When your handheld shooting video,
you're gonna want an image stabilized lens
to just help you that much more when you're recording.
Lenses from companies like Canon sometimes
have ultrasonic motors which will actually
autofocus faster and quieter than other lenses so
be on the lookout for those when you
get up in the higher models.
And lastly, the value of a lens sticks with it
longer than that of a camera body
so think about these as an investment
and don't be afraid to buy them second hand
or used from a camera store.
So that wraps up this video.
If you enjoyed this video and you want to
learn more about different camera gear
that I recommend that you use to start
shooting videos, just go over to
DIYVIDEOGUY.COM/GEAR
There's a free seven-part video course
that'll walk you through different budgets of gear.
If you have $150 all the way up to $10,000
what I recommend you end up getting
to make your videos so check that out at
DIYVIDEOGUY.COM/GEAR and I'll
see you in another video.
Peace.