Photography equipment - good websites, books?

I want to learn more about the technical side of photography. The equipment - lenses in particular. I'd like to learn what different lenses are used for, what you can do with them, what the differences between them are, what exactly the "numbers" on lenses mean... You get the idea. So anything would help. Websites, books, tutorials, videos... Anything.

agreed

I would recommend John Hedgcoe's books on photography. I started out with these and they cover a lot of material. Photo.net has a ton of info in their forums as well.

You;ve asked this twice now in a matter of with: "Scott Kelby's Digital Photography Boxed Set, Volumes 1, 2, and following books are also a good complement "Understanding Exposure: How to Shoot Great Photographs with a Film Or Digital Photography: Secrets of Posing & Lighting" http://www.amazon.ca/Portrait-Photography-Secrets-Posing-Lighting/dp/157990548X/ref=sr_1_17?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1321632840&sr=1-17

Don't particularly care about reviews they're almost always biased. You see professional reviewers can never slate equipment, as then the manufacturers won't lend them pieces to review in the future. Owners rarely give negative reviews as there is a psychological barrier, either that or they have got a lemon and give an excessively negative review. I personally prefer to look for a nice unbiased technical opinion on things. Canon are very good at providing information, the Canon Online camera museum, is very useful, Canon also produced a series of books called 'EF Lens Work' is really useful, as it's no nonsense technical information. There are three volumes in total, with the third volume published in its ninth edition now. Now whether a lens is good or bad, is often down to experience, and an understanding of lens physics. You will overall find prime lenses will produce better images because they are simply easier to engineer. You'll find cheap telephoto lenses are bad because telephoto lenses need expensive and exotic materials to produce high performance. You'll notice that zoom lenses rarely go faster than f2.8 and those that are f2.8 are hideously expensive, this is because larger amounts of exotic glass is needed to make lenses with bigger apertures.

The numbers on lenses mean focussing distance from some centimeters to infinite, the aperture and the depth of field in relation to both. In the lens front is the brand, lens diameter, wider aperture and serial number. Here you can learn some about

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