Bodies, lenses and light, read on their published figures
An equivalent focal length is arithmetic,
never a measurement.
Mirrorless bodies and DSLRs, compacts, action cameras and camcorders, drones and gimbals, the zooms, primes and macro lenses that go in front of them, studio flash and continuous light, softboxes and backdrops, tripods, heads and plates — and the filters, hoods, straps, bags and cells ordered the following week. Compared on the lines that settle what a piece of equipment can do: what an equivalence calculates rather than measures, which of the two apertures in f/3.5-6.3 applies at the long end, what a guide number depends on before it is printed, and what a declared load leaves out. Priced on your own country's Amazon.
- Categories covered
- 52
- Products reviewed
- 149
- Accessories & spares
- 101
The whole catalogue, family by family
Pick the job you are doing
28 families of hardware, 24 of filters, supports and spares. Each hub below compares one of them, opening on a plain answer to “what should I actually buy?” — followed by the published line that family is most often bought against by mistake.
- Mirrorless cameras Sensor format decides the lenses, and the lenses outlast the body
- DSLR cameras An optical finder and a mature lens catalogue, both sold used
- Compact cameras A fixed lens, and the aperture at the long end is the real specification
- Action cameras Sealing depth, mount ecosystem and how long it records before it stops
- Instant cameras The film format is the running cost, and it is chosen at the till
- Camcorders Long recording, a real zoom rocker, and audio inputs a body lacks
- Webcams Resolution is the least of it; the frame rate and the lens decide
- Camera drones Take-off weight decides which rules apply to you, before anything else
- Gimbal stabilisers Payload is the specification, and balancing is the skill it demands
- Standard zoom lenses The lens that stays on the camera, and its aperture tells you how it was built
- Telephoto lenses Reach is easy to buy and hard to hold still
- Wide-angle lenses A bulbous front element decides whether filters are possible at all
- Prime lenses One focal length, and usually the widest aperture the money buys
- Macro lenses The magnification ratio is the specification, and 1:1 is the dividing line
- Studio flash units Watt-seconds describe stored energy, not the light that lands
- On-camera flashes A guide number depends on the sensitivity and coverage behind it
- LED video lights Colour accuracy is published as an index, and it is worth more than brightness
- Ring lights One shadowless look, and the diameter is what changes it
- Softboxes The mount ties every modifier you will ever own to one system
- Light tents A box of even light, sized by the largest thing you will put in it
- Photo backdrops Material decides whether it creases, and creases are what you edit out
- Camera tripods Folded length, maximum height and a load figure that is static
- Monopods One leg, for the places where three are not allowed
- Camera sliders Travel is shorter than the rail, and the rail is what you carry
- Field monitors Brightness in nits decides whether it can be used outdoors at all
- Teleprompters Beam-splitter glass costs light, and the reflection has to be controlled
- Photo printers The ink set and the paper sizes matter more than the engine
- Film scanners Optical resolution is the real figure; the interpolated one is arithmetic
- Tripod heads The head is rated separately from the legs, and the lower figure governs
- Light stands Maximum height, folded length and a spigot size that decides what mounts
- Quick release plates A profile is a shape, and only one of them is published as a standard
- Camera cages A cage is cut for one body, and the port cutouts are the specification
- Reflectors and diffusers Diameter, surface and whether anything holds it but a hand
- Flash triggers A trigger belongs to a system, and the system is named on the box
- Flash diffusers A small modifier on a small flash is still a small source
- Lens adapters An adapter fills a gap in millimetres, and only in one direction
- Teleconverters Reach is bought with light, and the arithmetic is published
- Close-up lenses Dioptres screw on and cost no light, which is the whole appeal
- UV and protection filters On a digital sensor this is a glass lid, and it should be sold as one
- Polarising filters The one effect no editing reproduces, and it costs light to use
- ND filters Three notations for one quantity, and the box may use any of them
- Lens hoods Cut for one field of view, which is why a generic one vignettes
- Lens caps Front, rear and body caps are three different parts
- Lens cleaning kits Air first, then a dry cloth, and a liquid only when both have failed
- Camera straps The attachment is the part that fails, and it is the part least described
- Camera backpacks Internal dimensions decide what fits, and they are published less often
- Camera hard cases A sealing rating and a drop rating are two separate claims
- Camera rain covers Sized by lens length, and the eyepiece opening decides the rest
- Camera batteries Capacity in watt-hours is the figure that travels, and it is printed on the cell
- Battery grips Two cells and a second set of controls, cut for one body
- Remote shutter releases Cable, infrared or radio — and the socket is proprietary
- Grey cards and colour targets A reference is only a reference if it sits in the same light as the subject
How this site works
Three rules, and every page obeys all three
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Sequenced on what the maker published, never on what it pays
What a product pays plays no part in where it sits. Where the cheapest ball head in a family is the right answer for the camera going on top of it, that is what the page says — and where a dearer lens earns its price only because its aperture holds at f/2.8 across the whole range rather than closing to f/6.3, the page says that instead, in those words.
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The number that settles it, kept in the maker’s own words
A filter thread given in millimetres beside the ⌀ symbol, a mount named rather than implied, both ends of an aperture range written out, a guide number carried with the sensitivity and coverage it was quoted at, a stabilisation figure kept beside the protocol that produced it, a declared load kept apart from any claim about wind or vibration. These are the lines that settle what a piece of equipment can do, and each one appears here in the unit its maker used, credited to the document it came from. A figure nobody published is recorded as missing rather than filled in.
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Pointed at the Amazon that serves your own country
One button opens the same reference on the Amazon of the country you are browsing from, priced in the currency you pay in. Where a model has no offer there — and lenses in particular are stocked very unevenly from one market to the next, mount by mount — the page says so instead of pointing at an address that leads nowhere.