Exploring Vlogging: Selecting the Best Cameras & Lenses

A Vlogger’s Guide To Camera Lenses

Richard Bennett

Nov 01, 2022• Proven solutions

The staple of any vlog is the talking headshot, a shot of the speaker talking directly to the audience. You can compose this shot with different kinds of lenses for your interchangeable lens camera.

But which kind of lens is the right lens for you as a vlogger?

In this article, I’m going to help you figure that out.

Part 1: Three Focal Length Groups: Wide, Standard, Telephoto
Part 2: Vlogging With Each Focal Length Group
Part 3: Crop Factor
Part 4: Focal Length Equivalency Table
Part 5: Aperture
Part 6: Vlogging With a Fast Lens
Part 7: Optical Image Stabilization

Three Focal Length Groups: Wide, Standard, Telephoto

There are three main ranges in focal lengths that camera lenses can be categorized into wide, standard, and telephoto.

Wide-Angle Lens

Wide-angle lenses can “see more.” They allow more of your scene to fit inside your frame. Objects that are closer to the lens appear much bigger while objects that are further away appear even smaller. Perspectives are also enhanced, making close objects and people that just make it into the sides of the frame appear more stretched out. Out of all the other ranges in focal lengths, wide-angle lenses will appear the least zoomed in.

Standard Lens

With standard lenses or normal lenses, you won’t get the stretched out objects or enhanced perspectives that you get from wide-angle lenses. Instead, standard lenses are meant to see scenes as the natural human eye is meant to see them. If you shoot a scene with both a wide-angle lens and a standard lens from the same position, you’ll notice that less of the scene fits into your frame. Standard lenses will appear more zoomed-in than wide-angle lenses, but less zoomed-in than telephoto lenses.

Telephoto Lens

Out of all the other ranges in focal lengths, telephoto lenses will appear the most zoomed in. This can be beneficial for the shooter who wants to get a closer shot of a scene without having to physically be in close proximity to the scene. Objects that are further away in the background also appear larger and closer than they would appear on wide-angle or standard lenses.

Vlogging With Each Focal Length Group

You can get your talking head footage using lenses from any of the three focal length groups. Depending on how you plan to vlog most of the time, though, one of the three focal lengths might be more suitable for you.

When to vlog with a wide-angle lens

Wide-angle lenses are the most commonly used lenses for vlogging. Wide-angle lenses are great when you need to be close to your camera. This might be the case for you if your recording space is small or if you want to film yourself as you hold your camera up with your own hand.

Being close to your camera not only gives you the option to use your camera’s built-in microphone, but it also gives you the option to make use of camera-mounted shotgun microphones.

When to vlog with a standard lens

Standard lenses are great when you have more space to be further away from your camera. The perspectives in your shot will look more natural through a standard lens, making your talking head footage feel more corporate or professional. You’ll also be able to get blurrier backgrounds using a standard lens versus a wide-angle lens.

Being further away from your camera, however, means that you’ll have to use a separate microphone positioned closer to you.

When to vlog with a telephoto lens

As telephoto lenses are even more zoomed in, you’ll need to be even further away from your camera to fit yourself inside your camera frame. Why would any vlogger ever need to be that far away from their camera? One word… teleprompter. If you want or need to stick to a script, you’ll have to be far away enough from your camera that it doesn’t appear like your eyes are scanning left to right. You then close in the distance with a telephoto lens.

In the above video, Marcos Rocha compares different focal lengths for talking head videos. Which focal length range do you like the look of?

Crop Factor

Focal lengths in camera lenses are measured in millimeters. You can vlog yourself handheld with a 24mm lens on a camera with a full-frame sensor (the sensor is the piece of hardware inside your camera that turns the light it receives into a digital image). But if you use a 24mm lens on a camera with a smaller sensor, like an APS-C sensor or even smaller Micro 4/3 sensor, more of you will get cropped out (see below).

In order to make up for the cropping that occurs, you will need to use a wider lens on cameras with smaller sensors to get the same shot you’d get with a full-frame camera.

Focal Length Equivalency Table

This table shows you the focal lengths needed to achieve the same shot between cameras with different sensor sizes. In order to take a shot as wide as the shot I took of myself with the 24mm lens on my full-frame camera, I would need a 15mm lens on an APS-C sensor camera or a 12mm lens on a micro 4/3 camera.

Focal Length / Sensor	Full Frame	APS-C	Micro 4/3
Wide (Handheld Selfie-Safe)	16mm	10mm	8mm
Wide (Handheld Selfie-Safe)	18mm	11mm	9mm
Wide (Handheld Selfie-Safe)	24mm	15mm	12mm
Wide	35mm	22mm	18mm
Standard	50mm	31mm	25mm
Telephoto	70mm	44mm	35mm
Telephoto	100mm	63mm	50mm
Telephoto	200mm	125mm	100mm

Aperture

The next thing to consider when you’re looking for a lens is the aperture, the hole (often adjustable) within the lens that lets light in. Aperture for camera lenses is measured in f-stops (f/1.4, f/1.8, f/2.0) - the smaller the f-stop number, the larger the aperture (bigger hole letting even more light in).

Because larger aperture lenses let more light in, they need a shorter time for cameras to compose an image. This is why larger aperture lenses are also called “fast” lenses.

Fast lenses are more expensive because they cost more to produce. There’s a lot more that goes into them, including larger and higher quality glass elements.

But do you even need a fast lens?

Vlogging With a Fast Lens

Pros of Vlogging With a Fast Lens

Better low-light performance
Better autofocus performance
Better “bokeh” (out-of-focus areas, like your background, having that nice blurry look that you see in a lot of movies)

Cons of Vlogging With a Fast Lens

More expensive
Moving subjects more likely to get out of focus when shooting with a large aperture
Better continuous autofocus performance needed when shooting moving subjects with a large aperture

Optical Image Stabilization

Finally, you’ll have to decide whether or not you want your lens to have built-in optical image stabilization (OIS).

OIS is very beneficial to have on a lens if you’re a vlogger who films mostly handheld footage. Although this technology adds to the price of your lens as well, it can greatly help you to capture smoother footage that may otherwise be shaky. Nikon calls this technology “Vibration Reduction” (VR) for their lenses.

In the above video, you can see how much OIS can help to stabilize your footage. MicBergsma simultaneously compares the footage between two GoPro Hero5 Blacks, one with OIS on and one with OIS off.

If, however, you are shooting most of your vlogs on a tripod, you won’t need a lens with OIS.

Looking for ways to set up your talking-head shot for YouTube with any of these lenses? Check out our post on 4 Ways To Set Up Your Talking-Head Shots For YouTube .

Richard Bennett

Richard Bennett is a writer and a lover of all things video.

Follow @Richard Bennett

How to Create YouTube Channel in Mobile [Personal & Business]

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The relevance of YouTube and the need to have a channel are visible with the rise in viewership. Having launched on February 14th, 2005, YouTube has become the 2nd most visited social media website according to Google statistics having a whopping over 2 billion users on the platform monthly.

As an entrepreneur or a company, one of the easiest and fastest ways of selling your brand or skill is via the YouTube platform. Thus, you must know how to make a YouTube channel on iPhone and how to make a YouTube channel on Android. Having overwhelming subscribers becomes an added advantage as not only will you and your business be known or recognized, YouTube has a way of appreciating and paying some of their influencers as well.

At this point, I know how hungry you are to kick-start your YouTube. This article will help guide you through creating a YouTube channel on your mobile, whether for personal or business purposes. Rather than scanning through, you should peruse through attentively.

Part 1: How to Make a Personal YouTube Channel on Mobile

Creating a YouTube channel on mobile is not a cumbersome one. It is as easy as ABC, and within split seconds you’ve created your own YouTube channel. The guideline entails the following steps:

The first step to setting up your personal YouTube channel starts with creating a Google account for those who don’t have any yet.
Whether you open your YouTube app or via the web browser of your phone, open the YouTube website.
On the top right-hand side of your mobile, tap on your profile image

Source: howtogeek.com

A drop-down menu will pop up. Click on your channel icon.
An option to create a new channel comes up. (For those who have a channel already, an alternative to manage your channel or video will show.)

An option to input your name pops up on the screen. Carefully insert your desired name and tap on Create.
If you would love to halt and resume later in the setting up, you can scroll down to click on the ‘set up later.’

Part 2: How to Create a Business YouTube on Mobile

The clarity on the relevance of YouTube in this dispensation when it comes to branding or business-boosting is immense. Many savvy entrepreneurs and business companies have come to the known for their beautiful advantages. With over 2 billion people trooping into the site monthly, making your brand come to the limelight in this social media implies reaching one-tenth of the users,i.e., if you play by the rules of strategically planning your business growth, the top. However, this article may not reveal the different strategies to adopt so you can become an influencer in your line of business; instead, it will start from scratch on how to get your YouTube business page started. How then can one create his own business YouTube account?

1. Signing into a Google account

To successfully start using the YouTube app, there is a need to sign officially into Google. If you’ve it in mind to have a separate Google account for your business account, you kick-start it at this stage.

However, you can still use your name to open a Google account and create a business YouTube account for subsequent use. The truth is that YouTube gives room for you still to make a business account with a business name thus, eliminating the need to use a business name in creating your Google account.

2. Creating a business name

Once you create a Google account, the next step is to make your business a YouTube account. This you do by either signing into your YouTube app or via the YouTube website in your mobile browser. Once logged in to the app interface, you will see the profile photo you used in creating your Google account or the initial letter of the first name you used on the top right-hand side of your mobile. Tap on it, and a drop-down menu will come up, tap on the ‘create a channel’ icon, which will lead you to another interface where you have the option to select ‘Get started’ or ‘No thanks.’ A tap on the get started will reveal an option to either create your channel using the name and image of your Google account or use a customized name.

Source: buffer.com

Selecting the custom name gives you the autonomy to use the brand or business name of your choice, after which you tap on the create option.

3. Customize your business page

At this point, you can design the layout by utilizing the appealing icon and banner of your choice, just as provided by the likes of Facebook or Twitter. The customized templates in Canva are there for you to design your page to your state.

I know you would be wondering how to go about this; YouTube can directly upload your artwork with a preview option available. You can crop your artwork to fit your page, making it look more professional.

To be emphatic, creating a business account is still simple but with professionalism. Remember you are selling yourself and your brand, and it is expedient to give your best on your page. Do well to describe your page as excellent as you can, let your activity in terms of photo and video uploads be of the best. This way, subscribers will not hesitate to hit the like and subscribe button. Good luck as you kick-start your business page.

Part 3: Five Tips to Start a YouTube channel

Carefully observe how YouTube channels function and possibly how entrepreneurs and business owners make waves in the YouTube industry. Then, sit down and watch either your mobile phone or computer and think about making a YouTube Channel on iPhone or understand how to create a YouTube Channel on mobile and earn money, especially to beginners. This way, you can make it envy to all becomes a significant challenge—however, the crucial tips in starting your own YT channel.

Identify Goal of Channel

What are you trying to achieve? Customer education, testimonials or do you want people to subscribe? Be clear on what you want your YouTube channel to do for your brand and how it fits into your overall marketing strategy.

Gather Content Ideas

Gather content, even before you make a YouTube channel on mobile. You can start with a series of videos talking about your company, products, or industry and then launch the channel once they are all done. If you can’t think of any content on your own, try searching around online to see if others have already created videos of this sort and have posted them online. Then, use those videos as examples when you make your content.

Logo and Thumbnail Design

How to make a logo for YouTube on mobile?

Once you are up with content creation, you will have to create a thumbnail for your video. Attractive and catchy thumbnails that persuade searchers to click on your video are critical. Here we will see how to create a logo for a YouTube video on mobile. For this purpose, Canva.com can create attractive thumbnails and a Catchy logo. Using this tool, you can create, edit and customize graphics for your YouTube videos.

Quality of Video is Important

Don’t just put up videos willy-nilly. Think about what content would work for your brand and audience. The content needs to be engaging, relevant, and inspiring so people will keep coming back for more videos. You don’t have to have the latest video equipment either – think about the type of content that would work best.

Choose Video Editing Software

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Lastly, you must use high-quality producing software. So we recommend Filmora Video Editor that offers a wide range of effects, themes, and titles. It lets you create professional-looking videos with various presets for quick editing. It incorporates support for most common video formats. If you’re looking for a straightforward but potent video editor, Filmora is your best option.

Conclusion

I firmly believe that at this point, understanding how to create a YouTube channel in mobile will be an easy one. We discussed ways of not just developing your YT channel but also how to give your page the best of professional work. This article is truly an eye-opener and contains from scratch the step-wise order of growing and learning how to make a logo for YouTube Channel in mobile and creating personal and business accounts to earn some money.