From the course: DSLR Video Tips: Cameras & Lenses
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Understanding f-stop
Rich Harrington: One of the most important numbers when it comes to really getting to know your gear is the f-stop number, and you could typically find this right on the front of the lens. Now, it's going to be expressed as basically a decimal point, and on some prime lenses, it's going to be down to 1.4, 1.2, but on a longer lens, 2.4, 2.8, that's a really good high quality lens. Robbie Carman: It is, yeah. Basically, the way that f-stops work is that the lower that number is, the more light that's let into the camera. It's a little counterintuitive. You'd think that a bigger number would mean more light, but no, it's actually quite the opposite of that. So if you had a lens that had an f-stop of say 2.8, you are letting in a lot more light than say an f-stop of 5.6. Rich: Yeah, so when we are looking at lenses, this number is important, particularly when shooting in a low light situation or with a shallow depth of field. But where people run into problems is when they're using their…
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