Most digital cameras have the ability to zoom. Most use a physical lens to do the zooming with many cameras boasting a ‘digital zoom’. If I ever see any of you actually using that feature, I will hunt you down and force you to revert back to Polaroids. All digital zoom does is enlarge the pixels, giving a grainy, poorly defined image. Don’t use it.

As for the zooming in and out with the lens, I wholeheartedly agree you should be using that button more than you probably are. Most people zoom in when they cannot get close to the subject. For example, when photographing an alligator, it’s probably not the best bet to stand 2 feet away from his mouth. However, a lot of people tend to zoom all the way out when taking portraits of people and then stepping closer to fill the frame. Unless you really don’t like the person, this is not a good practice.

When taking someone’s picture, step back as far as you can and zoom in to fill the frame up with their face. The more you can zoom, the better. Why? Let me show you. (Click on image for a full size view)

This is a picture of my daughter using the default camera lens position which is all the way wide. To fill the picture with her face, I had to get really, really close. Notice how distorted her features appear. This is because of…. well, let’s just say there’s a bit o’ math involved. But wider angles make objects that are closer to the lens appear larger than those at further away. The wider the angle, the greater that difference will appear to be.

Georgia’s nose is not that large, but since it’s closer to the camera than her eyes, it will appear much larger than it really is. Also, notice how wide her cheeks look compared to her chin and how squished the sides of her head appear.

Now, let me take a few steps back and zoom in as far as I can and take the same basic picture (click to enlarge).

Notice how much more in proportion Georgia’s face appears You can see the sides of her hair, her nose is much more in line size wise in regards to her face. She doesn’t look like a chipmunk hoarding acorns for the winter either. And another plus is the fact that the flash didn’t wash her out as well.

When I’m doing portrait photography, I usually zoom in as much as I can in order to flatten the perspective and flatter my subjects. When I’m outside, I use the mac-daddy lens so I can zoom in even more (200mm!). This really squishes the perspective and is flattering to just about anyone.

So, the lesson here is this. Wide angles are good when you need to get a picture of a large group of people or a wide area such as a room or a sunset at the beach. But when you need to take a picture of a person or two, step back and zoom in instead.

Trust me, they will thank you for it later.