Nomenclature

[Killtimer]

Specifically the term "prime". I'm just getting back into serious photography after a very long hiatus... my last serious cameras were a Linhoff and a 'Blad, so a long time.
I'm delving into photography social media a bit and I've noticed that anything not a zoom is now called a prime. I always thought a prime lens was one that approximated the FOV of the human eye. Anything else was a telephoto, wide angle or zoom. I'm just curious when this changed, not that I'm surprised, most everything else has also changed.

 

[Unframed Dave]

I've always considered a fixed focal a prime, not based on anything, just a perception.

 

[iamdlewis]

I seem to remember in high school way back in the time before digital that we had prime and zoom lens. You would have a wide angle prime which was something less than 50mm, a wide angle zoom which was something that started wider than 50mm and it really didn't matter what the longest was. I am not sure what we considered telephoto because nobody had anything longer than a 75mm.

So I've pretty much always known fixed lengthens as Prime and anything with adjustable lengthens as zooms with a descriptor before of wide, standard or telephoto. Though I don't really know where telephoto starts or where wide ends. I feel that wide is <35mm with standard being 35-100 and telephoto >100.

 

[Killtimer]

I'm beginning to feel really old. Let me put it this way. I got out of the business just as digital was dawning, and I mean scanner based AV stuff, the consumer digital camera was still a dream. At that time not one of the majors, Canon, Nikon, Leica etc. even made a pro-grade zoom so the zoom/fixed focal length thing didn't really exist. In 25 years in business I only had a single zoom that I can remember... Actually might still have it along with a dozen or so Canon FD lenses in a box in the basement.

 

[Landshark99]

early on zooms were inferior to prime lenses, but there were a number of pro quality zooms available before the digital revolution, by the major camera companies

 

[Killtimer]

were a number of pro quality zooms available before the digital revolution, by the major camera companies

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on that. The first zoom that had anywhere near the resolution and contrast that would be useful was Vivitar. I know Canon had nothing and many of my contemporaries were Nikon users. There were many discussions on the relative merits of each, but I can't ever recall zooms being discussed. I will admit that 35mm was only about 10% of my shooting but I was an accredited Canon user and had access to their complete product line through the local service centre. I was out of the game by the '90s so no idea what happened after that.

 

[Landshark99]

Sorry but my memory is different than yours, in the early and mid seventies while trying to get my professional career started I managed one of the most important camera stores in Hollywood selling mostly to working pros of all styles. Quite a number of news and sport photographers bought those early zooms from Nikon and Canon. Funny you should mention the Vivitar because i was the main photo assistant on a Vivitar campaign. When I left the store and was shooting full time, I used only primes on my Nikons and Hasselblad(a camera which I hated), as I moved more heavily into medium format I shot only with primes on one my all time favorite workhorse camera, the Mamiya RZ67. At some point still before digital i switched to Canon for the occasional 35mm work and used both zoom and primes for those jobs. When digital arrived in the DSLR type cameras it became almost exclusively zooms plus maybe a 300mm. The main digital from this time was first Contax, only primes, Hassleblad primes, Leaf big zoom, back to Hasselblad and finally Phase One, along with switching back to Nikon for full frame only zooms and a 300F2,8, Now retired shooting Sony with primes and zooms just for me

 

[FowlersFreeTime]

Specifically the term "prime". I'm just getting back into serious photography after a very long hiatus... my last serious cameras were a Linhoff and a 'Blad, so a long time.
I'm delving into photography social media a bit and I've noticed that anything not a zoom is now called a prime. I always thought a prime lens was one that approximated the FOV of the human eye. Anything else was a telephoto, wide angle or zoom. I'm just curious when this changed, not that I'm surprised, most everything else has also changed.

I'm "new" to photography since beginning with an a6000 5 yrs ago. I have always heard of non-zoom lenses referred to as primes, so that's the nomenclature I know and accept.
I can only guess that "back in the day" "standard primes" were around 50mm, "wide prime" would be 35mm, and anything else would be unusual to encounter. Maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that nowadays there's more prime (non-zoom) lenses to choose from than ever before.

 

[Killtimer]

I used only primes on my Nikons and Hasselblad(a camera which I hated), as I moved more heavily into medium format I shot only with primes on one my all time favorite workhorse camera, the Mamiya RZ67. At some point still before digital i switched to Canon for the occasional 35mm work and used both zoom and primes for those jobs.

This has turned into a bit of a memory jogger. Same basic timeline very different progression in a totally different market. The first camera I used to make money was a Mamiya RB67 (Rotating Back) Awesome portrait/wedding system, but cumbersome on location. Then Mamiya 645, 'Blad and ended up doing mostly product and architectural with a variety of 4x5 full movement. No idea why I kept most of the 35mm when I sold the operation in the late 80s. Dug them up yesterday and will confess there are a pair of zooms in the box. A Vivitar 75-205 Macro that weighs as much as my a6700 and most lenses, and a Carl Zeiss Jena 35-135. I think some lens test are in order. Fun discussion.