Definition: Long Focus Lens

Long Focus Lens

A long focus lens is a photographic lens which provides an image in which distant objects appear magnified. The distant objects appear closer because the long focus lens appears to compress the distance between objects. This is actually the result of perspective being distorted at the distant location. Objects appear to have more mass than they actually have because of the relative perspective.

Long focus lenses are one of three types of lenses where the relative distortion of perspective is crucial to the type of use to which the lens is put. The other two types are the normal lens, and the wide angle lens.