Digital Camera + extra Zoom Lens?
21. Mar, 2010 
1 Comment
Hello
I have a Kodak Z812 IS, which has 10x optical zoom. There are threads allowing me to add an additional lens. If I was able to get a 2x lens, would that mean that my camera was capable of 20x optical? Or is there something major I am missing.
Also, how about if I got a macro lens, and added it while using 10x optical zoom?
Thanks!
Wow, thanks for the reply! This stuff seems a bit complex. Looks like I will be visiting the library again! 
Yes, you could actually do 24x the original view, but you couldn’t actually continuously zoom 24x; you have to take off the lens to get all 24x zoom.
If you added a 2x screw on adapter, you’d still have a 12x (It’s not 10x on your camera, but 12x) lens but with more magnification. What would happen is this: both the widest setting and the telephoto setting have been multiplied by 2. So the zoom itself with the 2x adapter remains a 12x zoom ration.
BTW, the Z812 IS actually has a 12x zoom lens! It has a field of view of 36mm to 432mm in 35mm equivalent. When you add the 2x screw-on lens, the zoom then becomes a 72mm to 864mm zoom (still 12x, because 864 divided by 72 = 12). Notice that the 864mm is now 24x 36mm though.
Thus, with the adapter on, the 864mm is 24 times the 36mm view, but the lens itself remains a 12x zoom (unless you remove the 2x adapter). Hope that makes some sense to you.
Now, if you add a macro lens (actually, it’s just a diopter lens), zooming should increase the working distance, that is, you can be further away and still get macro shots.