Today is Pancake Day. Whether you're going to spend your evening flipping bits of fried batter or not is neither here nor there because the kinds of pancakes we're interested in on Pocket-lint are ones you can strap to the front of your camera - pancake lenses, and if you don't know what a pancake lens is, then you're in the right place.
A pancake lens is a general term for short-barrelled camera lenses that have a very flat, thin shape making them lightweight and compact. They're used with DSLR cameras or hybrid models, like the Micro Four Thirds cameras from Olympus and Panasonic, and are favoured by shutterbugs who are looking for a relatively small camera with a pint-size lens system to match. The sweet moniker really only refers to the physical shape of the lens, rather than any special effects that they produce.
They tend to be be normal or slightly wide lenses, usually with a focal length of around 40-50mm, while the maximum aperture is generally about f/2.8, or slightly faster. They're also what's generally known as prime lenses, ie: that they are of a fixed focal length. So, there's no zooming in and out.