Patent ID: 7957070

Claim:
A zoom lens comprising: a first lens group having negative refracting power; a second lens group having positive refracting power; and a third lens group having positive refracting power, disposed in the order listed from an object side to an image side, wherein during zooming from a wide angle end to a telephoto end, the first lens group is moved and the second lens group is moved toward the object such that an air space between the first lens group and the second lens group decreases and such that an air space between the second lens group and the third lens group increases; and the first lens group is formed by a first lens which is a negative lens aspherically shaped on both sides thereof and having a concave surface facing the object and a second lens which is a positive meniscus lens aspherically shaped on at least a side thereof facing the object and having a convex surface facing the object, the first and second lenses being disposed in the order listed from the object side to the image side, the zoom lens satisfying the following Conditional Expressions (1) and (2) nd12>2.0 (1) νd12<21.6 (2) wherein nd 12 represents the refractive index of the second lens of the first lens group measured using a d-ray, and νd 12 represents the Abbe number of the second lens of the first lens group measured using a d-ray.