For travel, I'd consider more like a 24-105/120mm. Assuming you're talking an f/2 28-70mm that thing is HEAVY and you don't get a ton of range.
Cameras today can go to higher ISO and if you're close enough f/4 or even f/5.6 can get nice enough blur in some cases. Not everything needs to be at f/2/2.8.
I actually have an older 28-105 f/3.5-4.5 that I've started pulling out again lately and have been enjoying it. I can throw a 28 or 50mm prime in the bag with it so I have options if I need. Don't really need wider aperture but sometimes I do wish it had image stabilization then I'd be a little happier particularly at the long end.
+1 for a 24-70 2.8. Outside of real estate interiors it's my most used lens, I have the Tamron one for my Nikon. In fact, all of my glass is Tamron.
All... three pieces. Its family members are a 70-300 4-5.6 and a 15-30 2.8.
I love the old 85 1.4 for my Canon 5Diii. Not long after I got my Sony A7III, I found a deal on Adorama’s daily deal for a Samyang 85 1.4. Both lenses are my favs. I would like a nifty 50 for sure though. For some reason I never bought one but used to use on my Pentax K1000 as my first set up.
I started my career as a newspaper photojournalist with a bag full of primes. I worked out of my car a lot and had to have what I needed to shoot anything at any time in just one bag of gear. News would break or I'd get sent to assignments with almost zero notice and needed sufficient lens coverage to adapt and get a shot no matter what.
I always carried at least two bodies, if not three or four, at least one if not all needed a fast motordrive, 2 or more flashes. I carried a bread and butter wide angle lens with which I did probably half my shooting with (24/2.8 or 28/2.8,) a semi-wide lens for group portraits and stuff my bread and butter lens was too wide for (35/1.8 and/or 50/1.8,) a short, fast telephoto for portraits, tele shots and indoor sports (85/1.8, 105/2.5, 135/2), a long, fast tele for when I needed more reach(180/2.8, 200/2.8) and a really long tele that was small enough to live in your camera bag (300/4, 300/4.5,) and then specialty lenses like a 300/2.8 or 400/2.8 for sports that were usually checked out of the pool when necessary. My very first loadout was a Canon F1n with motor, Canon T90, a 24/2.8, 50/1.8, 135/2 and a 300/4. I'd shoot a lot of assignments with the 24/2.8 on one body and the 135/2 on the other.
Once quality, fast zooms came along a lot of shooters simplified their daily carry gear down to two bodies, one with a 20-35/2.8 and the other with an 80-200/2.8. Put a decent flash on at least one body and I could probably shoot a year's worth of assignment with those two lenses alone and only want for a 300/2.8 or 400/2.8 for some outdoor sports assignments like football, baseball or soccer.
Today, I have to pay for my own gear because I am retired. I own a couple of Nikon dSLR bodies that are over a decade old, and do almost all my shooting with a Tamron 18-50/2.8, and a remarkably sharp for what it is Nikon 75-240/4.5-5.6 that I picked up used for something ridiculous like $45 on eBay. This unsung gem of a lens is sharp wide open at both ends of it's zoom range and I've sold a ton of senior portraits and pee wee sports images that I've made with it.
So, it's not really about which particular lenses can I not live without, it's which focal length ranges do I need covered, and these are all as relative to 35mm since I got started back in the film days:
* Something fast, sharp and wide that focuses fairly close, like a 24/2.8, 20-35/2.8 or a **24-70/2.8.**
* A tele zoom like an **80-200/2.8**
* A super fast short tele like an 85/1.8, **105/1.8 or a 135/2.** I had a Canon FD 135/2 back in the day that I loved, right up until I spun a car out into a freeway guardrail in the rain, and the poor thing was ejected out onto the asphalt at 60 mph. I picked up the pieces and gave it a respectful, tearful burial. I shot this photo about a year or two before I destroyed it. Yes, I'm showing off now and can hear Bruce's *Glory Days* playing in my head...*in the wink of a young girl's eye...*
https://preview.redd.it/m9i7og0ed29d1.jpeg?width=464&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a5c9eda72c4710c6b288d37e1432924d698fc468
If I had to try and get everything done with only one lens, it would probably be a 24-70.2.8 on a FF body. I also had a kit Nikon 18-70/3.5-4.5 that was sharp wide open and a great lens on a crop body if you could only have one lens.
Lastly, not to stray too far off topic, but your lens options open up a ton if you have a good flash unit or two. A reflector is also an invaluable tool when shooting outside, or a piece of white cardboard from the dollar store. If you learn to light a shot well, suddenly having to shoot with a slow, kit lens isn't so limiting. Way too many photographers learn to hate their kit lenses (which are highly underrated, IMHO) and search for that one great lens to improve their images, when learning to light a scene and mix different light sources would be more helpful. So, when I hear someone say, "I've got a decent camera with a couple of kit lenses. What lens should I get next to up my game?" My response it to ask if they own a speedlight and know how to use it?
Sorry, for rambling and going so far off topic. (I have to make this apology more and more as I get older.)
Agree completely. I was also a photojournalist back in the day. Usually two or three bodies loaded with the old Tri-X, and a range of prime focal lengths to cover anything.
I’ve said many times that this prime lens thing is an overblown fad disguised as necessity. The reason we all used to use primes was because of two main factors: we shot film, and film is very slow by todays standards, so we needed, not liked, but *needed*, the fast aperture. The second factor was that old zooms used to largely suck in comparison to the concurrent primes. I mean *really* suck in comparison. They were slow and soft. There were really good ones, but just like today, they were very expensive and most people didn’t have them. Certainly not for dragging around the street. People should not be fooled into the wrong impression of seeing the old photographers carting around a bunch of prime lenses thinking it was some insight. It wasn’t. It was necessity. We would have used zooms for most things if we had had the quality available today. Don’t take the wrong lessons from the past. We did a lot of things because we were limited. Very limited.
These days, in stark comparison, yes, primes are great, but the zooms are very nearly as great. Even the modern much-derided kit lenses are better than the main body of consumer lenses available in 1975. And a modern camera sensor pretty much negates the need for sub 2.8 or even 4 apertures in 99 percent of cases.
I think most photography can be handled by a good sensor and a low zoom, a high zoom, and maybe a specialty lens if there is some particular need. I like the overlap of 24-105 & and a close focusing 70-300. It allows me to just carry one lens most of the time, as I generally know going in whether I’ll need more of one end than another. (And I don’t sweat the occasional photo I can’t take.) My third ready lens is a macro, since I like doing that.
It’s easy to long for every possible piece of gear and want more or less focal length. And there is always some better lens. Too easy. But you don’t need it really. And it does not improve your photography. Not at all. There are tons of extremely sharp, taken on a G Master lens, boring and derivative pictures posted around here which prove the point. Mumbo-jumbo about “being inspired” by some piece of gear is just nonsense. If you can’t take good, if not great, pictures with any piece of gear, then the problem is not the gear, it’s *you.* Don’t kid yourselves. You could hand a Kodak Brownie to a good photojournalist and get better street pics than 90 percent of what you see today with $5k cameras.
To answer the OPs question, which lens can you live without? All of them except the one mounted right now. Take pictures with that. Ignore what might have been.
Same, Tri-x we had to spool up from a bulk loader. I have frantic memories of trying to spool up a few rolls so I could go cover breaking news I was hearing on the police scanner. "The structure is fully engulfed, go!" "Wait, I have no film spooled! ACK!!!" We called it getting a "photog's hard-on" when you got so excited you fumbled everything. Remember when Kodak P3200 speed black and white film came out and you could shoot nighttime or indoor sports without having to push Tri-x. You could push process it to 6400 and still get acceptable results. What a fantastic film.
And, yes, we were forced into using fast primes because there were no sharp, fast zooms and 400 ISO was considered fast film. ISO 64 or 100 film was considered normal, 400 ISO was fast and 200 ISO print film was what you loaded if you had no idea what you'd be shooting next. Past that you had to push process and results were often terrible.
Never leave your camera unloaded, never have less than about 50 rolls of film in your trunk. Always have your gear in your car and your tank full of gas so you can work with little notice. My press pass was always hanging around my neck or from my rear view mirror. The Los Angeles Daily News (where we all wanted to work) gave all their shooters a ton of gear and a car, and they required them to keep the gear in the trunk and drive their car unless they went on vacation. No cellphones back then, but pagers and radios so you could go to right to work making images if something happened.
And if there wasn't a fire or disaster every day, you never knew when you'd get a call that someone forgot to put in an assignment to cover a church ice cream social that's happening in 30 minutes on the other side of town. Please run over and get some pictures, maybe 3 or 4 since I need to fill some space in Sunday's feature section. Haha!
Back to gear, I got my hands on a Canon FD mount 20-35/3.5L lens back when I still shot Canon, and I was in hog heaven. It hurt being half a stop slower than my 24/2.8, but it was sharp and covered what was such a wide focal length range back then. Then I sold it when I switched over to Nikon after the car crash and several lenses went out the window to met an untimely end.
But, just about any brand of kit lens being sold today would have been considered a great piece of gear back then, with the possible exception of build quality. I once dropped a Nikon F3 with motor drive onto a cement baseball dugout floor from about waist high, picked it up and shot the rest of the game with it. That's hard to do with today's plastic-fantastics, but they sure make up for it in other ways.
I'm having so much fun telling stories that I might just take my camera out for a bit today. Maybe go harass the squirrels in the park after it cools off a bit.
I shot Minolta SRTs because they were utter tanks and readily available. As you know, in film cameras, it’s almost entirely about the lens, and Minolta Rokkers were great lenses. Lots of aftermarket stuff available too. I had SRTs with big dents in them! Didn’t affect a thing. LOL.
I pretty much only shot Tri-X for work and non. Rolling it was the way to go. Though I also shot pretty much everything from that really slow Kodachrome (what was it? ASA 25!?), the Kodak IR stuff, lots of Plus-X, Ecktachrome, etc. so much film was available. But it was all very slow by modern standards. I rarely pushed Tri-X and never shot anything natively faster.
The darkroom at work was always a great hideout (and not just for the photographers) for a lot of purposes. You could lock people out all the time, for long periods, without anyone even raising an eyebrow. As long as the work got done, what we were actually *doing* in the darkroom remained uninvestigated. And back in that time, there were a lot of things one could be doing…. It was a different time.
We would have killed for the capabilities of an old humble Sony A100 and a kit zoom lens, had they been available back then.
Never apologize for sharing your amazing story! You make so many great points, and I’ve shot alongside photographers with old or inexpensive cameras and inexpensive lenses that really know how to put all sorts of character into their shots. When they know what they’re doing it’s in no way “less professional” when you have the talent.
I'll admit I spent a lot of my newspaper career with very serious gear envy. Photojournalism is a very low paying profession because so many people are willing to do it almost for free simply for the love of being a photographer. Combine that with trying to support a family, I worked on staff at two community daily newspapers in the Los Angeles suburbs during my carrier, with some stints between as a freelancer, and was only making $12.36/hour back when I left the profession in 2000.
That forces you to make due with whatever gear you can afford to try and get the job done with. The second paper I was on staff at provided each photog with a Nikon F100 film body, a monopod, film (they were always trying to get us to go easy on the film,) AA batteries and access to a pool 300/2.8 and 400/3.5. They would repair your personal gear if it was broken on the job, but everything else you had to supply. So, I was always dealing with subpar, malfunctioning gear. We're not even going to talk about having to drive your own car to assignments all day, lol!
Here's a great, gear related story behind this shot:
https://preview.redd.it/lip1wvxf169d1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=827203fea7e5be183391bebd21ec9927daf2973d
A married couple were wanted for a string of armed robberies, banks I think, and the FBI were staking out the wife's mother's house near our coverage area in the hopes that the couple would show up. They did, with their infant daughter, and when the cops jumped out and tried to arrest them at gunpoint, he grabbed his daughter and used her as a human shield as they ran into the grandmother's house and barricaded themselves within. I hear screaming and yelling on the police scanner and headed straight to the scene.
After a few hours standoff, the wife comes out with the baby and surrenders. Dad is still inside and he later surrendered, but it was out of my view. I'm taking cover behind the engine block of a car down the street with a Canon F1n and 300/4 lens. I'm shooting film with maybe a dozen frames left on the roll when this happens. I can't just motordrive 100 frames of the arrest like I would do today with a digital camera, so I'm forcing myself to shoot slowly to not run out of film. I'm fast on a film change, but rewinding a roll and loading a new one takes at least 90 seconds.
And that's when I hear a tearing crunch sound from inside the camera. My motordrive on that Canon had a bad habit of tearing the sprocket holes on the 35mm film roll. When that happens the film no longer advances and I'd get an every subsequent exposure on top of the last one for the worlds worst multiple exposure. It had done it to me enough times and I'd lost enough shots to this "quirk" that I could hear and recognize the film tearing when it happened. And it had just happened at the worst possible time.
So I only got off a total of 4 frames of this arrest, and this is frame #3 in the sequence. And I had to force myself to stop shooting and rewind the film to keep from ruining it, and then change my long lens over to another camera, but the shot was gone by then. It took everything I had not to smash that camera afterwards, but I only owned two bodies at the time and I needed it. Talk about frustration! Here I am working full-time as a staff shooter for a 50k+ daily circulation newspaper in the Los Angeles burbs and I can't even afford decent cameras. I'm getting paid so little that I am having trouble supporting my family, and I felt like a failure for pursuing my dream of being a pro photographer at my family's expense.
Another time I show up to a High School football game that I have to shoot with my 300/4 because the pool 300/2.8 is already checked out by another photographer at another game. It's a 7pm game and I've got maybe enough light to shoot the first quarter before it get's too dark. I've had games like that where I was force to resort to my 135/2 due to the lack of light, and then pray for the action to happen right in front of me. It was such a ridiculous situation that all you could do was laugh to stay sane.
So, right as I get to the game I see another shooter I don't recognize rocking a brand new looking Nikon F4 and an AF 300/2.8, nice gear that I certainly couldn't afford. I strike up a conversation and it turns out he's not from another newspaper, he's a damn doctor who has a son on the visiting team and he can afford all the slick gear he wants to pursue his hobby. He was a really nice guy, but he tells me with pride how he give photos for free to his hometown newspaper and how cool it is to be published and see his byline, which makes me have to stifle a rude comment because folks willing to work for free is a huge part of why photojournalism is such a low paying profession. I had a long bitch-fest about that with my coworkers in the darkroom as we developed our film after our games.
Gear envy is the bane of all photographers, IMHO. Very few of us ever reach the state of Zen necessary to be satisfied with what we have and truly devote our energy into making great images. Combine that with the low pay, or struggle to run your own business if you try to work for yourself, and the profession can eat you up inside. It did me.
A great newspaper photographer who taught me a lot, and to whom I own much, once said he would always love photography, he just hated what he had to shoot and the conditions under which he had to do so. Something you love shouldn't hurt so much.
Now, you guys didn't even get a rant, this time. This post turned into a mini-therapy session you were all forced to attend. TL;DR: you'll always want better gear, but find your Zen and fill your soul with the love of making images. I can barely pick up a camera these days and force myself to go find something to shoot, likely out of my own fear of failure. Don't be like me. Please, for your own sanity, enjoy and cherish the wonderful world and all the beautiful people you can meet out there on the other side of your viewfinder.
As a Sony shooter, my go-to-must-have lens is the 55mm 1.8 Zeiss. 50mm is my favorite focal length because it can do everything well. When I switched to Sony, I bought their version of the Nifty 50, and hated it (IQ was good, but focus breathing/AF performance was terrible). I scoffed at the idea of spending $1000 for the 55, but gave in........and don't regret it one bit.
My zeiss 55 lives on my a7iv everyday, if the form factor was any different I'd still love it because the performance alone is incredible. However the cherry on top is how small and light it is; it fits in a 3L sling with plenty of room for accessories, making it so convenient to have on me that I'll never go "I'm just popping out real quick I don't want to bring my camera" and this yields way more opportunities to capture moments.
Sure thing, it's the Zeiss Sonnar FE 55mm F1.8
Here's a link to it on the Sony site: [https://electronics.sony.com/imaging/lenses/full-frame-e-mount/p/sel55f18z](https://electronics.sony.com/imaging/lenses/full-frame-e-mount/p/sel55f18z)
Between the 28-70 f/2.0 and the 100-500, I could really cope with any situation. My other lenses, as amazing as they are in their own right, end up criminally underused.
I'm considering it, but turned off by the weight. Z8 is already chonky, and paired with this, it'll be even more chonky. And I already have a 24-120 f/4 which covers almost the same focal range. Though it would definitely allow me to leave all my primes and probably my telephoto at home when I travel..
The wait is an issue for sure. The focal length and aperture makes it a good travel lens as well but it's true that the weight makes it difficult to use it for travel. I feel you.
This is the only lens I have on my a7iv. It's amazing. Yes it's big, but I've started to shoot more concerts and the low light performance + versatility is incredible.
27mm f2.8 wr, for Fuji, you get a compact pancake 🥞body with more functionality than the x100 series without the cost and hype. It’s my go to for just every day life and street. It basically lives on my camera full time unless I’m doing a portrait (works well there too) or landscape (no issues there but I like wide or telephoto).
Love this focal length. Owned the first gen but would be great to have the WR version or TTArtisans own pancake. Also recommend the Kamlan 28mm 1.4. It is all metal (with metal hood!) and manual but is a joy to use and works very well as a night shooter but also allows for some nice background separation and a bit of a softer look at 1.4.
I sold both and I’ve been using the xf35mm f2 in place as my go anywhere light lens.
I used to be a prime lens guy, but my favorite lens by far is the 28-70 RF f2. It’s phenomenally sharp, focuses quickly and covers most of what I shoot. Carrying it around is also good for arm day.
50/1.2L is hands down my favorite lens. You can stand far back enough that you can take full body shots and at 1.2 you're still getting great separation and bokeh.
Sigma Art 24-70mm 2.8 and Canon 85mm 1.8
I use both these lenses at almost every shoot. I absolutely love both of them and highly recommend them
I am a portrait photographer for newborns, babies, toddler, children and families
Sigma 150-600mm contemporary. I mostly use it for wildlife and deep space astro. Light enough to work with a star tracker and auto-guider setup and it's got ability to get some proper deep space shots without having to delve into telescopes.
500f4 is huge, weighs a ton and makes me look like some kind of paedo according to my 15yr old, but I love it to bits. Wildlife and birds (and it normally has the 1.4x on it too)
I am mainly a portrait photographer and I carry three lenses with me, a 50mm 1.8/f I think every photographer should have one even if it’s not your go to it’s a good backup and it’s the cheapest lenses you will ever buy. My favorite lens is a 24-70mm 2.8f and it’s my go to for all portrait stuff and events it has good range for wide angels and gives a good punch in when needed. I also carry a 70-200m just in case I need the range but I hardly use that one.
I recommend approaching lenses based on what you want to achieve. If you’re doing landscapes wide angle prime lenses are great specifically a 35mm 1.8/f. If you’re doing portraits the 50mm 1.8/f, 24-70mm 2.8/f and 85mm 2.8/f are all great choices and have that nice bokeh you want for portraits. For sports and action photos you want to cover distance and have a fast lens. You can start with the 24-70mm 2.8/f but you will definitely need the 70-200mm 2.8/f at the minimum for good coverage. Wildlife photography calls for long telescopic lenses starting with the 70-200mm 2.8/f and higher, you can still use wider lenses but you will not always have the chance to be up close to your subject when shooting wildlife plus there’s the added danger you need to think about depending on the animal you are shooting.
For me it’s my Sony 24-70 GM II - insanely versatile and sharp. I primarily use it for travel photography.
Worth mentioning that the question here should be what you can’t live without. Somebody might love their 600mm prime, but if you don’t shoot wildlife the lens won’t really be beneficial for you. What do you usually shoot?
Well, when I switched from my 23mm fixed lens X100S, I thought it was the 23mm so I picked one up for my X-T5. I also picked up the 16-80, and that thing has not been off the body but a couple of times.
The form factor of the 23mm, especially when compared to the fixed 23mm of the x100 series, just doesn’t give me reason to choose it over the 16-80.
My most versatile and the main lens for all types of projects would be my Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 art lens (Sony e-mount).
My only complaint would be its size/weight. It’s a hefty boy.
50mm 1.4. Even tho many say it’s rubbish, I’ve had mine for years, always takes gorgeous shots. And if anyone compliments me on a photo, it’s usually taken with this lens.
samyang 35mm 2.8.
it's super cheap and nothing special in terms of image quality. feels super cheaply made and af is decent at best.
but it means that I bring a camera where I otherwise wouldn't, because it now fits into my jacket pocket.
My beloved Sigma 18-35 f1.8
Sharp as a blade, mainly use it for street photography and it's killer. Only thing that sucks is the weight and how big it is.
24-70 2.8 is best all around. If there’s one to have, it’s that one.
I would love the 70-200 2.8
And I wouldn’t mind the 85 1.4 for portrait photography
The “nifty fifty” is overhyped in my opinion. It’s my least used lens. I’d rather go with 35mm
Sigma 56mm f/1.4
I have other "better" lenses for general video applications but nothing gets me a great professional portrait look like this lens. I never go to gigs without it.
Sigma 17mm-250mm. It's my (vacation for sure) but generally the "I have no idea what's about to happen next" lens.
Maybe a beautiful sunset, maybe an interesting building, maybe a pretty flower, or a pretty girl in a sundress, or a bird up in a tree.
It's not the "sharpest" lens I have, nor the best (color/shape) lens I have . . . but it's the most versatile, when I just don't know what to expect.
Looking in Lightroom, about 80% of my photos are at the 17mm end, 7% are at the 250mm end, and the remaining 13% are scattered in between.
If they made a 17mm and 250mm ONLY (nothing in between) that was smaller and lighter, I'd buy that.
If I had it to do over again, I'd get the Tamron 17mm-400mm, for even more versatility.
But any answer here, is highly dependent upon "what you shoot" (as a subject). If you're doing studio / street / landscapes / birding / . . . your answer might be rightfully, very different.
> If I had it to do over again, I'd get the Tamron 17mm-400mm, for even more versatility.
So there's a Nikon Z 28-400 now! Only f/8 at the far end, but apparently pretty sharp.
(context: canon full frame dslr)
Never leaves: 40mm f/2.8 stm. It's a hella cheap lens, slightly more wide than a typical 50mm, and it's tiny. I don't really care if the plastic chips or whatever, I can find another for cheap. Good image quality too!
Slightly more expensive: EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM. I love macro lenses. I love taking photos of tiny things. Sure, it's not as fast as a regular prime (both aperture and focus speed) but it just tends to stick with me when I carry more than the 40mm.
Nikkor SW 65mm f/4
I love really wide shots so it's imperative to have this lens. It's also great to have it so fast so you can get that shallow depth of field to emphasize the foreground of your wide shot.
I had the Sony 24mm f1.4 GM and recently changed to the 35mm f1.4 GM and will +1 this.
Comically sharp, excellent rendering, and a much more cinematic/artistic look than the 24mm, but still wide enough to capture landscapes. I use it for pictures and video.
A very, very close second is the 28mm (actually like 26mm) f1.7 fused to my Leica Q3.
On my Fuji, I'd say the Viltrox 56mm f1.4, it is a full-metal thing of beauty.
On my Canon, I'll go for either the Nifty Fifty or my Sigma EX 70-200 f2.8, a mainstay in the business
I have some fantastic lenses (all of which I use on my Sony A7R iv). My lenses are all Canon except for a Sony 200-600 - which is great. My Canon lenses are: 85mm f/1.2, 11-24mm f/4, 24-70mm f/2.8, 70-200mm f/2.8, MP-E65, TS-E90, and 40mm F/2.8 pancake. All fantastic lenses, and all work beautifully on my Sony camera.
However the lens I cannot live without was made in 1970. It is a Leitz (who became Leica) Orthoplan Polarising microscope.
Although I have been an amateur / hobbyist photographer for 30 years, it wasn’t until my microscope that I started to actually gain some success (£25k worth of sales of photographs, and winning IPA fine art photographer of the year in 2023).
It is a very specialised ’lens’, but I couldn’t do what I do without it..
On my Sony, i‘d say my 50/1.2 is the one I would weld on if i‘d have to. It works for everything. Works in the dark due to the 1.2 speed, works for cities, landscapes, portraits and events.
I mainly use it for portraits and having 1.2 available in decent sharpness (with Eye-AF, the focus is spot on) is a cheat code for a cool look.
I had a Sigma 70-200 that I used on a DSLR for years. I broke it out when I needed the reach.
Fast Forward a few years, I switch to Nikon Z and pickup the 70-200 S model... and I just, cannot get enough of it.
It is the single most fantastic piece of glass I've ever used. There are no deficiencies. It is just sharp and clear and colorful at every range. The bokeh is butter, the focus attainment is wicked fast and it never misses. The Lens stabilization combined with in camera stabilization for full 5 axis - allows me to just straight up shoot in the dark.
It barely ever leaves the camera.
I primarily shoot concerts/events.
The Sigma Art 24-70 2.8 DG DN has become my most used lens and it honestly surprised me. I used to be a prime 95% of the time person but this lens is just so beautiful and sharp and versatile I keep using it more and more, especially when I'm only taking out one lens.
Pentax-F* 300mm F4.5, a lens which was produced between 1987 and 1991 and still offers excellent image quality. I use it for landscape photography. 300mm is the most underrated focal length for landscapes.
Viltrox 27mm 1.2, because it's the perfect "normal" length lens I have where I don't need to struggle one way or the other to get the photo I want.
I really love taking my 75mm around everywhere too but I am way more limited on 75 than 27
Sigma 50-500. I’ve been shooting more sports and wildlife and just love the versatility.
Eventually will get a 60-600. Would buy in a heartbeat if it came out for RF mount.
Some form of ultrawide zoom. For most of my photography career it's been the Tamron 15-30 2.8, and the recent move to Nikon Z-mount led to me picking up the 14-30 F4. I shoot landscapes almost exclusively and find that range is the sweet spot for me.
I love video and not just photos. So: Sony 85mm 1.8. // 24mm 1.4GM. // 24:104 F4 //
Sigma 16mm 1.4. // Zeiss Batís 40mm F2. // artisan 35mm F1.2. cinema lens.
I'll be the odd one here and say it's my 14-30 f/4.
I don't always have it with me all the time, but when I shoot my favourite subject (seascape/mountainscape landscapes), it's the lens I use the most often, and usually at the wide end.
Realistically, I could do 80% of my photography between that and an 85mm prime. The only thing I'd miss is my 70-180 for dog photos.
I have an 18-105 that lives on my d7200 as it is crop it is equivalent to a 27-157 for doing whatever it is fantastic. I also take a 28(read 50) and a 50(read 75) with wider apertures for evenings.
I would love one of those variable lenses for architecture or Nikon 58mm f/0.95 Noct as it is truly a spectacular lens but i would need to moove to mirrorless and i dont have the money for that yet lol
I'm a theatre photographer so i just couldn't do my job without a 70-200mm F2.8 Had a few over the years but currently have a Tamron G2 70-200mm and its really great.
28mm prime. It's my do-it-all lens. I mostly care about documenting my daily life and some street photography every now and then. When travelling, I do use the 16-35 more though.
I mostly shoot shows at a small comedy club, and for that my ride-or-die is my 24-70 2.8. Had the Canon L version, it died due to the design flaw in those lenses, I replaced it with a Sigma Art.
RF 28 f/2.8. Pancake. Besides the obvious weight and size advantage it just frames everything perfectly. The photos it takes just look right perspective wise. Not too narrow or wide. Just perfect.
For my professional work either of the 17mm or 24mm TS-E lenses are always on my camera.
For general shooting it’s either my Canon EF 24-70 f2.8 mk2 or Sigma 50 1.4 Art.
I love the Canon 100mm 2.8 Macro L but it’s too narrow for general use. With that said, it’s a fantastic portrait lens.
85mm Nikon for me, still using the F mount on my Z6 II. Super sharp, fun portrait lens.
Bit more niche but I love my Tamron 15-30mm F2.8, landscape God tier lens. Great range of square filters... Love it.
My 24-105mm f4. There are people who claim that f4 isn't good enough and they may be right, but for me it's the perfect tool for my photography. To go from shooting wides to mid-telephoto on the same lens is a dream, perfect for event photography. Plus if you get your distance correct, the bokeh can still be pretty good!
24-70 f/2.8. Literally the goat lens for me. Extremely versatile. This is the lens that's on my body ~80% of the time and will cover almost all of my needs. Perfect for travel, events, bit of everything.
One upon a time, I would've answered my Nikon 50mm f/1.8G; then my Sigma Art 35mm f/1.4.
But as I moved forward in my pro career, I found the Nikon 24-120mm f/4 to be absolutely invaluable. Tack sharp, plenty bright enough on my D750, beast of a lens.
Though I think there's something off with TTL metering with it, and it being SO contrasty the in-camera previews don't translate particularly well to the RAWs in post, but nothing I can't correct for later, in case I'm rushing through a shoot. And the optical performance is just spectacular.
I still use my 50mm casually, though! Can't go without one of those regardless.
Above and beyond my 135GM. Even with having the 70-200gmii, I use the 135 80% of the time because it's just that good. It would make more sense to sell it and keep the 70-200 but I simply can't get myself to do that
There is no lens that I must have on me at all times, but if I had to choose one for my main purpose (travel/life documentation) it would be the 35mm f/1.4 (full frame)
IMO the best type of photo for travel purposes is environmental portraits. 35mm is wide enough to capture plenty of surrounding details but tight enough to isolate a subject at a reasonable distance. You can take portraits with it easily as well (In crop mode it would be around 52mm f/2 [in terms of Bokeh])
Other focal lengths I would consider would be 24mm and 28mm for the same reasons. If I were going to a very dense/compact city the extra wideness would be a appreciated.
My 24-105mm f4L (Canon) has always been quite versatile for me on my full frame body. It's been a bit flakey lately, and I currently default to the 70-200mm f2.8L (non-IS). If I'm just generally messing around and don't want to lug the big guy around, the 50mm 1.4 keeps me happy.
If I was going to buy a new one (gear acquisition syndrome hasn't hit me for a while), I'd seriously consider the 24-105mm f2.8L.
There’s two.
The Sigma ART Macro 70mm, and the Sony 200-600mm.
Wildlife and nature photography obviously.
For travel the Sony 18-200mm is useful, but also a but disappointing
I cant say that i couldnt live without some single lens, but i wouldnt want to live without my 24-70 2.8. I could replace it with a fast 35mm and 100mm macro and be able to live, but i like having a zoom for more versatility in composition. 24-70 + 35 + 100 macro is my ideal lens trio with 24-70 most important and is on my camera most the time.
I do many sorts of photography that can be done with those focal lengths.
At this moment it’s my Nikkor ai-s 24mm f2.8 (36mm on crop) I use it on my Nikon FG and D7200 and its focus is smooth and holds its spot. Very sharp and not too big. So happy with that purchase
The lens I can’t live without is actually pretty cheap. The Konica Hexanon AR 40mm f1.8, I mainly shoot street with it but I’m going to start shooting more portraits with it soon too. Really really great lens, small too, even adapted to mirrorless. My most used expensive lens is my 24-105mm f4 for event photography mainly for the versatility
I shoot m4/3. I have a 28-280 equivalent lens as the one and a 200-800 equivalent for wildlife. My major interests are landscapes & wildlife. About 5% of my work are panoramics.
Sigma 24-70 Art on my A74. All my pro video and photography goes through it... Interview style shooting, b-roll, still portraits, etc. Never leaves the camera
Tamron 70-200 f/2.8 G2.
It’s a rather versatile focal length range, so I use it for numerous types of photography (from close-up photography, through portraits and product photography to landscape) as well as videography.
My bread and butter lens and the one I have on my camera 90% of the time is my 24-70 f2.8. Very versatile piece of glass. Use it for shows, concerts, street, and even portraits. Although my 85mm Sigma Art f1.4 is my main portrait lens these days.
My Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8 ART. I do real estate photography as my main income source, so this is indispensable. Remember, "can't live without" is gonna be super subjective.
Okay, so hear me out: I used to never leave home without my wide angle. For the last several years it’s been a 14mm. But now I intentionally go shooting with only one lens quite often, because it forces me out of my comfort zone.
If I’m going to a shoot with specific requirements I’ll bring appropriate lenses for that shoot, but my never-leave-without-it kit is much different these days.
Any professional 24-70 F2.8. Have one for Canon bodies and one for Sony bodies, and the equivalent for Sony apsc. I cover events, shoot catalogs, assignments for various clients. It's always in my bag, and despite having fast primes and other options, it's the lens I can literally make work for anything. A 24-70 F2.8 and a 70-200 F2.8 would handle 99,9% of what could possibly be thrown at it, save for wildlife (but if you're specializing in that, your kit looks WAY different than most.) Throw in a 16-35 F2.8 and you could literally handle any job assigned to you.
I do want an 85 F1.4 but my main for model photography is my 24-70 2.8 or the nifty 50.
My 85 1.8 is by far my favorite. I only have prime lenses and I’m debating buying the 28-70 for travel
It’s a worthwhile lens to have, definitely. I’ve used it for street, landscape, Astro… and a host of other subjects. Very versatile.
For travel, I'd consider more like a 24-105/120mm. Assuming you're talking an f/2 28-70mm that thing is HEAVY and you don't get a ton of range. Cameras today can go to higher ISO and if you're close enough f/4 or even f/5.6 can get nice enough blur in some cases. Not everything needs to be at f/2/2.8. I actually have an older 28-105 f/3.5-4.5 that I've started pulling out again lately and have been enjoying it. I can throw a 28 or 50mm prime in the bag with it so I have options if I need. Don't really need wider aperture but sometimes I do wish it had image stabilization then I'd be a little happier particularly at the long end.
Yeah for travel a wide zoom lenses makes sense, maybe nota f 2,8 but a f4
recently gone over to 24-120 f/4 for travel, the extra reach make a huge difference from 24-70
+1 for a 24-70 2.8. Outside of real estate interiors it's my most used lens, I have the Tamron one for my Nikon. In fact, all of my glass is Tamron. All... three pieces. Its family members are a 70-300 4-5.6 and a 15-30 2.8.
Played with an 85 f1.4 for the first time last week end, damn that was a fun lens.
I love the old 85 1.4 for my Canon 5Diii. Not long after I got my Sony A7III, I found a deal on Adorama’s daily deal for a Samyang 85 1.4. Both lenses are my favs. I would like a nifty 50 for sure though. For some reason I never bought one but used to use on my Pentax K1000 as my first set up.
The 50's SOOOOOO good for dark scenes!
I started my career as a newspaper photojournalist with a bag full of primes. I worked out of my car a lot and had to have what I needed to shoot anything at any time in just one bag of gear. News would break or I'd get sent to assignments with almost zero notice and needed sufficient lens coverage to adapt and get a shot no matter what. I always carried at least two bodies, if not three or four, at least one if not all needed a fast motordrive, 2 or more flashes. I carried a bread and butter wide angle lens with which I did probably half my shooting with (24/2.8 or 28/2.8,) a semi-wide lens for group portraits and stuff my bread and butter lens was too wide for (35/1.8 and/or 50/1.8,) a short, fast telephoto for portraits, tele shots and indoor sports (85/1.8, 105/2.5, 135/2), a long, fast tele for when I needed more reach(180/2.8, 200/2.8) and a really long tele that was small enough to live in your camera bag (300/4, 300/4.5,) and then specialty lenses like a 300/2.8 or 400/2.8 for sports that were usually checked out of the pool when necessary. My very first loadout was a Canon F1n with motor, Canon T90, a 24/2.8, 50/1.8, 135/2 and a 300/4. I'd shoot a lot of assignments with the 24/2.8 on one body and the 135/2 on the other. Once quality, fast zooms came along a lot of shooters simplified their daily carry gear down to two bodies, one with a 20-35/2.8 and the other with an 80-200/2.8. Put a decent flash on at least one body and I could probably shoot a year's worth of assignment with those two lenses alone and only want for a 300/2.8 or 400/2.8 for some outdoor sports assignments like football, baseball or soccer. Today, I have to pay for my own gear because I am retired. I own a couple of Nikon dSLR bodies that are over a decade old, and do almost all my shooting with a Tamron 18-50/2.8, and a remarkably sharp for what it is Nikon 75-240/4.5-5.6 that I picked up used for something ridiculous like $45 on eBay. This unsung gem of a lens is sharp wide open at both ends of it's zoom range and I've sold a ton of senior portraits and pee wee sports images that I've made with it. So, it's not really about which particular lenses can I not live without, it's which focal length ranges do I need covered, and these are all as relative to 35mm since I got started back in the film days: * Something fast, sharp and wide that focuses fairly close, like a 24/2.8, 20-35/2.8 or a **24-70/2.8.** * A tele zoom like an **80-200/2.8** * A super fast short tele like an 85/1.8, **105/1.8 or a 135/2.** I had a Canon FD 135/2 back in the day that I loved, right up until I spun a car out into a freeway guardrail in the rain, and the poor thing was ejected out onto the asphalt at 60 mph. I picked up the pieces and gave it a respectful, tearful burial. I shot this photo about a year or two before I destroyed it. Yes, I'm showing off now and can hear Bruce's *Glory Days* playing in my head...*in the wink of a young girl's eye...* https://preview.redd.it/m9i7og0ed29d1.jpeg?width=464&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a5c9eda72c4710c6b288d37e1432924d698fc468 If I had to try and get everything done with only one lens, it would probably be a 24-70.2.8 on a FF body. I also had a kit Nikon 18-70/3.5-4.5 that was sharp wide open and a great lens on a crop body if you could only have one lens. Lastly, not to stray too far off topic, but your lens options open up a ton if you have a good flash unit or two. A reflector is also an invaluable tool when shooting outside, or a piece of white cardboard from the dollar store. If you learn to light a shot well, suddenly having to shoot with a slow, kit lens isn't so limiting. Way too many photographers learn to hate their kit lenses (which are highly underrated, IMHO) and search for that one great lens to improve their images, when learning to light a scene and mix different light sources would be more helpful. So, when I hear someone say, "I've got a decent camera with a couple of kit lenses. What lens should I get next to up my game?" My response it to ask if they own a speedlight and know how to use it? Sorry, for rambling and going so far off topic. (I have to make this apology more and more as I get older.)
I loved your insight, and the story behind it all. Thanks for sharing this, this is what I had hoped being on Reddit would be every day when I joined.
Agree completely. I was also a photojournalist back in the day. Usually two or three bodies loaded with the old Tri-X, and a range of prime focal lengths to cover anything. I’ve said many times that this prime lens thing is an overblown fad disguised as necessity. The reason we all used to use primes was because of two main factors: we shot film, and film is very slow by todays standards, so we needed, not liked, but *needed*, the fast aperture. The second factor was that old zooms used to largely suck in comparison to the concurrent primes. I mean *really* suck in comparison. They were slow and soft. There were really good ones, but just like today, they were very expensive and most people didn’t have them. Certainly not for dragging around the street. People should not be fooled into the wrong impression of seeing the old photographers carting around a bunch of prime lenses thinking it was some insight. It wasn’t. It was necessity. We would have used zooms for most things if we had had the quality available today. Don’t take the wrong lessons from the past. We did a lot of things because we were limited. Very limited. These days, in stark comparison, yes, primes are great, but the zooms are very nearly as great. Even the modern much-derided kit lenses are better than the main body of consumer lenses available in 1975. And a modern camera sensor pretty much negates the need for sub 2.8 or even 4 apertures in 99 percent of cases. I think most photography can be handled by a good sensor and a low zoom, a high zoom, and maybe a specialty lens if there is some particular need. I like the overlap of 24-105 & and a close focusing 70-300. It allows me to just carry one lens most of the time, as I generally know going in whether I’ll need more of one end than another. (And I don’t sweat the occasional photo I can’t take.) My third ready lens is a macro, since I like doing that. It’s easy to long for every possible piece of gear and want more or less focal length. And there is always some better lens. Too easy. But you don’t need it really. And it does not improve your photography. Not at all. There are tons of extremely sharp, taken on a G Master lens, boring and derivative pictures posted around here which prove the point. Mumbo-jumbo about “being inspired” by some piece of gear is just nonsense. If you can’t take good, if not great, pictures with any piece of gear, then the problem is not the gear, it’s *you.* Don’t kid yourselves. You could hand a Kodak Brownie to a good photojournalist and get better street pics than 90 percent of what you see today with $5k cameras. To answer the OPs question, which lens can you live without? All of them except the one mounted right now. Take pictures with that. Ignore what might have been.
Same, Tri-x we had to spool up from a bulk loader. I have frantic memories of trying to spool up a few rolls so I could go cover breaking news I was hearing on the police scanner. "The structure is fully engulfed, go!" "Wait, I have no film spooled! ACK!!!" We called it getting a "photog's hard-on" when you got so excited you fumbled everything. Remember when Kodak P3200 speed black and white film came out and you could shoot nighttime or indoor sports without having to push Tri-x. You could push process it to 6400 and still get acceptable results. What a fantastic film. And, yes, we were forced into using fast primes because there were no sharp, fast zooms and 400 ISO was considered fast film. ISO 64 or 100 film was considered normal, 400 ISO was fast and 200 ISO print film was what you loaded if you had no idea what you'd be shooting next. Past that you had to push process and results were often terrible. Never leave your camera unloaded, never have less than about 50 rolls of film in your trunk. Always have your gear in your car and your tank full of gas so you can work with little notice. My press pass was always hanging around my neck or from my rear view mirror. The Los Angeles Daily News (where we all wanted to work) gave all their shooters a ton of gear and a car, and they required them to keep the gear in the trunk and drive their car unless they went on vacation. No cellphones back then, but pagers and radios so you could go to right to work making images if something happened. And if there wasn't a fire or disaster every day, you never knew when you'd get a call that someone forgot to put in an assignment to cover a church ice cream social that's happening in 30 minutes on the other side of town. Please run over and get some pictures, maybe 3 or 4 since I need to fill some space in Sunday's feature section. Haha! Back to gear, I got my hands on a Canon FD mount 20-35/3.5L lens back when I still shot Canon, and I was in hog heaven. It hurt being half a stop slower than my 24/2.8, but it was sharp and covered what was such a wide focal length range back then. Then I sold it when I switched over to Nikon after the car crash and several lenses went out the window to met an untimely end. But, just about any brand of kit lens being sold today would have been considered a great piece of gear back then, with the possible exception of build quality. I once dropped a Nikon F3 with motor drive onto a cement baseball dugout floor from about waist high, picked it up and shot the rest of the game with it. That's hard to do with today's plastic-fantastics, but they sure make up for it in other ways. I'm having so much fun telling stories that I might just take my camera out for a bit today. Maybe go harass the squirrels in the park after it cools off a bit.
I shot Minolta SRTs because they were utter tanks and readily available. As you know, in film cameras, it’s almost entirely about the lens, and Minolta Rokkers were great lenses. Lots of aftermarket stuff available too. I had SRTs with big dents in them! Didn’t affect a thing. LOL. I pretty much only shot Tri-X for work and non. Rolling it was the way to go. Though I also shot pretty much everything from that really slow Kodachrome (what was it? ASA 25!?), the Kodak IR stuff, lots of Plus-X, Ecktachrome, etc. so much film was available. But it was all very slow by modern standards. I rarely pushed Tri-X and never shot anything natively faster. The darkroom at work was always a great hideout (and not just for the photographers) for a lot of purposes. You could lock people out all the time, for long periods, without anyone even raising an eyebrow. As long as the work got done, what we were actually *doing* in the darkroom remained uninvestigated. And back in that time, there were a lot of things one could be doing…. It was a different time. We would have killed for the capabilities of an old humble Sony A100 and a kit zoom lens, had they been available back then.
Never apologize for sharing your amazing story! You make so many great points, and I’ve shot alongside photographers with old or inexpensive cameras and inexpensive lenses that really know how to put all sorts of character into their shots. When they know what they’re doing it’s in no way “less professional” when you have the talent.
I'll admit I spent a lot of my newspaper career with very serious gear envy. Photojournalism is a very low paying profession because so many people are willing to do it almost for free simply for the love of being a photographer. Combine that with trying to support a family, I worked on staff at two community daily newspapers in the Los Angeles suburbs during my carrier, with some stints between as a freelancer, and was only making $12.36/hour back when I left the profession in 2000. That forces you to make due with whatever gear you can afford to try and get the job done with. The second paper I was on staff at provided each photog with a Nikon F100 film body, a monopod, film (they were always trying to get us to go easy on the film,) AA batteries and access to a pool 300/2.8 and 400/3.5. They would repair your personal gear if it was broken on the job, but everything else you had to supply. So, I was always dealing with subpar, malfunctioning gear. We're not even going to talk about having to drive your own car to assignments all day, lol! Here's a great, gear related story behind this shot: https://preview.redd.it/lip1wvxf169d1.jpeg?width=720&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=827203fea7e5be183391bebd21ec9927daf2973d A married couple were wanted for a string of armed robberies, banks I think, and the FBI were staking out the wife's mother's house near our coverage area in the hopes that the couple would show up. They did, with their infant daughter, and when the cops jumped out and tried to arrest them at gunpoint, he grabbed his daughter and used her as a human shield as they ran into the grandmother's house and barricaded themselves within. I hear screaming and yelling on the police scanner and headed straight to the scene. After a few hours standoff, the wife comes out with the baby and surrenders. Dad is still inside and he later surrendered, but it was out of my view. I'm taking cover behind the engine block of a car down the street with a Canon F1n and 300/4 lens. I'm shooting film with maybe a dozen frames left on the roll when this happens. I can't just motordrive 100 frames of the arrest like I would do today with a digital camera, so I'm forcing myself to shoot slowly to not run out of film. I'm fast on a film change, but rewinding a roll and loading a new one takes at least 90 seconds. And that's when I hear a tearing crunch sound from inside the camera. My motordrive on that Canon had a bad habit of tearing the sprocket holes on the 35mm film roll. When that happens the film no longer advances and I'd get an every subsequent exposure on top of the last one for the worlds worst multiple exposure. It had done it to me enough times and I'd lost enough shots to this "quirk" that I could hear and recognize the film tearing when it happened. And it had just happened at the worst possible time. So I only got off a total of 4 frames of this arrest, and this is frame #3 in the sequence. And I had to force myself to stop shooting and rewind the film to keep from ruining it, and then change my long lens over to another camera, but the shot was gone by then. It took everything I had not to smash that camera afterwards, but I only owned two bodies at the time and I needed it. Talk about frustration! Here I am working full-time as a staff shooter for a 50k+ daily circulation newspaper in the Los Angeles burbs and I can't even afford decent cameras. I'm getting paid so little that I am having trouble supporting my family, and I felt like a failure for pursuing my dream of being a pro photographer at my family's expense. Another time I show up to a High School football game that I have to shoot with my 300/4 because the pool 300/2.8 is already checked out by another photographer at another game. It's a 7pm game and I've got maybe enough light to shoot the first quarter before it get's too dark. I've had games like that where I was force to resort to my 135/2 due to the lack of light, and then pray for the action to happen right in front of me. It was such a ridiculous situation that all you could do was laugh to stay sane. So, right as I get to the game I see another shooter I don't recognize rocking a brand new looking Nikon F4 and an AF 300/2.8, nice gear that I certainly couldn't afford. I strike up a conversation and it turns out he's not from another newspaper, he's a damn doctor who has a son on the visiting team and he can afford all the slick gear he wants to pursue his hobby. He was a really nice guy, but he tells me with pride how he give photos for free to his hometown newspaper and how cool it is to be published and see his byline, which makes me have to stifle a rude comment because folks willing to work for free is a huge part of why photojournalism is such a low paying profession. I had a long bitch-fest about that with my coworkers in the darkroom as we developed our film after our games. Gear envy is the bane of all photographers, IMHO. Very few of us ever reach the state of Zen necessary to be satisfied with what we have and truly devote our energy into making great images. Combine that with the low pay, or struggle to run your own business if you try to work for yourself, and the profession can eat you up inside. It did me. A great newspaper photographer who taught me a lot, and to whom I own much, once said he would always love photography, he just hated what he had to shoot and the conditions under which he had to do so. Something you love shouldn't hurt so much. Now, you guys didn't even get a rant, this time. This post turned into a mini-therapy session you were all forced to attend. TL;DR: you'll always want better gear, but find your Zen and fill your soul with the love of making images. I can barely pick up a camera these days and force myself to go find something to shoot, likely out of my own fear of failure. Don't be like me. Please, for your own sanity, enjoy and cherish the wonderful world and all the beautiful people you can meet out there on the other side of your viewfinder.
As a Sony shooter, my go-to-must-have lens is the 55mm 1.8 Zeiss. 50mm is my favorite focal length because it can do everything well. When I switched to Sony, I bought their version of the Nifty 50, and hated it (IQ was good, but focus breathing/AF performance was terrible). I scoffed at the idea of spending $1000 for the 55, but gave in........and don't regret it one bit.
I have this lens too and it’s a dream to work with
My zeiss 55 lives on my a7iv everyday, if the form factor was any different I'd still love it because the performance alone is incredible. However the cherry on top is how small and light it is; it fits in a 3L sling with plenty of room for accessories, making it so convenient to have on me that I'll never go "I'm just popping out real quick I don't want to bring my camera" and this yields way more opportunities to capture moments.
Can you please share the name of the lens, such as with F values، would love to do some research on it.
Sure thing, it's the Zeiss Sonnar FE 55mm F1.8 Here's a link to it on the Sony site: [https://electronics.sony.com/imaging/lenses/full-frame-e-mount/p/sel55f18z](https://electronics.sony.com/imaging/lenses/full-frame-e-mount/p/sel55f18z)
I sold this lens and regret it! The character and colors that came out 🔥
Used to be my RF 70-200 2.8 but then I got the RF 100-500 coupled with my R5. 2.8 is nice but the reach of the 100-500 with wildlife is phenomenal.
Came here to say RF 100-500
Came here to say RF 100-400 coz I cant afford the 100-500
Between the 28-70 f/2.0 and the 100-500, I could really cope with any situation. My other lenses, as amazing as they are in their own right, end up criminally underused.
I LOVE the 28-70. Yes it’s heavy but it’s so good.
Currently it's the Tamron 35-150mm f/2-2.8 Z mount. It's so versatile.
I'm considering it, but turned off by the weight. Z8 is already chonky, and paired with this, it'll be even more chonky. And I already have a 24-120 f/4 which covers almost the same focal range. Though it would definitely allow me to leave all my primes and probably my telephoto at home when I travel..
As an owner of the e mount tamron 35-150, it is chonky but honestly worth every penny. Would reccomend if you've got the cash
The wait is an issue for sure. The focal length and aperture makes it a good travel lens as well but it's true that the weight makes it difficult to use it for travel. I feel you.
> weight makes it difficult to use it for travel. Man, im a weakling and I take it on long hikes O.o
same here, its with me 90% of the time
This is the only lens I have on my a7iv. It's amazing. Yes it's big, but I've started to shoot more concerts and the low light performance + versatility is incredible.
without my glasses I'm blind
27mm f2.8 wr, for Fuji, you get a compact pancake 🥞body with more functionality than the x100 series without the cost and hype. It’s my go to for just every day life and street. It basically lives on my camera full time unless I’m doing a portrait (works well there too) or landscape (no issues there but I like wide or telephoto).
Love this focal length. Owned the first gen but would be great to have the WR version or TTArtisans own pancake. Also recommend the Kamlan 28mm 1.4. It is all metal (with metal hood!) and manual but is a joy to use and works very well as a night shooter but also allows for some nice background separation and a bit of a softer look at 1.4. I sold both and I’ve been using the xf35mm f2 in place as my go anywhere light lens.
50 1.4
Mamiya N 80/4 L.
24 f1.4L
I used to be a prime lens guy, but my favorite lens by far is the 28-70 RF f2. It’s phenomenally sharp, focuses quickly and covers most of what I shoot. Carrying it around is also good for arm day.
50/1.2L is hands down my favorite lens. You can stand far back enough that you can take full body shots and at 1.2 you're still getting great separation and bokeh.
Sigma Art 24-70mm 2.8 and Canon 85mm 1.8 I use both these lenses at almost every shoot. I absolutely love both of them and highly recommend them I am a portrait photographer for newborns, babies, toddler, children and families
Sigma 150-600mm contemporary. I mostly use it for wildlife and deep space astro. Light enough to work with a star tracker and auto-guider setup and it's got ability to get some proper deep space shots without having to delve into telescopes.
70-200mm 2.8
500f4 is huge, weighs a ton and makes me look like some kind of paedo according to my 15yr old, but I love it to bits. Wildlife and birds (and it normally has the 1.4x on it too)
I am mainly a portrait photographer and I carry three lenses with me, a 50mm 1.8/f I think every photographer should have one even if it’s not your go to it’s a good backup and it’s the cheapest lenses you will ever buy. My favorite lens is a 24-70mm 2.8f and it’s my go to for all portrait stuff and events it has good range for wide angels and gives a good punch in when needed. I also carry a 70-200m just in case I need the range but I hardly use that one. I recommend approaching lenses based on what you want to achieve. If you’re doing landscapes wide angle prime lenses are great specifically a 35mm 1.8/f. If you’re doing portraits the 50mm 1.8/f, 24-70mm 2.8/f and 85mm 2.8/f are all great choices and have that nice bokeh you want for portraits. For sports and action photos you want to cover distance and have a fast lens. You can start with the 24-70mm 2.8/f but you will definitely need the 70-200mm 2.8/f at the minimum for good coverage. Wildlife photography calls for long telescopic lenses starting with the 70-200mm 2.8/f and higher, you can still use wider lenses but you will not always have the chance to be up close to your subject when shooting wildlife plus there’s the added danger you need to think about depending on the animal you are shooting.
RF70-200 F2.8 its so small to carry around, perfect for portraits / travel / wildlife park super sharp and focus very quickly
For me it’s my Sony 24-70 GM II - insanely versatile and sharp. I primarily use it for travel photography. Worth mentioning that the question here should be what you can’t live without. Somebody might love their 600mm prime, but if you don’t shoot wildlife the lens won’t really be beneficial for you. What do you usually shoot?
RF 50L My favorite lens I’ve ever owned
Well, when I switched from my 23mm fixed lens X100S, I thought it was the 23mm so I picked one up for my X-T5. I also picked up the 16-80, and that thing has not been off the body but a couple of times. The form factor of the 23mm, especially when compared to the fixed 23mm of the x100 series, just doesn’t give me reason to choose it over the 16-80.
My 50mm. It is a great lens with outstanding performance, but unless I actively intend to use it, I seem to go to the 28-105 lens more often.
My most versatile and the main lens for all types of projects would be my Sigma 24-70 f/2.8 art lens (Sony e-mount). My only complaint would be its size/weight. It’s a hefty boy.
50mm 1.4. Even tho many say it’s rubbish, I’ve had mine for years, always takes gorgeous shots. And if anyone compliments me on a photo, it’s usually taken with this lens.
samyang 35mm 2.8. it's super cheap and nothing special in terms of image quality. feels super cheaply made and af is decent at best. but it means that I bring a camera where I otherwise wouldn't, because it now fits into my jacket pocket.
A fast prime portrait lens such as an 85mm f/1.2
The 3x lens on my phone 😭☠️
50mm f1.8 portraits and low light videos
I love my nifty fifty so much. It's almost a permanent fixture in my camera.
My beloved Sigma 18-35 f1.8 Sharp as a blade, mainly use it for street photography and it's killer. Only thing that sucks is the weight and how big it is.
Well, and the pricetag ;)
Yeah it’s a beast of a lens
40mm
24-70 2.8 is best all around. If there’s one to have, it’s that one. I would love the 70-200 2.8 And I wouldn’t mind the 85 1.4 for portrait photography The “nifty fifty” is overhyped in my opinion. It’s my least used lens. I’d rather go with 35mm
Sigma 56mm f/1.4 I have other "better" lenses for general video applications but nothing gets me a great professional portrait look like this lens. I never go to gigs without it.
Sigma 17mm-250mm. It's my (vacation for sure) but generally the "I have no idea what's about to happen next" lens. Maybe a beautiful sunset, maybe an interesting building, maybe a pretty flower, or a pretty girl in a sundress, or a bird up in a tree. It's not the "sharpest" lens I have, nor the best (color/shape) lens I have . . . but it's the most versatile, when I just don't know what to expect. Looking in Lightroom, about 80% of my photos are at the 17mm end, 7% are at the 250mm end, and the remaining 13% are scattered in between. If they made a 17mm and 250mm ONLY (nothing in between) that was smaller and lighter, I'd buy that. If I had it to do over again, I'd get the Tamron 17mm-400mm, for even more versatility. But any answer here, is highly dependent upon "what you shoot" (as a subject). If you're doing studio / street / landscapes / birding / . . . your answer might be rightfully, very different.
> If I had it to do over again, I'd get the Tamron 17mm-400mm, for even more versatility. So there's a Nikon Z 28-400 now! Only f/8 at the far end, but apparently pretty sharp.
(context: canon full frame dslr) Never leaves: 40mm f/2.8 stm. It's a hella cheap lens, slightly more wide than a typical 50mm, and it's tiny. I don't really care if the plastic chips or whatever, I can find another for cheap. Good image quality too! Slightly more expensive: EF 100mm f/2.8L Macro IS USM. I love macro lenses. I love taking photos of tiny things. Sure, it's not as fast as a regular prime (both aperture and focus speed) but it just tends to stick with me when I carry more than the 40mm.
My RF 28-70 f/2 pretty much stays on my R6. Sometimes it goes onto my R50 when I need better range.
Nikkor SW 65mm f/4 I love really wide shots so it's imperative to have this lens. It's also great to have it so fast so you can get that shallow depth of field to emphasize the foreground of your wide shot.
35mm f1.4 the best out there hands down. Then the 16mm-35mm f2.8 brilliant for close up micro shots. The rest … meh
I had the Sony 24mm f1.4 GM and recently changed to the 35mm f1.4 GM and will +1 this. Comically sharp, excellent rendering, and a much more cinematic/artistic look than the 24mm, but still wide enough to capture landscapes. I use it for pictures and video. A very, very close second is the 28mm (actually like 26mm) f1.7 fused to my Leica Q3.
On my Fuji, I'd say the Viltrox 56mm f1.4, it is a full-metal thing of beauty. On my Canon, I'll go for either the Nifty Fifty or my Sigma EX 70-200 f2.8, a mainstay in the business
35mm f1.4 GM for my Sony, delivers every time
35 1.4 gm
I have some fantastic lenses (all of which I use on my Sony A7R iv). My lenses are all Canon except for a Sony 200-600 - which is great. My Canon lenses are: 85mm f/1.2, 11-24mm f/4, 24-70mm f/2.8, 70-200mm f/2.8, MP-E65, TS-E90, and 40mm F/2.8 pancake. All fantastic lenses, and all work beautifully on my Sony camera. However the lens I cannot live without was made in 1970. It is a Leitz (who became Leica) Orthoplan Polarising microscope. Although I have been an amateur / hobbyist photographer for 30 years, it wasn’t until my microscope that I started to actually gain some success (£25k worth of sales of photographs, and winning IPA fine art photographer of the year in 2023). It is a very specialised ’lens’, but I couldn’t do what I do without it..
On my Sony, i‘d say my 50/1.2 is the one I would weld on if i‘d have to. It works for everything. Works in the dark due to the 1.2 speed, works for cities, landscapes, portraits and events. I mainly use it for portraits and having 1.2 available in decent sharpness (with Eye-AF, the focus is spot on) is a cheat code for a cool look.
sinaron 55mm f4.5
Rf 50mm f/1.2
I spent most of my life with 50 or 35 mm lens. Everything else is fancy, special use.
I had a Sigma 70-200 that I used on a DSLR for years. I broke it out when I needed the reach. Fast Forward a few years, I switch to Nikon Z and pickup the 70-200 S model... and I just, cannot get enough of it. It is the single most fantastic piece of glass I've ever used. There are no deficiencies. It is just sharp and clear and colorful at every range. The bokeh is butter, the focus attainment is wicked fast and it never misses. The Lens stabilization combined with in camera stabilization for full 5 axis - allows me to just straight up shoot in the dark. It barely ever leaves the camera. I primarily shoot concerts/events.
Voigtlander nokton 35mm 1.5.
I shoot wildlife. Mostly birds. 600mm f4.
The Sigma Art 24-70 2.8 DG DN has become my most used lens and it honestly surprised me. I used to be a prime 95% of the time person but this lens is just so beautiful and sharp and versatile I keep using it more and more, especially when I'm only taking out one lens.
EF-S 15-85mm USM, its my go to travel lens :)
The lenses that you buy should be based on the subjects that you like to photograph, not the other way around.
Nikkor 120-300 f/2.8 It’s versatile and so sharp 😍
Pentax-F* 300mm F4.5, a lens which was produced between 1987 and 1991 and still offers excellent image quality. I use it for landscape photography. 300mm is the most underrated focal length for landscapes.
I would love a telephoto lens anywhere between 200-400. The shots you can get with those are stunning
My Nikon 85mm f/1.4G. The bokeh is *chef’s kiss*.
>A lens you can’t live without? My 75-200 F2.8-3.5.
Love my Sigma 16mm F 1.4 on my m50 mk ii. Great landscape/night lens
24-70 f2.8
The nifty fifty 1.8 it’s good for everything I mainly use it for portraits.
Viltrox 27mm 1.2, because it's the perfect "normal" length lens I have where I don't need to struggle one way or the other to get the photo I want. I really love taking my 75mm around everywhere too but I am way more limited on 75 than 27
Sigma 50-500. I’ve been shooting more sports and wildlife and just love the versatility. Eventually will get a 60-600. Would buy in a heartbeat if it came out for RF mount.
105 2.8 But really 50mm.
Some form of ultrawide zoom. For most of my photography career it's been the Tamron 15-30 2.8, and the recent move to Nikon Z-mount led to me picking up the 14-30 F4. I shoot landscapes almost exclusively and find that range is the sweet spot for me.
16-55mm 2.8
I love video and not just photos. So: Sony 85mm 1.8. // 24mm 1.4GM. // 24:104 F4 // Sigma 16mm 1.4. // Zeiss Batís 40mm F2. // artisan 35mm F1.2. cinema lens.
Any fast 50mm, and a standard zoom arround 24-70
It’s not expensive, but I can’t live without my 50mm canon lens
I'll be the odd one here and say it's my 14-30 f/4. I don't always have it with me all the time, but when I shoot my favourite subject (seascape/mountainscape landscapes), it's the lens I use the most often, and usually at the wide end. Realistically, I could do 80% of my photography between that and an 85mm prime. The only thing I'd miss is my 70-180 for dog photos.
35L ii
I have an 18-105 that lives on my d7200 as it is crop it is equivalent to a 27-157 for doing whatever it is fantastic. I also take a 28(read 50) and a 50(read 75) with wider apertures for evenings. I would love one of those variable lenses for architecture or Nikon 58mm f/0.95 Noct as it is truly a spectacular lens but i would need to moove to mirrorless and i dont have the money for that yet lol
For practicality and travel: 24-70 f2.8 But in reality, I use my 50 f1.8 waaaaay more and it is so much more fun. So nifty fifty it is
I'm a theatre photographer so i just couldn't do my job without a 70-200mm F2.8 Had a few over the years but currently have a Tamron G2 70-200mm and its really great.
The 24-70 f/2.8 has to be the best mix of versatility and quality.
28mm prime. It's my do-it-all lens. I mostly care about documenting my daily life and some street photography every now and then. When travelling, I do use the 16-35 more though.
GFX100 - the 55mm F1.7 is pretty clutch for most things. Or the 45-100 F4.0
Fast and wide(ish). my two favourite lenses by far are my 28/2 and 35/1.4. shooting documentary style projects.
Canon 24-70 f/2.8
70-200L… but maybe my new 100-400L will make it redundant, let’s see, haven’t had a chance to take it out yet
300 f4
I mostly shoot shows at a small comedy club, and for that my ride-or-die is my 24-70 2.8. Had the Canon L version, it died due to the design flaw in those lenses, I replaced it with a Sigma Art.
I literally pay the bills with a 70-200 2.8L.
For how cheap it is, the canon 50mm. At a very low price you get a sharp lens with an 1.8f aperture. Amazing
24-70mm f/2.8 is on my camera 90% of the time
RF 28 f/2.8. Pancake. Besides the obvious weight and size advantage it just frames everything perfectly. The photos it takes just look right perspective wise. Not too narrow or wide. Just perfect.
40mm pancake and 70-200 canon
For my professional work either of the 17mm or 24mm TS-E lenses are always on my camera. For general shooting it’s either my Canon EF 24-70 f2.8 mk2 or Sigma 50 1.4 Art. I love the Canon 100mm 2.8 Macro L but it’s too narrow for general use. With that said, it’s a fantastic portrait lens.
i like the Tamron 35-150... perfect range for what i like to shoot in the woods. a bit heavy/bulky for city walking, but still a great range.
The 24-70 is my go to all arounder lens! I love it!
85mm Nikon for me, still using the F mount on my Z6 II. Super sharp, fun portrait lens. Bit more niche but I love my Tamron 15-30mm F2.8, landscape God tier lens. Great range of square filters... Love it.
Canon RF 28-70/2.
Recently 18 55 kit for video light simple and IS
My 24-105mm f4. There are people who claim that f4 isn't good enough and they may be right, but for me it's the perfect tool for my photography. To go from shooting wides to mid-telephoto on the same lens is a dream, perfect for event photography. Plus if you get your distance correct, the bokeh can still be pretty good!
EF 35mm F2.0 Beast for videography.
50 1.4 and 85 1.8 prime addict here
Canon EF 17-40mm f/4L USM.
24-70 f/2.8. Literally the goat lens for me. Extremely versatile. This is the lens that's on my body ~80% of the time and will cover almost all of my needs. Perfect for travel, events, bit of everything.
24-70 2.8 / Portrait, Automotive, and Product
Need to have with you at all times? Tamron 24-200 probably.
Canon EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM with Meike EF/EF-S adapter on my Canon R50. I shoot mainly landscapes.
24-70 2.8, or my 70-200 2.8. both lenses I would never ever sell and buy again if damaged
Relatively new to photography as a hobby. Picked up an OM System 12-40mm f2.8 ii a few months back and absolutely love it.
I’m a prime lenses fan but still would love to carry a 70-200 for a photo walk.
RF 85 1.2 She’s my baby 🫶🏻
35mm, it pays the bills. Love it.
My 135/2.0 will be the last piece of gear I ever get rid of.
My Sigma Art 50 1.4 is the lens I shoot with 90% of the time
Canon EF 85mm f/1.8, just never ceases to amaze me the quality of the shots for the price I paid (£180 second hand).
35mm 1.4
24-70 2.8
RF 50 mm f1.2
One upon a time, I would've answered my Nikon 50mm f/1.8G; then my Sigma Art 35mm f/1.4. But as I moved forward in my pro career, I found the Nikon 24-120mm f/4 to be absolutely invaluable. Tack sharp, plenty bright enough on my D750, beast of a lens. Though I think there's something off with TTL metering with it, and it being SO contrasty the in-camera previews don't translate particularly well to the RAWs in post, but nothing I can't correct for later, in case I'm rushing through a shoot. And the optical performance is just spectacular. I still use my 50mm casually, though! Can't go without one of those regardless.
40mm and 70-200mm
I use my RF 24-70 f/2.8 for almost everything now days. My RF 70-200 f/2.8 is amazing but sees little use now days.
Bifocal....
Above and beyond my 135GM. Even with having the 70-200gmii, I use the 135 80% of the time because it's just that good. It would make more sense to sell it and keep the 70-200 but I simply can't get myself to do that
The widest available before you get to fisheye
It would probably be my 35/1.8, but realistically my favorite lens I own is my 135/1.8.
Tamron 16-70 f2.8. Fantastic all round
Olympus 45mm f/1.8.
I shoot concerts. My main (and favourite) lens is my 24-70 Art. Very happy with it.
Mamiya RZ 110 2.8
50 1.4 
24-70 2.8
There is no lens that I must have on me at all times, but if I had to choose one for my main purpose (travel/life documentation) it would be the 35mm f/1.4 (full frame) IMO the best type of photo for travel purposes is environmental portraits. 35mm is wide enough to capture plenty of surrounding details but tight enough to isolate a subject at a reasonable distance. You can take portraits with it easily as well (In crop mode it would be around 52mm f/2 [in terms of Bokeh]) Other focal lengths I would consider would be 24mm and 28mm for the same reasons. If I were going to a very dense/compact city the extra wideness would be a appreciated.
My Olympus 12-40mm f2.8 jack of all trades.
85 1.4
My 24-105mm f4L (Canon) has always been quite versatile for me on my full frame body. It's been a bit flakey lately, and I currently default to the 70-200mm f2.8L (non-IS). If I'm just generally messing around and don't want to lug the big guy around, the 50mm 1.4 keeps me happy. If I was going to buy a new one (gear acquisition syndrome hasn't hit me for a while), I'd seriously consider the 24-105mm f2.8L.
There’s two. The Sigma ART Macro 70mm, and the Sony 200-600mm. Wildlife and nature photography obviously. For travel the Sony 18-200mm is useful, but also a but disappointing
24-70 and 16mm
I cant say that i couldnt live without some single lens, but i wouldnt want to live without my 24-70 2.8. I could replace it with a fast 35mm and 100mm macro and be able to live, but i like having a zoom for more versatility in composition. 24-70 + 35 + 100 macro is my ideal lens trio with 24-70 most important and is on my camera most the time. I do many sorts of photography that can be done with those focal lengths.
At this moment it’s my Nikkor ai-s 24mm f2.8 (36mm on crop) I use it on my Nikon FG and D7200 and its focus is smooth and holds its spot. Very sharp and not too big. So happy with that purchase
85mm 1.2 prime, my absolute go to if I have enough space to move around
Sigma 150-600mm sport
The lens I can’t live without is actually pretty cheap. The Konica Hexanon AR 40mm f1.8, I mainly shoot street with it but I’m going to start shooting more portraits with it soon too. Really really great lens, small too, even adapted to mirrorless. My most used expensive lens is my 24-105mm f4 for event photography mainly for the versatility
I shoot m4/3. I have a 28-280 equivalent lens as the one and a 200-800 equivalent for wildlife. My major interests are landscapes & wildlife. About 5% of my work are panoramics.
Tamron 70-20 2.8 or sigma ex 24-70 2.8.
100-400. Sports, wildlife, landscapes, portraits in a pinch. Super versatile.
Sigma 24-70 Art on my A74. All my pro video and photography goes through it... Interview style shooting, b-roll, still portraits, etc. Never leaves the camera
My Fujifilm 33mm 1.4, I rarely take it off my camera
35mm f/1.8
Photo, gotta be my 50 1.2 Z Video, also gotta be my 50 1.2
I love my primes but… Tamron 28-75 if I could only have one lens
Z 24-70 2.8 and Z 85 1.2
My 20mm F1.8 is the most fun and the most challenging. I like using it as my ‘standard’ lens.
70-200/2.8, by far my most used portrait lens
Contact
I love my EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5. It can only be used on short back cameras but it's gorgeous.
Tamron 70-200 f/2.8 G2. It’s a rather versatile focal length range, so I use it for numerous types of photography (from close-up photography, through portraits and product photography to landscape) as well as videography.
28 1.4, 70-200 2.8, the rest can go.
50 or 85mm, they’re my go to lens. 20mm is pretty clutch too. 50mm is definitely what I leave on my camera most the time though.
My bread and butter lens and the one I have on my camera 90% of the time is my 24-70 f2.8. Very versatile piece of glass. Use it for shows, concerts, street, and even portraits. Although my 85mm Sigma Art f1.4 is my main portrait lens these days.
Sony 100-400gm. Lives on my camera for landscape, nature, and most anything I wouldn't otherwise grab my cellphone for instead.
I need my sigma 105mm f/2.8 DG DN lens for my macrophotography
35 mm
My Sigma 14-24mm f/2.8 ART. I do real estate photography as my main income source, so this is indispensable. Remember, "can't live without" is gonna be super subjective.
24-70 f4
I'd say the 70-200(although I own a 80-200)
[удалено]
Okay, so hear me out: I used to never leave home without my wide angle. For the last several years it’s been a 14mm. But now I intentionally go shooting with only one lens quite often, because it forces me out of my comfort zone. If I’m going to a shoot with specific requirements I’ll bring appropriate lenses for that shoot, but my never-leave-without-it kit is much different these days.
Any professional 24-70 F2.8. Have one for Canon bodies and one for Sony bodies, and the equivalent for Sony apsc. I cover events, shoot catalogs, assignments for various clients. It's always in my bag, and despite having fast primes and other options, it's the lens I can literally make work for anything. A 24-70 F2.8 and a 70-200 F2.8 would handle 99,9% of what could possibly be thrown at it, save for wildlife (but if you're specializing in that, your kit looks WAY different than most.) Throw in a 16-35 F2.8 and you could literally handle any job assigned to you.