Photography Travel Kit for River Cruise?

[Rebel54]

I have 4 prime lenses: 60mm macro, 50mm "nifty fifty", 40mm pancake lens, and the 28mm. Since I am using a crop sensor camera body, the 28mm is the one I use most for a walk around camera - especially on busy city streets. It is less intimidating to people in rural Africa as well. I also love the macro lens but tend to use it more often when shooting locally.

 

Looking forward to hearing how others respond to your question!

 

I recently switched from an Olympus E3 to the Canon so I'm building my lens inventory. I can't even remember what I have. Going to have to go look. I have a wonderful fisheye that I love for big buildings and landscapes. I just got a 10-step neutral density filter for some long exposure work I want to do in Prague and I keep a polarizing filter on my daily shooter lens.

[JVilleGal]

Used my iPhone 6, guess I don't know too much about photography and the pictures turned out fine :)

[bubbulz]

For Canon shooters, if you could take only ONE prime lens...what lens would it be?

 

Full frame or crop sensor? If the latter, you may want to take a look at the EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM 'pancake' lens. It gets excellent reviews and you can't beat the price! (And it's nice and small!)

[pbnjrockette]

For years I carried my Sony DSLR with several lens and have wonderful pictures from trips to Africa, Australia and other places. I did grow tired of carrying multiple lenses and changing them in dusty road conditions .... so after much research I purchased a much lighter Canon bridge camera with a 50xzoom and was pleasantly surprised that I could be tourist and photographer and pretty happy with my photos with considerable less hassle. When we headed to Macchu Picchi and the Galapagos I debated long and hard about bringing the DSLR and the lenses but eventually left them home. Fate was on my side for when I fell at Macchu Picchu and spent the rest of the trip in a sling I was still able to use my Canon--- would never have been able to lift and hold the heavier Sony with its long lens. And I have great pictures taken thru gritted teeth!!

 

Bridge camera and small pocket point and shoot travel with me everywhere now!

[Rebel54]

Full frame or crop sensor? If the latter, you may want to take a look at the EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM 'pancake' lens. It gets excellent reviews and you can't beat the price! (And it's nice and small!)

 

Full Frame

[Rebel54]

So I looked and this is what I have:

 

Sigma 50-500

Canon 70-300

Canon 50mm f1.4

Canon 8-15mm f1.4

Canon 28-135mm f1.3

 

The 28 is my on the camera all the time lens because it's the one I have both polarizing and the ND filter on.

 

Planning on bringing everything but the 50-500. It's just too big to drag all the way there and it won't fit in my carry on.

[Sapphire73]

This has been a great thread!

 

WRT OP's question - we did the Basel-Amsterdam cruise with the two small cameras mentioned above. I'd go with the 18-135, and I'd leave that on most if not all of the time. You may run into occasions where the 18 isn't wide enough but in those settings you're up so close that the picture would be distorted. And I find that with such a wide angle, you get too much sky and not enough landscape. So I wouldn't bring the 10-22. That said, I've never had such a wide-angle lens so maybe I'd love it...

 

WRT to the 70-300, I personally wouldn't bother with that either. If I wanted a closeup, I'd probably crop an image taken at 135. With a crisp DSLR shot, some cropping probably would be acceptable. There were only a few times that my 120mm zoom wasn't enough and in those cases, Chris' P&S was fine.

 

The 28 prime lens sounds handy for downsizing the camera and since it adds almost no bulk, go for it.

 

[Missed seeing this earlier]

Thanks for your input on this - reflecting both your experience cruising from Basel to Amsterdam and the goals of balancing the desire for good photos and traveling light. Currently thinking that I will take the 10-22 mm wide angle lens, the 28 mm prime, and a relatively compact zoom (18-135 or 18-200 or the Tamron PZD 18-270).

 

The 10-22 mm lens is invaluable for landscapes and I found it handy for my first attempts to photograph the Milky Way in Big Sur as well. Great lens - if landscapes are a priority. And Lightroom 5 is pretty good at minimizing the distortion. But I leave it home more often than not.

 

I appreciate your thoughts on the mirrorless cameras and follow up question for Bescotti as well. So much food for thought!

Edited October 27, 2015 by Sapphire73

[jpalbny]

It was great to get that firsthand info from Bescotti about the mirrorless system! I browsed that camera and lenses today... Some day I may make the switch, but I think I'll wait for the lenses to proliferate a little bit and come down in price (and maybe size)...

 

For 3-4 years, my Sigma 18-200 was the only lens I used. I still have it, but now the 18-250 is what's permanently on the camera. Between the extra zoom, and the optical stabilizer, it's a fair amount bigger, though, so the 18-200 is comparatively much easier to handle. If your choice is between 18-135 or 18-200, bring the 18-200 unless it's way bigger.

 

If the 10-22 is a lens that you use frequently then don't leave it behind on my account. I will tell you that with my 24-120 pocket camera, the times I wanted more zoom far outnumbered the times that I wanted a wider angle. My pocket camera has panoramic mode so if I want a real wide landscape shot, I just use that.

 

BTW, how do you like your Tamron lens? I have looked at that 18-270 lens for years, and wondered why no one else makes it. My FIL had a few of their lenses but I have never owned one. I think you have even more lenses than he did! :)

[Sapphire73]

For years I carried my Sony DSLR with several lens and have wonderful pictures from trips to Africa, Australia and other places. I did grow tired of carrying multiple lenses and changing them in dusty road conditions .... so after much research I purchased a much lighter Canon bridge camera with a 50xzoom and was pleasantly surprised that I could be tourist and photographer and pretty happy with my photos with considerable less hassle. When we headed to Macchu Picchi and the Galapagos I debated long and hard about bringing the DSLR and the lenses but eventually left them home. Fate was on my side for when I fell at Macchu Picchu and spent the rest of the trip in a sling I was still able to use my Canon--- would never have been able to lift and hold the heavier Sony with its long lens. And I have great pictures taken thru gritted teeth!!

 

Bridge camera and small pocket point and shoot travel with me everywhere now!

 

So sorry to hear that you fell at Machu Picchu! Glad your camera worked out well for you in spite of your injuries, and that it continues to serve you well.

[Sapphire73]

If your choice is between 18-135 or 18-200, bring the 18-200 unless it's way bigger.

 

...BTW, how do you like your Tamron lens? I have looked at that 18-270 lens for years, and wondered why no one else makes it. My FIL had a few of their lenses but I have never owned one. I think you have even more lenses than he did! :)

 

The 18-200 used to be my main travel lens but I have been leaving it home more often lately and using the 18-135 because it is lighter. The Tamron PZD 18-270mm comes in handy as long as one keeps in mind that it's a bit soft when fully extended. I had the earlier version and like the PZD version much more. It is the only non-Canon lens that I own, but one of my sons has several Tamron lenses for his Canon 60D.

 

When traveling somewhere that I may revisit (not a once in a lifetime experience), I sometimes purposely limit the lenses I take to focus my efforts on getting the most out of them. On a trip to Big Sur in January 2014, I took the 70-300mm and the 10-22mm. An unusual choice of lenses that worked out well. We were there for a family wedding and happened to see a couple of California condors on the day of the wedding. I didn't get any great photos of them, but good enough to see their tracking numbers and google them later.

Edited October 27, 2015 by Sapphire73

[SteveU]

My wife and I did Basel-Amsterdam in late September. I took my Canon 5DIII with the 24-105 and 70-200 lenses. For the most part it gave me everything I needed. The only time I used the 70-200 was when we were passing the castles in the Rhine gorge, otherwise it stayed in the safe in the cabin. My wife had a Canon SX60HS (which has the equivalent of 1200+ mm on the long end), so she was able to cover the few really long distance shots when we needed it.

If you really want to minimize what you are carrying, you might want to take just your 70D with the 18-135 for general use, and carry your SX60HS for the long zoom (and backup). You can always stitch together several shots into a panorama if you want a wide angle landscape. As for the faster prime, I was able to get some nice indoor cathedral shot at f4 and ISO 6400, and even did a few in-camera HDR shots with some interesting results. Since both of my lenses are f4, I don't think a one stop faster lens would have made a big difference.

Enjoy your cruise!