Gary’s Q&A

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Let’s get started with the first question. Andrew Reck asks, “When you were doing travel photography, what did your kit include? (what was your) Go to lens for urban or streetscape photos? Nikon, Canon, Sony, etc?”

When I began traveling, I purchased a Nikon D200. It was a crop sensor camera, which was fine, but I always had issues with how it performed in low light. I eventually upgraded to a Nikon D300s and waited for years for Nikon to upgrade their crop sensor line.

After years of waiting, I finally gave up and decided to switch platforms completely. I eventually purchased a Sony a7rii. It was a big switch not only going from Nikon to Sony but also from a crop sensor to a full-frame camera.

I never carried very many lenses with me. It just isn’t practical for doing travel photography. Lugging everything around got in the way of getting shots, and having to change lenses in the field caused problems as well.

I only used three lenses on a regular basis. A 50mm f/1.2 prime lens, which I have to admit I seldom used, a 16-35mm wide angle lens, and a 24-240mm super zoom lens.

Those lenses really were able to do pretty much everything save for wildlife photography. I had a 600mm lens that I used for wildlife, but I wouldn’t usually travel with that.

That being said, since I started the podcast, I haven’t taken my camera out of my bag.