It’s true, if you’re traveling, you typically don’t want to bring a lot of camera gear with you. That’s especially the case when you’re working with autofocus camera gear. Sometimes, two lenses are more than enough for most photographers. So if you’re jetset sooner or later, then here are some of our favorite lenses for travel photography tht do everything right.
This blog post is presented in partnership with LUMIX.
Table of Contents
How We Test and Choose the Best LUMIX Lenses for Travel Photography
- The Phoblographer’s various product round-up features are done in-house. Our philosophy is simple: you wouldn’t get a Wagyu beef steak review from a lifelong vegetarian. And you wouldn’t get photography advice from someone who doesn’t touch the product. We only recommend gear we’ve fully reviewed in these roundups.
- If you’re wondering why your favorite product didn’t make the cut, there’s a chance it’s on another list. If we haven’t reviewed it, we won’t recommend it. This method keeps our lists packed with industry-leading knowledge. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
- When we test lenses, we’ve got various things in mind. First off, we consider who might want to buy the lens and what they might do with it. With that in mind, we try to tackle at least three genres of photography with that lens in a variety of situations. If the lens has weather resistance, then we’ll test it accordingly with a weather-resistant camera. We also test the autofocus of the lens in continuous mode, single mode, with exposure preview effects, without those effects, and then with all the major image quality parameters. These days, no one really makes a bad lens — but some are far better than others.
- In this specific roundup, we’re basing our findings on the reviews that we’ve done. We’re choosing a favorite, but we’re also giving photographers a bunch of others that they might like, depending on how they shoot.
Our Choice Amongst the Best Lenses for Travel Photography: LUMIX 24-105mm f4
We’re giving the winner of this roundup to the LUMIX 24-105mm f4 as our favorite pick. Overall, it’s versatile with a consistent f4 aperture. When you pair it with the LUMIX S5 II, you’ll get some of the best image stabilization you can ask for. It’s also fairly small while being weather-resistant and exhibiting really nice image quality.
Tech Specs
These specs are taken from the Lensrentals listing.
Angle of View | 94° to 40° |
Aperture Blades | 9, Rounded |
Aspherical Elements | 2 |
Autofocus | Autofocus |
Brand | Panasonic |
Diameter | 3.1″ |
Extra Low-Dispersion Elements | 3 |
Filter Size | 67.0mm |
Focal Length | 20.0-60.0 |
Groups/Elements | 9/11 |
Hood Included | Yes |
Image Stabilization | No |
Item Type | Lens |
Length | 3.4″ |
Low Dispersion Elements | 3 |
Maximum Aperture | f/3.5 |
Maximum Magnification | 0.43x |
Mfr. Part Number | S-R2060 |
Minimum Aperture | 22.0 |
Minimum Focusing Distance | 0.5’ |
Mount | L Mount |
Weight | 0.8 lb. |
What We Think
In our review, we state:
What the Panasonic Lumix S 24-105mm f4 Macro OIS excels at…is the image quality.
Three Others That Might Be Your Favorite Lenses for Travel Photography
In this list of our favorite lenses for travel photography, we always take one good zome lens with us. But on the side, we also bring a solid prime lens. Bring one of these with you just in case you need to shoot in low light or want a shallow depth of field.
LUMIX 35mm f1.8
In our review, we state:
While this lens is plastic, LUMIX says it is dust and splash-resistant, as well as being rated for shooting 10 degrees below zero. I took this lens hiking in the snow to photograph ice caves and frozen waterfalls. The snow was falling hard enough to build up between the dials on the S5 body. But, I didn’t experience any issues with the lens shooting in the snowfall. I didn’t find any internal fogging or moisture. There was some slight dust on the camera sensor, which could possibly be attributed to swapping lenses.
LUMIX 50mm f1.8
In our review we state:
It can offer nice bokeh, beautiful color, and sharpness. It doesn’t have character per se, but it also doesn’t exhibit anything that folks these days would consider to be flaws.
LUMIX 18mm f1.8
In our review, we state:
The LUMIX 18mm f1.8 is in a pretty special place. It’s a small, lightweight lens with full weather resistance, and it focuses incredibly fast. Beyond that, it delivered images that I wouldn’t have imagined otherwise.
Using This Guide to Our Favorite Lenses for Travel Photography
If you’re considering purchasing anything from this list of our favorite lenses for travel photography, know the following:
- All the product images and sample photos in these roundups are shot by our staff. In fact, we don’t talk about products at length in roundups like this unless we’ve done full reviews of them. But you can surely know that we’ve done all the research ourselves.
- This list of the our favorite lenses for travel photography includes a lot of options for a variety of photographers. We didn’t necessarily feel the need for a longer portrait focal length because a few of the lenses are more than good enough for most needs when it comes to shooting that subject matter. But otherwise, we were focusing on small, lightweight, rugged, and high-performance.
- If you shoot portraits, consider the 50mm or 35mm.
- If you shoot landscapes, try out the 35mm or the 18mm.
- Truly, you could create a whole kit for your Panasonic full-frame camera by buying all these lenses and therefore being all set.
- All of our favorite lenses for travel photography are weather-resistant. In fact, LUMIX has built that feature into all their Lumix S lenses. It means that they’ll last that much longer because they’re so much more durable while being lightweight.
- All of these lenses work well with any L-mount camera.
Picking the Right One For You
If you’re still a bit confused as to the right lens for you, here are some questions to ask yourself
- What’s your budget?
- How will you use the product?
- What lighting situations are you in, and how will that affect what you’re doing? Our reviews hyperlinked in this article can help with that.
- Are you traveling a lot with it?
- Will you be using it in a situation that’s a bit rougher?
- Who else uses this product? How are they using it?
- What’s so appealing about this product that I can’t get from what I have already or something else?
- When will I really have time to use this product?
- Where will I bring this product?
- How will this product help bring me joy and joy in my photography?
These are just a few of the questions that we ask ourselves, but we think that you should ask yourself these for sure.