What Lens Do You Use The Most?

[Photo-John]

I just added a new Quick Poll to find out what lenses we use the most. I think I covered all the bases but if I missed something let me know. This poll will make the most sense for interchangeable lens camera users. But if you want to vote about your point-and-shoot lens, feel free.

What lens do you use the most?

For the past year, I've been using my Canon 18-200mm IS lens the most. It's light, compact, versatile, and the image quality has performed better than my expectations.

[Greg McCary]

Olympus 12-60mm 80% of the time or more. I think I am going to sell my 70-300mm, I almost never use it.

[CaraRose]

300mm f/4L IS

[EOSThree]

Probably my 28-70 f/2.8, if you would have asked this earlier this year it would have been my 24-105 f/4. I like the honesty of the 28-70 and the range of the 24-105. So for now, they are both in my bag.

[n8]

That's a toughy. I said my super zoom (18-200), but it hasn't touched my camera in weeks since getting my macro prime. I prefer my primes, but the super zoom is often best.

[PWhite214]

The Minolta 100-300MM stays on most of the time.

Phil

[Photo-John]

The Minolta 100-300MM stays on most of the time.

Wow - that's a long lens for most of the time! At least it would be in my world. Photo-Dad has a 70-200mm lens on his camera most of the time, though. So you're not alone. Are you a wildlife shooter> Because that lens would make sense then

[OldClicker]

According to Lightroom, in the last year it would be the Sony DT Zeiss 16-80mm f/3.5-4.5 by far. - Terry

EDIT - Would that be a standard zoom? - TF

[Photo-John]

Nice - using stats!

Yeah, I think a 16-80mm lens qualifies as a standard zoom on a crop-sensor camera.

[mjs1973]

The lens that is on my camera the most is the 170 - 500mm. It's mostly for wildlife, but it's great for isolating sections of landscapes too. My next most used lens would probably be the 35-210mm on the G9.

Kind of ironic that most expensive lens I own (24-70mm f/2.8L) is probably one of the least used in my kit. Still love it though.

[JETA]

I'm my Mark IV I use the 70-200mm f/2.8L IS and on my 5d mark II it's the 24-70 f/2.8L.

[Liz]

Since I purchased the Olympus 9-18 it's on my E-PL1 most of the time; however, it's probably a toss between this and the 14-42 which is more accommodating when I'm surprised by a photo op.

Liz

[Axle]

My 14-24mm 1:2.8G. Second most used, 50 1.4.

[JoshD]

Lately it seems like my 17-50 f/2.8.

My 50mm f/1.8 and 55-250 f/4.5 have hardly seen any action recently.

[Dylan8i]

70-200 2.8 usually (now that i have it) with the 1.7x tc

[ksbryan0]

The 100-400 f4-5.6 L is pretty much standard equipment on my 7D, and is my most used lens. I generally have the 24-70 f/2.8 L on my 5D2, but don't use it nearly as much.

[OldClicker]

If you use Lightroom (or Elements, Aperture, others???) and have just 'guessed', look and see what is really true. It's very easy:

Metadata>Date and pick OCT, Nov and DEC for 2009 and all of 2010.
Metadata>Lens and look at the numbers.

Was reality what you thought? Mine wasn't.

Terry

[Old Timer]

A year ago I would have said my 28-70 f2.8 Nikkor, but for the last year or so it has been the 24-120 VR Nikkor that has been my walk about and general use lens.

[Photo-John]

I did as you suggested, OldClicker. As I thought, my most-used lens was the Canon EF-S 18-200mm IS with 3899 photos - and that's without the throwaways. My second most-used lens is my Canon 70-200mm f/2.8L with 946 photos. Third place was the Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8 with 876 exposures. That one surprised me since that was a loaner lens. I do like the Nikon D3S a lot, though. And that 24-70mm f/2.8 is a wonderful lens.

[mjs1973]

I did as Terry suggested too and I was correct. I thought it was interesting that LR had some of my lenses listed twice. There were lenses listed as 170-500 and one as 170-500mm. These were both right next to each other in the list. There were also 2 listings for my 100mm macro lens. One simply said 100mm, the other said 100mm f/2.8. These two were not listed together so I had to add the two totals together.

[OldClicker]

I did as Terry suggested too and I was correct. I thought it was interesting that LR had some of my lenses listed twice. There were lenses listed as 170-500 and one as 170-500mm. These were both right next to each other in the list. There were also 2 listings for my 100mm macro lens. One simply said 100mm, the other said 100mm f/2.8. These two were not listed together so I had to add the two totals together.

I have seen lenses listed two ways also. The cuplrit I have found is that the name can change with LR version upgrades. - Terry

[SmartWombat]

I would say it's between the 24-70, 70-200, or 300mm on the Canon.
And on the micro four thirds, on the E-P1 the 14-42 and on the GH-1 the 45-200.

Now to check in Lightroom's metadata to see if I am right!

[Franglais]

My wide-angle to tele zooms:

1. Nikon 16-85
2. Nikon 18-200

This of course is on APS-C. The performance of the 16-85 is consistent at all focal lengths and apertures, I just use it without thinking. I use the 18-200 when I need more reach, but I'm careful to use it between f8 and f11 to get the best out of it.

[drg]

Going back to June of this year, out of ~15600 images, the highest number for a single type of lens is for the wide angle prime/zooms.

For wedding photos using the 'work' Nikons (two each D3 & D700) the only two lens used are 20-35mm f/2.8 and 24-70 f/2.8.

My 'personal' use has been focused (pun intended) on using wide angle primes of the 28mm & 35mm variety on my Canon bodies.

In fact the Canon 30d that I am using as my 'beater' camera has only had about two dozen images made with the 70-200mm f/4!

NOTE on Lightroom and lens reporting. A JPEG image imported into Lightroom or an image that was not properly passed back/forth to Adobe Photoshop may only report the focal lenght and not the model/f-max of the lens. Using an older version of Photoshop or Elements with the newest version of Lightromm can also introduce some changes to the EXIF data or another incompatibility for some reason. And vice versa apparently, even though this isn't well or fully documented yet(October 2010).

[EOSThree]

If you use Lightroom (or Elements, Aperture, others???) and have just 'guessed', look and see what is really true. It's very easy:

Metadata>Date and pick OCT, Nov and DEC for 2009 and all of 2010.
Metadata>Lens and look at the numbers.

Was reality what you thought? Mine wasn't.

Terry

Still my 28-70.