Europe - lens advice

[DionM]

Friend of mine is heading to Europe soon. Thankfully he listened to me when buying and has himself a 350D and a 17-40 F4L lens. That's it, however (oh, besides the rubbish kit lens).

He's travelling to europe soon and is keen to get another lens. Currently he is looking at the 70-200 F4 or the 24-105 F4 IS. I have the 70-200 and have travelled with the 17-40 and 70-200 combo and suits me okay, but I really think that maybe the 24-105 is a good idea as I doubt he'd need more than 100mm for landscape/cityscape type photos over there?

His main use back home is shots of his kids, just general photos (I know he has grumbled about 17-40 being a bit limiting for those shots - not enough zoom, but I tell him the 17-40 is a better investment than the 70-300 generic zoom he was looking at getting).

Suggestions - what focal lengths do you use for travel in Europe? He will be hitting Germany, Italy and Greece. I am imagining most of it will be wide angle type stuff anyway, with maybe the odd zoom on some feature of a building or city (in which case, is 100mm sufficient, or is 200mm better?).

[gstark]

Dion,

While I don 't know the lenses personally, I think I'm inclined to aggree with your thoughts, especially when you consider that if he gets the 70-200, while he'll gain that reach, he will also have a significant gap in the focal lengths available.

[MCWB]

Dion, my suggestion would be to go wider i.e. Canon 10-22 or 3rd party equivalent. When I was in Europe last year for 6 weeks I used the Sigma 12-24 more than any other lens (I also had the 24-120 VR and 70-200 VR). The only time I used the 70-200 VR was at the Belgian GP and for a few shots at a wedding; the 12-24 was my 'walkaround' lens whilst in Europe.

[robboh]

When I was in Thailand (and other places) I found that it depended a lot on the location and what I was shooting as to what f/l's were useful (well duh )

Obviously landscape stuff and general 'feel of the town' usually work best with wider-angle, but for a lot of the statues and architecture stuff, I often found I was using the long end of my 70-210 (film camera) and wishing that I had more length (id guess that now being on a dSLR with the crop factor that a 70-200 would be about right). The reason was that I quite often wanted to isolate smaller things or else couldnt get as close as id like to something, either due to crowds or obstacles.

[Sheila Smart]

We went to Paris last year and looking at my images, I realised that the lens I used the most was my 70-200 f/4L (which I sold recently to buy the 24-105 f/4 L IS). To date, I do not regret selling this superb lens as I found that I was rarely using it. One day I might buy the 2.8 version if I feel the need for this focal length.

Cheers
Sheila

[DionM]

Thanks for the varied opinions all.

Seems he has a decision to make.

[birddog114]

Perhaps looking for a series of lenses which specially built for Europe and North America
They're difference with the lenses, which are using in SEA and South America or South Africa.

[DionM]

Perhaps looking for a series of lenses which specially built for Europe and North America
They're difference with the lenses, which are using in SEA and South America or South Africa.

Heh ... I guess it was more just what is the type of scenes over there. Here in Oz is much different to o/s and old European towns in terms of layout, style etc.